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“Do not stand idly by while your neighbor’s blood is shed.” (Leviticus 19:16)
This campaign, launched by the faith leaders and citizens who make up the Metro Industrial Areas Foundation (Metro IAF) network, is based on two simple premises:
- We can’t end the plague of gun violence in America until the manufacturers of guns make safety and responsible sales among their highest priorities.
- The companies that step up to lead in these areas will thrive. They’ll tap a growing demand for safety, and expand their market share among major public-sector gun buyers.
Citizens, law enforcement leaders, public officials and investors are working together to ask gun manufacturers to lead their industry by:
- Creating first-rate networks of dealers that meet high standards of security, record keeping and cooperation with law enforcement.
- Bringing child-proof, theft-proof guns to market – along with a variety of other gun safety technologies.
These and other changes can be made, starting right now, without jeopardizing in any way the ability of law-abiding Americans to buy and own firearms. The result will be fewer gun-related crimes on the streets of our cities, fewer mass shootings in our schools and public places, fewer accidental deaths and injuries caused by children and others with guns.
These common-sense changes might very well happen without us – eventually – because the interests of all parties are aligned in this direction. But “eventually” is not soon enough! We need urgency. Metro IAF and our allies are reaching out to leaders in every sector of American society and asking them to act now, rather than standing idly by while Americans’ blood is shed in everyday gun violence.
This mandate is ages old. Obeying it in a time of ever-increasing firepower will require a new approach, an unlikely assortment of allies, and a refusal to tolerate large-scale death and injury as the necessary price of liberty in America.