Meet a Pro-Gun Activist: Karl Hadley

In a universe of pro-gun activists that love to harass, intimidate and threaten Americans who call for stronger gun laws, perhaps no single activist is more aptly nicknamed than Karl Hadley, AKA “Kaveman.”

Hadley, a 40-year-old resident of Corvallis, Oregon, is well known to those in the gun violence prevention movement as the co-author of the blog “Days of Our Trailers” (http://daysofourtrailers.blogspot.com/). There—along with co-blogger Roy Kubicek (an Illinois militia member who goes by the screen name “Thirdpower”)—Hadley launches endless personal attacks on gun violence survivors and others engaged in the fight to reduce gun violence in America. Hadley and Kubicek pride themselves on being “the bane of hoplophobes everywhere” (“hoplophobe” being an imaginary term made up by former NRA board member Jeff Cooper to describe those with a supposedly "irrational" fear of firearms).

Normally, Hadley’s attacks wouldn’t raise many eyebrows here at CSGV, but certain comments he recently left at one of CSGV staffer Ladd Everitt’s blogs surpass even his “standard” in terms of profanity, crudeness, and viciousness.

On October 24, 2011, Ladd posted a blog at Waging Nonviolence entitled “The Racist Charge.” The blog dealt with accusations by pro-gun activists that gun control was “racist,” based on some very flimsy suppositions.

Hadley jumped in with a series of ugly comments on the blog, including this one:

"Hey Laddie, have you consulted with your mommy about the hard majic of black cock?

She sure does like sucking her own shit off it.

Don't tell your dad."



He also made some not so thinly-veiled threats, by suggesting he could post Ladd’s home address and even the location at which his wife works:



This is nothing new for “Kaveman.” Earlier this year, he celebrated the threatened posting of the home address of Joan Peterson, a gun violence survivor from Minnesota (Joan’s sister was shot and killed by her husband three years into divorce proceedings) in a blog entitled, “The Most Dangerous Game.”

There is certainly concern that Hadley could back up these threats. He has bragged of owning an arsenal of firearms and other military-style equipment (e.g., grenade launchers), is permitted to carry a concealed handgun in public in Oregon and 15 other states, and brags of serving with a paramilitary citizen’s militia in Oregon. He had at least one felony arrest in April 1994, when he was charged with manufacturing and/or dealing a controlled substance. And he is well-tied to other pro-gun activists nationwide who regularly spew venom at Americans who disagree with them about gun laws. For our part, CSGV promptly reported Hadley’s recent comments to law enforcement authorities.

But perhaps the most disturbing of all our recent discoveries about “Kaveman” is that he and Roy Kubicek are treated as credentialed media by the NRA at their annual conventions. It’s a disturbing statement about how extreme today’s pro-gun movement has become.