The good news in Illinois is that we are the one state out of 50 with no provision for concealed carry, and that's a glaring fact that people are frustrated with. Starting with Otis MacDonald joining up with the ISRA to take Chicago to court, more and more in the black community are starting to complain about their lack of the ability to protect themselves. Two black Democrats from Chicago (so far) are pushing back on the anti-gun cabal. Most lower-middle class people in Chicago work for a living and don't like the situation. If we could get more of their opinions on this subject publicized there would be a shift. Sadly, Chicago has suffered from conservative flight from the city over the past 30 years.
The Black community in Chicago is a truly Kafkaesque environment.
The exact same people who [rightfully] don't trust or respect the police there, will in the same breath tell you that:
- They don't need a gun because the police they don't trust have a DUTY to protect them.
- That they support the gun laws (including the now defunct handgun ban).
- AND that they illegally own a handgun for self-defense.
It has no more relationship to reality than the end of the movie "Walker" where USMC helicopters rescue American mercenaries from 19th century Nicaragua.
It's like living in '90s Yugoslavia, a Hobbseian war of all against all with no good guys, devoid of rational thought, with people willing to harm themselves if they think they might get to harm somebody else in the process.
The system has been so corrupt and so racist for so long that nobody expects it to even make sense, much less work for the public good. At the same time, people brought up in that system are generally incapable of conceiving of anything different, and disbelieve you if you claim to live somewhere that isn't "Escape from L.A." in real life.
Tell a Black Chicagoan that you live some place where the police don't operate home invasion gangs, and not only can you own a handgun, but that you can carry one most places for self-defense, and he'll look at you like you've lost your mind.
In the land of madmen, the sane person is seen as crazy.