Day: January 25, 2026

American gun rights groups, such as the NRA (National Rifle Association), have long argued that citizens need to be armed as a defense against government tyranny. The traditional narrative has been that “the left” would send agents of the state to “take your guns.” In recent years, right wing protestors and demonstrators have often made a point of being well-armed, sometimes looking like they were LARPing a Call of Duty game. White Americans have also enjoyed a right to use violence in “self-defense” against people of other colors, with the Kyle Rittenhouse case being a famous example.

As many pointed out on Facebook and other social media sites, the NRA and other gun rights groups remained silent when the Trump regime sent ICE to impose the president’s whims and act on his petty grievances. But the killing of Alex Pretti by ICE triggered a response.

While the evidence seems clear that Alex was executed by ICE agents, the Trump regime immediately claimed the ICE agents acted in self-defense. Obviously, no investigation had been conducted, and the Trump regime has blocked efforts of local law enforcement to investigate the shooting. Alex was legally carrying a gun, and Bill Essayli, the first assistant U.S. attorney for the Central District of California, said, “if you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you,” finishing with “Don’t do it.” This was a rhetorical mistake on his part, as it triggered an immediate response from gun activists as well as gun rights groups. A response from Gun Owners of America was that “federal agents are not ‘highly likely’ to be ‘legally justified’ in ‘shooting’ concealed carry licensees who approach while lawfully carrying a firearm. The Second Amendment protects Americans’ right to bear arms while protesting — a right the federal government must not infringe upon.” Essayli seems to have attempted to move the goal posts in the face of this criticism or, as his defenders would say, “clarified his remarks.” Gun rights activists do have grounds for concern and those on the right probably feel that they have been betrayed.

As noted above, people on the right often show up at protests and demonstrations well-armed. In states that allow open carry, people sometimes make a point of openly carrying their weapons. But there seems to have been a social contract that the police would leave armed whites alone, if they were not committing crimes.  But Alex, who was a white gun owner, was killed while doing nothing wrong and the narrative used against him was anti-gun rights. As such, Essayli’s statement would sound like a threat to people who believe in Second Amendment rights. So, the criticism of Essayli and these specific actions of ICE are consistent with the values and warnings expressed by the right leaning gun rights groups. That said, the Gun Owners’ of America also accused the left of “antagonizing” ICE agents. This could be seen as a gesture to the Trump regime to show their solidarity with the President and ICE’s actions. On this view, the condemnation of Essayli and “the left” can be seen as a warning for officials to adjust their rhetoric rather than a true condemnation of ICE’s unrestrained violence. After all, these groups did not issue statements about the killing of Renee Good and their condemnation has focused on the demonization of the gun and gun ownership rather than primarily on the killing. As such, the right leaning gun rights groups face a quandary here: they want to defend gun rights but also want to blame and condemn “the left.”

To be fair and balanced, some gun rights activists have condemned the killing and have noted that ICE presents a threat that crosses the left/right boundary in the United States. This is a reasonable view for although liberals tend to favor gun control and conservatives tend to favor gun rights, taking away or protecting gun rights is not a matter of left versus right. Rather, taking away or protecting rights is on the authoritarian axis of politics, and this can be left or right. Jokingly, I call authoritarians on the left “authoritarians in red” and those on the right “authoritarians in black.” While the right often aligns itself with authoritarian views in the United States, those who are truly in favor of gun rights and sincerely oppose government tyranny should oppose the tyranny being imposed by the Trump regime, especially the use of ICE. But there are presumably those who think that gun rights should depend on both a person’s color and their political views, such that law enforcement should leave the right and white alone, while they should be free to kill the left or non-white.

While the Trump regime has attempted to demonize Alex, he seems to have been a kind, caring person who worked as a registered nurse for the United States Department of Veteran’s Affairs. While the Trump regime is surely hoping his killing will intimidate people by sending the message that ICE will kill even people like Alex if they oppose the whims of Trump, it does run the risk of galvanizing Americans by making it clear that no one is safe from the Trump regime. It is a sad and terrible thing that he was killed, and the world is a worse place because of his absence.

My critical thinking class covers credibility, experiments and studies. As critical thinking is often seen as dull, I use real-world examples that might be marginally interesting to students. One is John Bohannon’s detailed account of how he “fooled millions into thinking chocolate helps weight loss.”

Bohannon’s con provides an excellent cautionary tale for critical thinkers. First, he shows how easy it is to rig an experiment to get “significant” results. As I point out to my students, a small experiment or study can easily generate results that seem significant. This is why it is important to have an adequate sample size. What is also needed is proper control, proper selection of the groups, and so on.

Second, he provides a clear example of a blight on academic publishing, namely “pay to publish” journals that lack peer review. While bad science does slip through peer review, these journals seem to publish almost anything, provided payment is made. Since the journals have reputable sounding names and most people do not know which journals are credible, it is easy to create a journal publication that seems credible. This is why I cover the importance of checking sources in my class.

Third, he detailed how news outlets published or posted the story without even perfunctory efforts to check its credibility. I cover the media in my class both from the standpoint of being a good journalist and being a critical consumer of news. I stress the importance of confirming credibility before accepting claims, especially when doing so is (supposed to be) one’s job.

While Bohannon’s con is evidence of problems with corrupt journals, uncritical reporting and consumer credulity, it raises other points worth considering. One is that while he might have “fooled millions” of people, he seems to have fooled relative few journalists (13 out of about 5,000 reporters who subscribe to the Newswise feed Bohannon used) and these seem to be more of the likes of the Huffington Post and Cosmopolitan as opposed to what might be seen as more serious health news sources. While I do not know why the other reporters did not run the story, it is worth considering that some did look at it critically. In any case, the fact that a few reporters fell for a dubious story is hardly shocking. It is, in fact, just what would be expected given the history of journalism.

Another point of concern is the ethics of engaging in such a con. It can be argued that Bohannon acted ethically. One way to do this is to note that using deceit to expose a problem can be justified on utilitarian grounds. For example, it seems morally acceptable for a journalist or police officer to use deceit and go undercover to expose harmful criminal activity. As such, Bohannon could contend that his con was effectively an undercover operation. He and his fellows pretended to be the bad guys to expose a problem and thus his deceit was morally justified.

One obvious objection is that Bohannon’s deceit did not just expose corrupt journals and incautious reporters. It also misinformed people. To be fair, any harm would be minimal. At worst, people who believed the story would consume dark chocolate and this is not a health hazard. Interestingly, as I am writing this, the view is that dark chocolate is beneficial. However, intentionally spreading such misinformation is morally problematic, especially since story retractions or corrections get far less attention than the original story.

One way to counter this objection is to draw an analogy to the exposure of flaws by “white hat” hackers. These hackers reveal vulnerabilities in software with the professed intent of forcing companies to address them. Exposing vulnerabilities can do some harm by informing the bad guys, but the usual argument is that this is outweighed by the good done when the vulnerability is fixed. Assuming it gets fixed.

While this does have some appeal, there is the concern that the harm might not outweigh the good. In Bohannon’s case it could be argued that he did more harm than good. After all, it was well-established that the “pay to publish” journals are corrupt, that there are incautious journalists and credulous consumers. As such, Bohannon did not expose anything new and merely added more misinformation to the pile.

It could be countered that although these problems are well known, it does help to continue to bring them to the attention of the public. Going back to the analogy of software vulnerabilities, it could be argued that if a vulnerability is exposed, but nothing is done to patch it, then the problem should be brought up until it is fixed, “for it is the doom of men that they forget.” Bohannon brought these problems into the spotlight and this might do more good than harm. If so, then this con would be morally acceptable—at least on utilitarian grounds.