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Father of Parkland Victim Perfectly Shames the NRA After They Posted a 9/11 Tribute

Father of Parkland Victim Perfectly Shames the NRA After They Posted a 9/11 Tribute
Ed Rode/Getty Images for Politicon; Michael Brochstein/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Today is, of course, the 19th anniversary of the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, and the internet has been full of tributes from media figures, brands, politicians and everything in between.

This includes the National Rifle Association, which posted a tribute on Twitter. But to many, a 9/11 tribute from the NRA seemed more than a bit tone-deaf, given the violence with which the association is associated and at times even encourages.

Enter Fred Guttenberg, a parent of one of the children slain in the Parkland school shooting in 2018, who perfectly and bluntly highlighted the NRA's hypocrisy to widespread social media applause.


Quote-tweeting the NRA's tweet, which sought to honor first responders, law enforcement officers and members of the armed forces, Guttenberg pulled no punches in his take-down of the NRA.

Sarcastically stating that he agrees with the NRA's tweet, Guttenberg went on to call-out the organization and, implicitly, its leader Wayne LaPierre, calling their mission "terrorism."

"My brother was one of those heroes of this terror attack and he died in 2017 of cancer from 9/11. Sadly, because of the terrorism from the NRA, my daughter was murdered 4 months later as a result of gun violence."

Guttenberg's brother, Dr. Michael Guttenberg, worked at the site of the attacks providing medical treatment to victims and workers in the aftermath. He died of pancreatic cancer linked to airborne toxins at Ground Zero.

Far more widely known is Guttenberg's 14-year-old daughter, Jamie, who was murdered in the mass shooting at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida in February of 2018.

The loss of his daughter turned Guttenberg, along with many other parents and students from Douglas High School, into a gun-control activist. He has frequently focused his work directly upon the NRA and its leadership.

While the NRA was already well-known for its often ghoulishly blasé response to mass shootings, the Parkland massacre became something of a turning point toward infamy for the organization.

In the days following the massacre, commentators on its since-shuttered TV channel mocked surviving student activists as opportunists and liberal media darlings.

And the appearance of organization's former spokesperson, Dana Loesch, at a town hall held by CNN in the immediate aftermath was decried for the callous way Loesch spoke to the students and dodged the questions they asked. Loesch was also caught publicly lying about having been threatened at the event,

On Twitter, people applauded Guttenberg's plain-spoken take-down of the organization.






And the NRA's 9/11 tribute received a flood of indignant responses from people angered by the organization's hypocrisy.







The NRA is currently the subject of a lawsuit brought by the New York Attorney General following an 18-month investigation that uncovered massive financial fraud committed by the organization and its leadership, including CEO Wayne LaPierre. Should the New York AG prevail in court, it will result in the total dissolution of the NRA as we know it.