news
February 14, 2001
BY TAMARA AUDI
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER
With its green indoor turf, a parking lot that could double as a minivan
showroom and a popular soccer clinic for toddlers called Wee Kickers, Total
Soccer in Wixom seemed an unlikely battlefield for the national gun debate.
But it was there on a Friday night, as the last games of pickup soccer were
ending, that pro-gun forces dealt a blow to gun control. As battles go, it
wasn't much to watch. The gun-control soldiers carried petition sheets and
pens, and wore sweat suits, ponytails and tight smiles. They spoke in low
voices. This is how soccer moms fight.
They were defeated by the only group powerful enough to beat them: other
soccer moms.
Gun-rights mothers threatened to pull their kids off Total Soccer teams if
the gun-control mothers -- mostly members of the Million Mom March -- did
not stop collecting signatures at the facility for a petition that could
overturn Michigan's new concealed-weapons law. The pro-gun mothers used the word "boycott." Petitioners were asked to leave.
Uploaded: 2/14/2001
Uploaded: 2/14/2001