The two mass shootings this weekend have inflamed a gun-control debate that never seems to go away and never seems to get resolved. …
The view of guns as neutral tools, a view shared by conservative defenders of gun rights as well as liberal advocates of gun regulation, misses a crucial fact about guns and gun ownership. It wrongly assumes that the distribution of guns and their presence in their owners’ lives are a totally independent facts that don’t shape the opportunities and choices of the people who use them.
But increasingly, research into the culture and political views of gun owners is painting a very different portrait. Gun owners’ politics don’t generally fall into lockstep with the NRA—but guns themselves are woven into people’s lives in ways that go far beyond a tool. This suggests that the path to gun law reform won’t be as simple as liberals might hope or conservatives might fear. CONT.
Austin Sarat & Jonathan Obert (Amherst), Politico Magazine