I was previously a gun owner. I had rifles and shotguns which I used for hunting. I owned a pistol which I thought of as a means of self-protection, particularly when living in a remote rural area. I knew quite a few other sportsmen whose gun ownership and use resembled mine; none seemed to represent a threat to themselves or others. I ultimately lost interest in hunting and sold my long guns. I also got rid of the pistol; its mere presence in the home seemed more of a threat than that posed by any imagined intruder.
The fellow I sold the guns to was a long time photographer-friend who became a gun collector. He fit the pattern of others I knew and his weapons did not represent any kind of direct threat to others. However, he was also a member of the National Rifle Association. When the Sandy Hook school massacre happened in 2012, he immediately sent out an email bemoaning the likelihood that the event would spark a movement toward restrictions on gun ownership.
I don't know if that email from my friend represented an original concept or a passing on of an NRA-inspired missive. In any case, I was stunned that a smart and seemingly decent individual would have such a first response to such an awful human tragedy. It seemed to me he had given priority to a toy collection over the bottomless grief of the Sandy Hook families.
Looking back now on that time I think my friend's reaction was fundamentally based on fear. He had suffered the loss of his home in a fire not long before in which he had lost a lifetime of photographic work along with his cameras. To some extent I think he had developed a sense of identity tied to his gun collection and he felt threatened by any public move toward gun restrictions.
In fact, I think fear is at the base of the acquisition of all non-sporting weapons including pistols and assault rifles. Such weapons are seen as sources of power to people who have underlying feelings of fear and inadequacy in regard to the protection of self and family. Most people who own such weapons do not really represent a threat to society because the reality is that the likelihood of an actual need for such a weapon is exceedingly remote. There are, however, aspects of our fear-based gun culture which do contribute substantially to public safety.
A fundamental issue, I think, is an empathy deficit among the weapons enthusiasts which is stoked by fear and which trumps basic rationality and decency. Such an emotional response is fertile ground for the NRA and the unscrupulous politicians who accept NRA support or fear its power. Which all leads to half of the civilian-owned arms in the world (about 390,000,000) being in the United States. Given our rates of suicide and daily shootings attributable to accident, gang membership or issues of impulse control, a large proportion of that vast stockpile is obviously ending up in the wrong hands.
Optimism about the chances of substantial gun control seems naive given the current political climate. It does seem that some common sense initiatives like background checks, gun by-backs and red flag laws may have a chance to chip away at gun culture since they did work in Australia and New Zealand. I wonder also if term limits throughout the political spectrum might offer some beneficial immunity to gun lobby influence.
