Page 187 - Information and American Democracy Technology in the Evolution of Political Power

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Political Organizations
help us send a Million Moms of our own, to let Congress know that these
women do not speak for all mothers!” 161
The structure of the Sisters group was similar to that of the Moms,
but it was unable to attract a comparable level of public support and
media attention. An important reason was the Sisters’ violence-tinged,
revenge-orientedmessage.Onephotoappearingattheirwebsitepictured
a well-dressed businesswoman with a phone in one hand and a rifle in the
other, with a caption that said: “Two shots to stop. One to make sure. Re-
load. Call 911.” 162 Another depicted a woman in casual attire pointing
a gun straight at the camera, with the words “As seen by a would-be
rapist (for about 0.2 seconds).” 163 These extreme images characterized
the group’s approach to organizing. The Sisters’ concept of armed self-
defense was doomed to failure as a broad counterpoint to the Moms’
message of keeping children safe.
The Million Mom March and AIMM countermarch on May 14, 2000,
unfolded as dueling events organized independently of traditional gun
control groups and reliant heavily on information infrastructure in place
of traditional organizational resources – more so initially than at the
climax of the campaign, in the case of the Moms. 164 The Moms’ march
was a standard large-scale Capitol Mall event, with an Interfaith Service
and a “children’s village” with face painting, juggling, storytelling,
and soccer clinics. It included a memorial wall listing the names of
4,001 Americans who had died of gunshot wounds between the shooting
spree at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, and the march;
voter registration tables; music; and speeches by a variety of public
figures hosted by Rosie O’Donnell: Martin Luther King III, Lieutenant
Governor of Maryland Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Kerry Kennedy
Cuomo, and Sarah and Jim Brady. Organizers claimed 750,000 partic-
ipants in Washington, and “tens of thousands” more at several dozen
local marches around the country. Although no disinterested measure-
ments of the size of the Washington crowd were made, it is reasonable
to assume that attendance was smaller than organizers’ estimate of
750,000 but still substantial. 165 A few blocks away, the AIMM event

161 Home Page, Second Amendment Sisters, Inc.
162 Levine, “Pro-Gun Women to Counter ‘Million Mom’ Message,” p. B1.
163
Home Page, Second Amendment Sisters, Inc., May 11, 2000, http://www.sas-aim.org.
164
Levine, “Many Moms’ Voices Are Heard on Mall”; Rosenfeld, “A Force of Nurture
Readies for Battle.”
165
TheParkPolicenolongerestimatetheattendanceateventsontheCapitolMall,sothe
organizers’estimatewastheonlyoneavailable.Otherestimatesoftheattendancewere
lower than those of the march organizers. Reports in the Washington Post estimated
170