Julianne Moore just launched a gun safety program
It was the nightmarish Sandy Hook shooting that took the lives of 20 children and six adults that convinced Julianne Moore, a mother of two, that she had to use her power and celebrity to advocate for gun control.
“I was like, ‘I’ve had it.’ I said to my husband, ‘I’ve got to do something,’” Moore told PEOPLE. “This is the one thing that I need to say something about. This is my responsibility as a parent.”
This is why Moore has joined forces with Everytown for Gun Safety (the most prominent gun safety organization in the United States, a grassroots organization that has won victories for gun control in 40 states), to launch the Everytown Creative Council, to include the creative community in the fight to end gun violence in America.
“The creative community is committed to helping erase the scourge of gun violence, which claims 88 American lives every day,” a statement from the creative council reads. “We are artists, but we’re American citizens first.”
The list of artists committed to helping end gun violence reads like a who’s who of Hollywood: J.J. Abrams, Aziz Ansari, Judd Apatow, Elizabeth Banks, Kristen Bell, Steve Carrell, Jessica Chastain, Sophia Coppola, Ellen Degeneres, Rashida Jones, Mindy Kaling, Kim Kardashian West, Jennifer Lawrence, Spike Lee, Nick Offerman, Amy Schumer, Sarah Silverman, Sofia Vergara, Reese Witherspoon, and Sasheer Zamata, are among the close to 100 celebrities who have pledged themselves to the cause.
“As actors, we are citizens first so we believe in the Constitution and the Second Amendment,” Moore said. “But 92 percent of the people in the United States are in favor of background checks, too, so I don’t feel like I’m in the minority. I definitely feel like I’m in the majority here.”
It didn’t take much doing for Moore to get her celeb friends on board with the cause.
“I was going through my address book alphabetically. That’s all I did. ‘Please, are you interested,’ and the response has been overwhelming. I’m so, so thrilled. Everybody feels this way about this issue,”
As Moore sees it, there’s precedent for this kind of major regulation shift. Just look at the history of car safety in America.
“For cars, you have to have training and you have to have a license, and you wear seat belts and we have airbags and we have all of these things in place that have reduced fatalities unbelievably,” Moore explained. “And it was a totally unregulated industry at first. I feel like something that is very sensible and straight forward can be done also with guns.”
And Moore thinks the men behind the U.S. Constitution would be with her on this one.
“I feel like with gun safety, there have been many people who feel threatened by saying something but I don’t think I’m saying anything that’s unreasonable. With all of these rights that we have in our Constitution come a great deal of responsibility, and I think the founding fathers would agree with me.”
We are so glad Moore took a stand on this critical issue and is using her power and her platform for good. We sincerely hope that the Everytown Creative Council is able to help make America a safer place for the people who call it home.
Related reading:
Amy Schumer takes a break to get serious about gun control on SNL
UT students have found a very creative way to protest gun laws
[Image via Tinseltown / Shutterstock]
