While discussing the demographics of gunshot victims on a chat list, one person (whom I’ll call Bruce, to protect his real identity) opined: “Best not to take guns from home where they are needed to protect home and haul them into town so they can settle any local squabbles as well as due to inability to shoot straight, shoot as many bystanders as possible”. As poorly constructed as that sentence is, I got the gist of it. “Leave guns at home. Do not take them to town to settle squabbles, besides, you’re such a bad shot, you’ll hit bystanders.” Or something like that.
To which I replied:
Guns don’t get “taken into town to settle local squabbles“. They’re already in town, in the hands of gang members who use them to settle local squabbles.
This is “gang culture”, not to be confused with the “gun culture”, of which I am a member.
Since April, I have shot nearly 5,000 rounds of 9mm and not once was it to settle a squabble. Not one shot in anger. Just honing my shooting skills. My wife shot perhaps 700-800 rounds as well. No squabbles were harmed in the firing of her Glock.
Like many who cannot see the forest for the trees, “Bruce” believes that the best way to curtail the “gun violence” of the lawless gang culture is to impose yet more legal restrictions on the gun culture, i.e., the folks who actually obey the law.
Abusers of firearms are easily identifiable demographically. Until we start addressing the cultural problem of that demographic, “gun violence” will continue. No one wants to see this problem solved more than the gun culture, since we bear the brunt of efforts to “fix” it.
The fixes offered are ineffective because they do not address the problem. They may address fear of the problem! but not the problem itself. Magazine capacity limits and the assault on “assault weapons” don’t address the tools of gang culture nor the mindset (or the government policies that created it) of that demographic. You are more likely to be struck by lightning than to be shot by an “assault weapon”.
Restricting the carrying of guns by law abiding citizens just plays into the hands of the gang culture, who prefer their victims disarmed.
And perpetuating stereotypes like the average Joe who uses a gun to “settle squabbles” is a disservice to all.