The Tweet that Lost (Not Really) Katee Sackhoff 100,000 Followers

Katee Sackhoff, known as a badass on TV ("Battlestar Galactica," "Longmire") and in film (the upcoming "Riddick" with Vin Diesel) got into hot water earlier this week with a rabidly progun Twitter fight.

Or did she?

It started off with an innocuous tweet. Presumably everyone finds the story of a 4-year old-accidentally shooting her father to be horrible:

She retweets a follower who advocates no guns rather than gun safety; Sackhoff correctly, and quite tamely, points out that that is a logistical impossibility:

Another noninflammatory retweet:

A longer response that, again, is as reasonable and middle-of-the-road as you can get when talking about guns:

". @Sharky57 @plompr Just to be clear...I NEVER said automatic guns should be legal! My goal is to open a respectful intelligent informed dialogue. This is the problem with guns and people...too much passion on all sides to have a discussion that yields results everyone can be content with."

And then this:

...which prompted a wave of articles that reported a loss of 100,000 Twitter fans.

Of course, her remark was a joking exaggeration in keeping with the tone of the rest of her tweets. But sites like Fox News were quick to jump on it with headlines like "[Sackhoff] urges gun safety on Twitter, loses half her followers," and the Washington Times reported, "[Sackhoff] loses Twitter star power for upholding gun rights." These articles and others perpetuated the 100,000 number.

[Photo: 'Battlestar Galactica' Cast Reunites Over BBQ]

However, statistics from twittercounter.com, though not entirely reliable, show a normal and steady increase over the past few months rising to rather than dropping to 100,000. In fact, the online fracas has garnered Sackhoff a spike of nearly 35,000 followers since Monday.

The irony, of course, is that news sites trying to stir the pot and start fights between the gun rights nuts and the gun control nuts ended up just putting the focus on a relatively reasonable discussion.

[Related: Katee Sackhoff on Playing 'Herself' in 'Longmire']

No word on whether the NRA plans on changing its slogan to "I'll give you my gun when you pry it from my cold, dead hands — but I'd rather sit down with you and discuss how we can improve firearm safety without curtailing liberties enshrined in our Constitution. Would you like a cup of coffee?"

Check out photos of Sackhoff: