On July 30, 2012, Catherine Murch shot her two children in her St. Louis-area home and then killed herself, using a 9 millimeter handgun that she had purchased on July 28 from ontargetstl.com for $473. \u00a0The tragic story of murder-suicide with a handgun was the top news story in St. Louis for days.\u00a0 Less than one week later, on August 8, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch<\/em> dedicated the bottom half of page 3 of its front section to an ad by MidAmerica Arms, touting \u201cGlock Days.\u201d<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t go looking for gun-show ads. But I do read the morning paper, and this ad would have been tough to miss. I suppose I\u2019m na\u00efve, but I was rather shocked by the prominence of the ad, what it advertised, and how it portrayed and hyped the product.<\/p>\n

Glock Days. It sounds so festive, it almost makes you want to pack a picnic lunch and head on over for some real wholesome, functional family fun. Glock’s own Facebook page calls Glock Days ” special events (similar to a department store one day sale).” And the ad copy is fun and celebratory,too:<\/p>\n

\u201cCome in to register for a free Glock drawing.\u201d \u00a0[Hooray, I can get a gun for nothing!]<\/p>\n

\u201cSee us for a suppressor\/silencer.\u201d [We all really need one of those, don\u2019t we?]<\/p>\n

\u201cAmmo deals!\u201d [The more the better, right?]<\/p>\n

\u201c3,000 square feet of guns, ammo, apparel, accessories, safes, knives, targets, optics and more.\u201d [That\u2019s more square feet that my entire house, and it\u2019s hard to imagine filling the whole joint with firearms and ammo.]<\/p>\n

My favorite promotional line from the ad: \u201cChoose the right Glock for you from our great selection.\u201d \u00a0[I can\u2019t wait to have a professional gun profiler interview me to determine exactly which gun is right for my personality and purposes.]<\/p>\n

And for those, like me, who have no clue as to how much money we need to stockpile in order to buy a gun, here\u2019s some useful info from the ad:<\/p>\n

\n
• Glock Gen 3, 9mm, .40, S&W:\u00a0 $499.95<\/li>\n
• Glock Gen 4, 9mm, .40 S&W:\u00a0 $539.95<\/li>\n
• Ammo, 9 mm:\u00a0 $10.99\/box<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

  All the fun and special-event gun shopping was brought to us by MidAmerica Arms. It was on August 10-11, 2012 in South St. Louis County [6 miles from the site of the Murch murder-suicide]. And I forgot to put it on my calendar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  On July 30, 2012, Catherine Murch shot her two children in her St. Louis-area home and then killed herself, using a 9 millimeter handgun<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":17327,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[843,1656,119,1528,834],"tags":[1657,1658],"yoast_head":"\n