A Rally Around the Guns: Richmond Virginia
By: Kinley DuRant & Kenedey Ward
What to Know about the Rally
Is there a better way to make a statement than getting 22,000 like-minded people together on Capitol Hill to protest a change in legislation?
This is exactly what occurred this past Monday, January 20, 2020. The group of gun-rights activist came to make a statement against Governor Ralph Northam’s proposition to limit the right to bear arms in the state of Virginia. One of the elements that must be notes about this day is the fact that the rally occurred on Martin Luther King Junior day as a representation of peace and unity.
Due to recent debate surrounding the Second Amendment right via both media and politics, this protest sticks out for more than one reason. Both Democratic and Republican party supporters were present at the rally, demonstrating a controversial topic can have a peaceful option.
Here are some basic things you should know:
- 22,000 in attendance with only one arrest made and a large majority of attendees were armed
- Based on the numbers: it appears that much of the democratic conversation focused too much on violence potential of this protest via social media prior to the protest
- Holding the Rally on MLK Day was meant to send a message of peace
- The conversation surrounding the rally on social media was 55.7% positive
- Most negative comments were focused on the governor of Virginia
- Governor Northam using barricades in front of the capitol as a “safety barrier”
As seen in this graph, there was a big increase in the conversation surrounding the event on Monday:
Along with a variety of commentary and post from influences such as Tomi Lahren, where she notes the inclusivity in terms of the participants in the rally.
In the last Tweet, we see a variety of the commonly used hashtags that focus on the peacefulness of the rally as a whole, particularly given the number of guns at the event.
Twitter Update on the Rally
Based on the information that is mentioned on the conversation surrounding the event as well as the results of the rally, the overall impact demonstrated a positive display of protesting without incident; an idea practice of our First Amendment rights. The Republican conversation post-rally honed in on the level of stability and harmony that the gun-right activists brought to defend their 2nd Amendment Rights.
- All data was collected through an analyzation of the above keywords in the Social Media Listening Center on January 21, 2020 dating posts back the last 7 days.
