What do Britney Spears, the Unitarian-Universalist Church, the YWCA, Walter Cronkite, Tara Lipinski, Boys II Men, the New York Times and the St. Louis Cardinals have in common? No, they're not appearing together at some bizarre socio-political Lollapalooza event. They've all been identified by the NRA as being "anti-gun."

Yes, it's true. The NRA has a blacklist of "organizations have lent monetary, grassroots or some other type of direct support to anti-gun organizations" and celebrities and national figures "who have lent their name and notoriety to anti-gun causes, speaking out for anti-gun legislation and providing a voice for anti-gun organizations." Believe it or not, these are actual quotes from their website.

I first became aware of the NRA Blacklist through a column by Boston Globe columnist Ellen Goodman that was reprinted in the Hampshire Gazette. Ms. Goodman has been anti-gun all her life, and was appalled to find that her name wasn't on the NRA's list. Dustin Hoffman was apparently so aggravated that he had been overlooked that he wrote a letter to the NRA's president suggesting that he be included.

Dustin and Ellen may have been left off, but the list includes scores of organizations and individuals from a broad spectrum of contemporary American life. In fact, it reads like a "who's who," reflecting differing religious organizations, ideologies, ethnicities, music styles, fashion sensibilities, and corporate structures. It just goes to show how out of step the NRA is with America that it keeps an enemies list with groups as diverse as the United States Catholic Conference and American Jewish Congress, the League of Women Voters and the National Urban League, the American Association of Retired Persons and the Children's Defense Fund.

It also includes some of my favorite food groups, from Ben & Jerry's ice cream to Sara Lee cheesecake (gosh, is nothing sacred?).

Soon after the list was discovered, Jim and Sarah Brady's Stop the NRA campaign (www.stopthenra.com) put up the nrablacklist.com website. Jim and Sarah, it seems, had been carelessly left off the list, and they hoped their site would give others feeling just as neglected an opportunity to volunteer for the blacklist. It also includes a link to the entire blacklist, which can be difficult to find on the NRA's site (I wonder why?).

In addition, nrablacklist.com calls attention to two critical NRA initiatives currently before Congress. The first is The Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (S. 659/H.R. 1036), which has already passed the House (and will soon be up for a vote in the Senate). It would provide blanket immunity to gun manufacturers, gun shops, dealers and distributors even in cases in which their negligence contributed to an injury or death. Sounds like a great idea, right?

Second, the site draws attention to the rapidly approaching expiration of the federal law banning the sale of semi-automatic assault weapons, known as the Federal Assault Weapons Ban, which was signed into law by President Clinton in 1994. The NRA is against renewing the ban (surprise, surprise) which makes me want to support renewal all the more.

So as fast as my little fingers could click, I surfed on over to nrablacklist.com and signed right up. And to date, more than 50,000 others have done the same thing. I'm proud to be blacklisted by the NRA. Care to join me?

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