tag:theconversation.com,2011:/au/topics/guns-3548/articlesGuns – The Conversation2024-03-26T16:36:32Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2259942024-03-26T16:36:32Z2024-03-26T16:36:32ZN.S. Mass Casualty Commission a year later: What recommendations have been implemented?<p>March 30 marks the first anniversary of the release of the <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/final-report/">Mass Casualty Commission’s final report</a> into the April 2020 <a href="https://atlantic.ctvnews.ca/a-look-at-the-22-nova-scotians-killed-in-canada-s-worst-mass-shooting-1.6335839">mass shooting in Nova Scotia that left 22 people dead.</a> It was the most <a href="https://theconversation.com/nova-scotias-mass-casualty-commission-calls-for-stricter-gun-control-laws-202808">thorough study</a> of a mass shooting in Canadian history. </p>
<p>The non-partisan commission’s <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/files/documents/Turning-the-Tide-Together-List-of-Recommendations.pdf">130 recommendations</a> included several focused on gun laws. </p>
<p>Over the past year, the federal government has had a mixed record in implementing the commission’s firearms policy recommendations. Some provincial governments, however, have sought to limit implementation, and Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has provided little indication that he will follow the commission’s recommendations if he becomes prime minister.</p>
<h2>Firearm recommendations</h2>
<p>Among the commission’s recommendations:</p>
<ol>
<li>The federal government should “amend the Criminal Code to prohibit all semi-automatic handguns and all semi-automatic rifles and shotguns that discharge centre-fire ammunition and that are designed to accept detachable magazines with capacities of more than five rounds.” </li>
<li>Ottawa must “take steps to rapidly reduce the number of prohibited semi-automatic firearms in circulation in Canada.”</li>
<li>The federal government must <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-three-years-ago-loopholes-in-canadas-gun-laws-paved-the-way-for-a/">close loopholes</a> that allow gun owners to use large-capacity ammunition magazines.</li>
<li>Purchasers of ammunition and magazines should possess a firearms license. </li>
<li>Stronger measures need to be put in place to prevent gun possession by people involved in domestic or gender-based violence.</li>
<li>Governments should adopt a public-health approach to firearms policy.</li>
<li>Governments should improve efforts to combat gun smuggling.</li>
</ol>
<h2>Ottawa’s efforts</h2>
<p>The federal government has implemented some of the Mass Casualty Commission’s recommendations with its most recent gun control legislation, <a href="https://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/44-1/bill/C-21/royal-assent">Bill C-21</a>. </p>
<p>In fact, the government <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/public-safety-canada/news/2023/05/government-announces-strengthened-measures-to-prevent-gun-violence-and-ban-new-assault-style-firearms.html">described this law</a> as being designed to “align with recommendations put forward by the Mass Casualty Commission.” </p>
<p>To help address intimate partner and gender-based violence, the act enhances measures allowing for <a href="https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/cntrng-crm/frrms/c21-en.aspx">emergency prohibition orders</a> to remove firearms in situations in which gun owners pose dangers. </p>
<p>Bill C-21 also statutorily enacted a freeze on handgun purchases and transfers. In addition, the Liberals amended the definition of prohibited firearms to include models of <a href="https://digitalcommons.schulichlaw.dal.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2226&context=dlj">assault-style rifles</a> “designed and manufactured” after the legislation came into force.</p>
<p>Most gun control advocates supported the final version of C-21, <a href="https://polysesouvient.ca/Documents_2023/PRSS_23_05_01_NewAmendment_AssW.pdf">but some noted</a> that the legislation did <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/9665478/liberal-gun-amendment-assault-style-firearm/">not fully implement</a> the commission’s recommendations. </p>
<p>For example, it doesn’t require current owners to dispose of handguns, and thus does not address the commission’s goal of rapidly reducing the number of semi-automatic firearms in circulation. </p>
<p>As well, the new definition of prohibited weapons left many models of semi-automatic rifles in the Canadian market. If models of such rifles were not previously prohibited, and have already been designed and manufactured, then they remain legal.</p>
<p>Other aspects of C-21 have yet to be implemented through regulation. This includes new limits on ammunition magazines. </p>
<p>The federal government has also <a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/ottawa-extending-amnesty-for-assault-style-firearms-again-until-october-2025">delayed its buyback</a> of assault-style rifles like the AR-15 prohibited by <a href="https://gazette.gc.ca/rp-pr/p2/2020/2020-05-01-x3/html/sor-dors96-eng.html">order-in-council</a> after the Nova Scotia mass shooting. This again means that Ottawa is not following the commission’s recommendation to rapidly reduce the number of semi-automatic firearms in Canada.</p>
<h2>Opposition to the recommendations</h2>
<p>While the federal government has taken significant but incomplete steps, some provincial governments oppose the commission’s recommendations. </p>
<p><a href="https://edmonton.ctvnews.ca/alberta-granted-permission-to-intervene-in-gun-lawsuits-against-canada-1.6228294">Alberta</a> and <a href="https://regina.ctvnews.ca/saskatchewan-applies-to-intervene-in-legal-challenges-against-federal-firearms-legislation-1.6757210">Saskatchewan</a> are supporting a <a href="https://www.canlii.org/en/ca/fct/doc/2023/2023fc1419/2023fc1419.html">Federal Court case</a> challenging the prohibition of some assault-style rifles. </p>
<p>Several provinces, <a href="https://edmonton.ctvnews.ca/alberta-introduces-firearms-act-to-counter-federal-legislation-1.6303172">including Alberta</a> <a href="https://leaderpost.com/news/saskatchewan/new-sask-firearms-act-aims-to-balance-gun-rights-with-public-safety">and Saskatchewan</a>, want to make it more difficult for Ottawa to carry out its planned gun buyback strategy.</p>
<p>Poilievre is critical of the Mass Casualty Commission’s work. In <a href="https://www.cpac.ca/headline-politics/episode/conservative-leader-on-federal-bail-policies-carbon-pricing?id=978a1314-9e80-47d6-b108-0ef0ba842d85">April 2023</a>, he complained that the “commission is really an outrage.” In his view, the commission had “ignored the victims of crime” and “the facts on the ground.” Poilievre went on to criticize the federal government’s effort to prohibit some firearms.</p>
<p>Poilievre, however, is vague about his own firearm policies. His <a href="https://x.com/PierrePoilievre/status/1750947088181956795?s=20">social media</a> simply speaks of a desire to “stop Trudeau’s hunting rifle ban.” Some Conservative MPs, however, have promised to repeal the Liberal government’s gun control measures. </p>
<p>For example, Conservative shadow minister Rachael Thomas said on <a href="https://x.com/RachaelThomasMP/status/1735798525336633801?s=20">X (formerly Twitter)</a> that a “Conservative government will repeal Bill C-21 and take real action to tackle crime and put criminals behind bars!”</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1735798525336633801"}"></div></p>
<h2>Previous Tory stances</h2>
<p>The Conservatives’ stance is at odds with some steps taken by previous <a href="https://vancouversun.com/opinion/op-ed/blake-brown-conservatives-should-take-lessons-from-progressive-conservatives-on-gun-control">Conservative governments and prime ministers</a>.</p>
<p>Brian Mulroney <a href="https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/history-firearms-canada#s2">tightened access</a> to assault-style weapons, <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-short-history-of-the-ar-15-in-canada-123959">including the AR-15</a>, after the 1989 Montréal Massacre. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-short-history-of-the-ar-15-in-canada-123959">A short history of the AR-15 in Canada</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>In 2012, Stephen Harper rejected calls to make some high-powered weapons more available, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/no-plans-to-end-restrictions-on-prohibited-guns-harper-says-1.1151923">saying that “prohibited weapons exist as a category under the law for essential reasons of public security</a>.” He said his government had “absolutely no intention of weakening that category of protections.” </p>
<p>These wise words should be kept in mind by politicians of all stripes as they face the important task of implementing the Mass Casualty Commission’s final report.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/225994/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>R. Blake Brown does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Over the past year, Ottawa has had a mixed record in implementing the Mass Casualty Commission’s firearm recommendations. Some provinces, however, have sought to limit implementation.R. Blake Brown, Professor, History, Saint Mary’s UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2263822024-03-25T12:39:35Z2024-03-25T12:39:35ZGary, Indiana’s lawsuit against gunmakers is shot down by a new law, after surviving 25 years of appeals<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/583573/original/file-20240321-28-lcwl0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=26%2C26%2C5964%2C3961&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Indianapolis hosted the National Rifle Association's national convention in 2023.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/NRAConvention/ce35a00799704e60b2b10016b1af0168/photo">AP Photo/Darron Cummings</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>After 25 years of legal wrangling, a lawsuit described as “<a href="https://indianacapitalchronicle.com/2024/03/15/holcomb-signs-bill-killing-garys-gunmaker-lawsuit-but-two-others-hang-in-the-balance/">the most consequential legal case</a> against the gun industry in this country” appears to have met its end – but the industry isn’t out of the legal woods just yet.</p>
<p>Back in 1999, the city of Gary, Indiana, filed a lawsuit attempting to hold firearm manufacturers responsible for failing to prevent illegal gun sales. On March 15, 2024, Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb <a href="https://iga.in.gov/legislative/2024/bills/house/1235/details">signed a law</a> aimed at extinguishing the suit.</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://law.gsu.edu/profile/timothy-d-lytton/">legal scholar</a> who has <a href="https://press.umich.edu/Books/S/Suing-the-Gun-Industry2">followed the case</a> since it was <a href="https://www.bradyunited.org/legal-case/city-of-gary-v-smith-and-wesson-indiana-supreme-court-gun-lawsuit">first filed</a>, I believe that the now all-but-certain dismissal of this lawsuit represents a major setback for gun control advocates. </p>
<p>But it won’t stop other states from trying to use civil litigation to rein in the gun industry. To understand why, let’s take a closer look at how Gary’s lawsuit lasted so long in the Indiana courts, and how state lawmakers finally gunned it down.</p>
<h2>Blaming gunmakers for illegal retail sales</h2>
<p>In September 1999, Gary sued 11 leading handgun manufacturers, including Smith & Wesson, Beretta, Glock and Ruger. The suit alleged that <a href="https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/in-supreme-court/1437577.html">a small group of gun stores</a> was responsible for a large amount of illegal gun sales in the state. </p>
<p>Through a <a href="https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/sting-operations">sting operation</a>, the Gary Police Department discovered that certain retailers conducted <a href="https://www.nssf.org/articles/beware-the-straw-purchase/">straw sales</a>, failed to perform required <a href="https://www.thetrace.org/2015/07/gun-background-check-nics-guide/">background checks</a> and intentionally sold guns directly to <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/922">ineligible buyers</a>. </p>
<p>The lawsuit further claimed that the gun manufacturers “intentionally ignored” these illegal practices to boost their profits, and so served as “knowing accomplices.”</p>
<p>Gary’s lawsuit demanded that the gunmakers compensate the city for the costs of emergency services, policing, lost tax revenues and lower property values caused by gun violence. Gary also asked the court to issue an order requiring the manufacturers to take reasonable measures to reduce the risk of illegal sales — for example, by cutting off the supply of weapons to gun stores with a record of illegal sales.</p>
<p>In 2001, a state trial court dismissed Gary’s lawsuit, but the city <a href="https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/in-supreme-court/1437577.html">successfully appealed</a> to the Indiana Supreme Court, which, in 2003, sent the case back to the lower court for trial.</p>
<h2>The gun industry’s federal immunity shield</h2>
<p>In 2005, Congress passed the <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/chapter-105">Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act</a>, or PLCAA, which prohibits lawsuits against firearm manufacturers and sellers for injuries arising out of criminal misuse of a gun. Armed with this new federal immunity shield, the gunmakers in the Gary lawsuit moved to dismiss the case a second time.</p>
<p>However, both the trial court and an appellate court refused to dismiss the case. The appellate court explained in a 2007 <a href="https://casetext.com/case/wesson-corp-v-gary">opinion</a> that the federal immunity shield didn’t apply to Gary’s case.</p>
<p>Although sweeping, PLCAA immunity <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/7903">doesn’t protect</a> a manufacturer or seller who “knowingly violated a state or federal statute applicable to the sale or marketing” of a firearm. The court reasoned that because the gunmakers had served as knowing accomplices to the violation of state and federal laws governing the sale of firearms, PLCAA immunity <a href="https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2032628/smith-wesson-corp-v-city-of-gary/?q=cites:(769351)">didn’t protect them</a>. </p>
<p>The Indiana Supreme Court <a href="https://www.casemine.com/judgement/us/59146884add7b049342c67bc">refused the gunmakers’ resquest</a> to appeal the decision, and the case went back down to the trial court again.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/583759/original/file-20240322-28-6wql6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="The governor of Indiana stands behind a podium during a presentation at an NRA event." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/583759/original/file-20240322-28-6wql6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/583759/original/file-20240322-28-6wql6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/583759/original/file-20240322-28-6wql6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/583759/original/file-20240322-28-6wql6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/583759/original/file-20240322-28-6wql6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/583759/original/file-20240322-28-6wql6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/583759/original/file-20240322-28-6wql6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb speaks to guests at the 2023 NRA-ILA Leadership Forum in Indianapolis.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/indiana-governor-eric-holcomb-speaks-to-guests-at-the-2023-news-photo/1251837109?adppopup=true">Jeremy Hogan/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Indiana’s state immunity shield</h2>
<p>In 2001, four years before Congress passed PLCAA, Indiana passed its own <a href="https://law.justia.com/codes/indiana/2017/title-34/article-12/chapter-3/section-34-12-3-3/">state law</a> granting firearm manufacturers and sellers immunity from civil lawsuits arising out of criminal misuse of weapons. In 2015, Indiana’s then-governor, Mike Pence, signed a law making the state’s immunity law retroactive to Aug. 26, 1999, four days before the city of Gary initially filed its lawsuit.</p>
<p>For a third time, the gunmakers moved to dismiss the lawsuit, and once again, the courts refused. </p>
<p>A 2019 <a href="https://casetext.com/case/city-of-gary-v-smith-wesson-corp-1">appellate court opinion</a> explained that the specific language of the state’s immunity statute did not cover the gunmakers’ alleged “willful blindness” to illegal retail sales of their weapons, making them accomplices to illegal activity.</p>
<p>The appellate court sent the case back to the trial court.</p>
<h2>The final blow</h2>
<p>In June 2023, the trial court allowed <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/groups/public_education/resources/law_related_education_network/how_courts_work/discovery">discovery</a> in the case to <a href="https://www.pressreader.com/usa/chicago-tribune/20240119/281552295720347">go forward</a>. During discovery, opposing parties in a lawsuit share information that may be later used as evidence in a trial. Amid wrangling over discovery requests, lawyers for Gary hoped to force the gunmakers to turn over any <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/indiana-guns-gary-lawsuit-gunmakers-hb1235">internal documents</a> that would show if they knew about illegal activity among retailers who sell their products.</p>
<p>However, with the new law signed by the current governor, Holcomb, the discovery process has been preempted, and the case is all but certain to be dismissed — this time, for good.</p>
<p>The dismissal of Gary’s lawsuit means that gun control advocates have lost the most promising means of finding a <a href="https://smokinggun.org/">smoking gun</a> that they have long hoped would prove that gun manufacturers knowingly facilitate illegal sales.</p>
<p>In its defense, the gun industry has denounced lawsuits attempting to hold it responsible for firearm-related violence as <a href="https://www.nssf.org/articles/city-of-gary-25-years-of-discovery-abuse-of-legal-system-must-end/">frivolous fishing expeditions</a>. </p>
<p>The National Shooting Sports Foundation — the industry’s leading trade association — insists that industry defendants <a href="https://www.nssf.org/articles/city-of-gary-25-years-of-discovery-abuse-of-legal-system-must-end">have readily complied</a> with discovery requests in the Gary case to turn over sales records and to depose industry executives.</p>
<p>The group has also argued that holding gun manufacturers liable for the misuse of their products would be as absurd as holding car and beer companies <a href="https://www.nssf.org/articles/city-of-gary-25-years-of-discovery-abuse-of-legal-system-must-end/">liable for drunk driving</a>.</p>
<p>In my view, the industry’s <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/indiana-guns-gary-lawsuit-gunmakers-hb1235">intensive lobbying efforts</a> in the state legislature to quash the lawsuit suggest it isn’t confident that it would ultimately prevail in court. The recent success of <a href="https://www.naag.org/issues/opioids/">lawsuits against opioid manufacturers</a> for enabling misuse of their products gives gunmakers good reason to seek legislative protection from lawsuits. </p>
<h2>What’s next?</h2>
<p>Not all state legislatures have been as eager as Indiana’s to shield the firearms industry from civil lawsuits. A growing number of states — including <a href="https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/GBS/898-B">New York</a>, <a href="https://casetext.com/statute/california-codes/california-civil-code/division-3-obligations/part-4-obligations-arising-from-particular-transactions/title-20-firearm-industry-responsibility-act/section-327350-definitions">California</a>, <a href="https://legiscan.com/IL/comments/HB0218/2023">Illinois</a>, <a href="https://casetext.com/statute/new-jersey-statutes/title-2c-the-new-jersey-code-of-criminal-justice/chapter-2c58-registration-of-manufacturers-and-wholesale-dealers-of-firearms/section-2c58-35-gun-industry-member-engage-in-public-nuisance-prohibited-consequences-reasonable-controls">New Jersey</a>, <a href="https://casetext.com/statute/delaware-code/title-10-courts-and-judicial-procedures/part-iii-procedure/chapter-39-pleading-and-practice/section-3930-civil-action-for-public-nuisance-by-firearm-industry-member">Delaware</a>, <a href="https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/sb23-168">Colorado</a>, <a href="https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=7.48.330">Washington</a> and <a href="https://www.capitol.hawaii.gov/session/archives/measure_indiv_Archives.aspx?billtype=HB&billnumber=426&year=2023">Hawaii</a> — have recently passed laws that make gunmakers liable for selling weapons without implementing “reasonable controls” to prevent illegal sales by retailers.</p>
<p>In these states, legislatures appear to be fanning the flames of civil litigation against the gun industry instead of trying to extinguish it.</p>
<p>What this means for the industry remains to be seen.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/226382/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Timothy D. Lytton has provided expert consulting services to law firms representing gun violence victims.</span></em></p>Expect other states to pick up the civil-litigation torch.Timothy D. Lytton, Regents' Professor & Professor of Law, Georgia State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2231612024-03-08T13:37:29Z2024-03-08T13:37:29ZWhat families need to know about how to safely store firearms at home<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/579045/original/file-20240229-20-8z3by2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=42%2C0%2C3430%2C2404&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Guns are the leading cause of death of children in the U.S.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/child-holding-gun-mid-section-b-w-royalty-free-image/pha184000035?phrase=kids+guns&adppopup=true">Laurent Hamels via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>For the past few years, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/12/14/magazine/gun-violence-children-data-statistics.html">guns have been identified</a> as the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/12/14/magazine/gun-violence-children-data-statistics.html">leading cause of death</a> for children in the United States.</p>
<p>There were <a href="https://www.kff.org/mental-health/issue-brief/child-and-teen-firearm-mortality-in-the-u-s-and-peer-countries/">2,571 children age 1 to 17 who died in shootings</a> in the U.S. in 2021, 68% more than the 1,531 that occurred in 2000.</p>
<p>To help reduce the number of firearm-related deaths and injuries among children, Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona in January 2024 <a href="https://www2.ed.gov/policy/gen/guid/secletter/012524.html">called upon school and district administrators</a> to talk with parents and guardians about safe firearm storage practices.</p>
<p>As <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=6kAiow8AAAAJ&hl=en">experts</a> on the <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=r9lbnH0AAAAJ">safe storage of firearms</a> – and as leaders of the University of Connecticut’s <a href="https://arms.chip.uconn.edu/">ARMS Center for Gun Injury Prevention</a> – we often get questions about the best ways to keep guns out of the hands of children. We offer the following tips:</p>
<h2>1. Safely store all of your firearms</h2>
<p>Nearly half of the households in the U.S. have at least one firearm, but only about 40% of firearm owners store all of their guns when not in use, according to data in a survey we recently fielded. Unsecured firearms have been linked to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11524-018-0261-7">suicides, domestic homicides and accidental shootings</a>. They also heighten the risk of unauthorized use, which <a href="https://www.thetrace.org/2017/11/stolen-guns-violent-crime-america/">includes theft</a>.</p>
<h2>2. Don’t assume you can hide your guns</h2>
<p>Kids generally know the hiding spots for the things their parents or caretakers do not want them to find, such as holiday gifts or Halloween candy. The same is true with firearms.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://publications.aap.org/aapnews/news/13788?autologincheck=redirected">40% of gun-owning households</a> with children, adults said their children did not know where firearms were stored, a 2017 study found. However, many of the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1542/hpeds.2016-0146">children reported knowing</a> and being able to access the firearms.</p>
<p>Researchers estimate that <a href="https://www.nationwidechildrens.org/research/areas-of-research/center-for-injury-research-and-policy/injury-topics/general/gun-safety">75% of children</a> who live in homes with guns know where they are stored.</p>
<p>Adults may think they can instruct children to leave firearms alone, but the 2017 study also found that <a href="https://publications.aap.org/aapnews/news/13788?autologincheck=redirected">22% of parents</a> wrongly believed that their children had never handled their gun.</p>
<h2>3. Store ammunition separately</h2>
<p>Research shows that locking ammunition separately from firearms further <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.293.6.707">reduces the risk</a> of firearm injuries in homes with children and teenagers. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/579044/original/file-20240229-20-yhh7th.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Bullets are scattered about a table top." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/579044/original/file-20240229-20-yhh7th.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/579044/original/file-20240229-20-yhh7th.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/579044/original/file-20240229-20-yhh7th.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/579044/original/file-20240229-20-yhh7th.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/579044/original/file-20240229-20-yhh7th.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/579044/original/file-20240229-20-yhh7th.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/579044/original/file-20240229-20-yhh7th.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Storing ammunition separately from firearms can help reduce the risk of injury.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/war-bullets-pistol-9-mm-royalty-free-image/1940835204?phrase=guns+ammunition&adppopup=true">Olena Domanytska via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While storing an unreadied weapon locked away may feel counterintuitive to those who own guns for personal protection, research shows that keeping firearms locked or unloaded, or both, can also <a href="https://doi.org/10.1136%2Fjech.2003.017343">reduce risk of injury</a>. </p>
<h2>4. Learn to talk about firearm safety</h2>
<p>While some families may not have firearms in their home, eventually children go to other homes and, as they get older, go unsupervised.</p>
<p>Keeping children safe from gun violence requires normalizing conversations on firearm storage, even for people in households where no gun is present. </p>
<p>Approximately <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/72/wr/mm7250a1.htm#T2_down">45% of all unintentional shooting deaths</a> of children under 17 occurred outside of their own homes. When children visit friends, we believe it’s important for their parents to know if guns are present in the home they are visiting and, if present, whether those firearms are being safely stored.</p>
<p>For more information about how to discuss firearm safety, parents can visit websites such as <a href="https://besmartforkids.org/">BeSMART</a>, <a href="https://www.endfamilyfire.org/about">End Family Fire</a> and <a href="https://www.sandyhookpromise.org/blog/advocacy/how-secure-storage-of-guns-makes-children-and-families-safer/">Secure Storage of Lethal Means</a>.</p>
<h2>5. Know the law</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.aap.org/en/advocacy/state-advocacy/safe-storage-of-firearms/">Twenty-seven states</a> have some version of <a href="https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/firearms-and-children-legislation/">secure storage laws</a>.</p>
<p>Based on our calculations <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/firearm_mortality/firearm.htm">using data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention</a>, states with child access prevention laws – known as <a href="https://www.countyhealthrankings.org/strategies-and-solutions/what-works-for-health/strategies/child-firearm-access-prevention-laws#">CAP laws</a> – have a gun death rate that is 65% lower than states that do not have CAP laws (12.33 vs. 20.38 per 100,000). Of course, states with and without CAP laws have many differences; therefore, the lower rates cannot be attributed to CAP laws alone. However, the presence of CAP laws is protective and reduces gun death.</p>
<p>In the absence of a federal secure storage law, the legal requirements around firearm storage and preventing unauthorized children from accessing weapons vary by state or municipality.</p>
<p>For example, Connecticut <a href="https://www.cga.ct.gov/2019/act/pa/pdf/2019PA-00005-R00HB-07218-PA.pdf">requires firearms be in a locked device</a> when not in use. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.legis.iowa.gov/docs/iac/rule/07-01-2020.441.113.7.pdf">Iowa prohibits</a> the storing or leaving a loaded firearm around children 14 and younger if it is not secured by a trigger lock or a securely locked container or some other secure location.</p>
<p>Further, while Michigan only recently added a safe storage law, Jennifer Crumbley, the mother of a boy who committed a mass school shooting with his parents’ unsecured firearm, <a href="https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/oxford-school-shooting-ethan-crumbley-parents.html">was recently convicted</a> of involuntary manslaughter in connection with the case. Her husband’s trial in the matter <a href="https://www.fox2detroit.com/news/james-crumbley-trial-date-lawyer-charges">began on March 5, 2024</a>.</p>
<h2>6. Invest in a quality safe and/or locking device</h2>
<p>There are various levels of locked gun storage, including <a href="https://health.ucdavis.edu/what-you-can-do/firearm-safety.html#">trigger locks</a>, <a href="https://health.ucdavis.edu/what-you-can-do/firearm-safety.html">metal cable locks</a>, <a href="https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/what-qualifies-secure-gun-storage-or-safety-device#">locked gun cases and gun safes</a>. While storing a firearm and the ammunition in a locked combination or biometric device <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62245-9_12">is safest</a>, all of these methods can reduce the risk of gun injury and death. These locking devices can be purchased online, through some gun sellers or at sporting goods stores.</p>
<p>A biometric safe for a handgun is about US$65, a gun lock runs $55 to $75 dollars, and combination safes for long guns range widely from a couple of hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars.</p>
<p>Family-school-community partnerships allow America’s children to grow and thrive. By asking schools to share resources for secure firearm storage and communicate evidence-based safety practices, the Department of Education is helping schools address the leading cause of death among American children.</p>
<p>But families have to do their part, too. It begins by normalizing firearm safety conversations and storing firearms properly to keep children safe.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/223161/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kerri Raissian is affiliated with the Niskanen Center (Sr. Fellow) and Arnold Ventures (paid consultant).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jennifer Necci Dineen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Research shows that more children have handled household guns than their parents think.Kerri Raissian, Associate Professor of Public Policy, University of ConnecticutJennifer Necci Dineen, Associate Director of the ARMS Center for Gun Injury Prevention, University of ConnecticutLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2202672024-02-28T12:34:47Z2024-02-28T12:34:47ZLow-level blasts from heavy weapons can cause traumatic brain injury − 2 engineers explain the physics of invisible cell death<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574230/original/file-20240207-24-4417vk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3500%2C2331&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Low-level blasts can cause physical changes in the brain.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/RussiaUkraineWarFrenchWeapons/0b650af49a654704a4bef82ae8a4bc93">Libkos/AP Photo</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When the force of a blast shoots a round out of a large-caliber rifle, howitzer or M1 Abrams tank gun, the teams of people operating these weapons are exposed to <a href="https://health.mil/Reference-Center/Fact-Sheets/2023/07/18/Low-Level-Blast-Service-Members-Fact-Sheet">low-level blasts</a> that can cause <a href="https://www.brainline.org/qa/what-do-blast-injuries-do-your-brain">traumatic brain injuries</a>.</p>
<p>Low-level blasts do not cause visible trauma, such as bleeding from ruptured eardrums, and they don’t cause injury through violent head motion, such as a concussion. Yet, these blasts can cause <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27291520/">physical changes in the brain</a> that lead to a host of neuropsychiatric symptoms.</p>
<p>The link between the force of a blast and the resulting changes in the brain is not completely understood. So our team of <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=VlzdxcEAAAAJ&hl=en">engineers and</a> <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=aIl1GHoAAAAJ&hl=en">scientists in</a> the <a href="https://www.panther.engr.wisc.edu/">PANTHER program</a>, funded by the Department of Defense, is using physics to elucidate how blasts cause traumatic brain injury.</p>
<h2>What is a blast?</h2>
<p>When a weapon like a rifle <a href="https://www.hunter-ed.com/national/studyGuide/Video-How-a-Cartridge-Is-Fired/201099_92813/">is fired</a>, the round is initially in its barrel. Pulling the trigger engages a primer that produces a flame, igniting the propellant. This chemical reaction releases stored energy and creates high-pressure, rapidly expanding gas. This is the blast.</p>
<p>The rate and magnitude of gas expansion are often so extreme that they <a href="https://www.americanscientist.org/article/high-speed-imaging-of-shock-waves-explosions-and-gunshots">create a shock wave</a>, where high-pressure air molecules travel outward faster than the speed of sound. This invisible pulse of high pressure carries a tremendous amount of energy. It’s the same force that can propel a 24-pound warhead out of the muzzle of a howitzer to hit a target 19 miles (30.6 kilometers) away. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574231/original/file-20240207-29-yowd6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Cross-section of a cartridge" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574231/original/file-20240207-29-yowd6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574231/original/file-20240207-29-yowd6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574231/original/file-20240207-29-yowd6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574231/original/file-20240207-29-yowd6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574231/original/file-20240207-29-yowd6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574231/original/file-20240207-29-yowd6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574231/original/file-20240207-29-yowd6.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This cross-section shows: 1. bullet; 2. case; 3. gunpowder; 4. rim; and 5. primer.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cartridge_cross_section.svg">Glrx/Quadrell via Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>After the blast leaves the gun’s muzzle, it dissipates quickly because it is free to expand in the open air. This is when the high pressure washes over the bodies of nearby people. </p>
<p>The blast from the muzzle of a large gun like the <a href="https://youtu.be/1anCHKq6ESg?feature=shared">M777 howitzer</a> does not pulverize rocks or knock someone off their feet. But some of the blast pressure enters the body, passing through the skin and rigid skull bone and into the soft tissue of the brain. </p>
<h2>Linking blast to brain injury</h2>
<p>As blast pressure enters the brain, it is initially compressive, meaning it squeezes the tissue equally from all sides. Because brain tissue is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11831-019-09352-w">largely composed of water molecules</a>, which are difficult to compress, this type of pressure <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10439-019-02437-4">tends to cause little known harm</a> to cells. </p>
<p>An initially compressive wave, or positive pressure wave, that squeezes brain tissue changes when it bounces off the inside of the skull. It is reflected as a tensile wave, or negative pressure wave, which tends to pull brain tissue apart. With low enough pressures, <a href="https://doi.org/10.2217/cnc-2017-0011">micron-sized bubbles can form</a> in a process called cavitation. These bubbles can grow 10 to 50 times their initial size over the course of less than a tenth of a millisecond, rapidly stretching the adjacent brain tissue.</p>
<p>Experiments from our lab have shown that the deformation caused by cavitation bubbles happens so rapidly – like the speed of a bullet – that cells tend to <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666522021000149">get torn apart</a>. The extreme speed of stretching and squeezing causes nearby brain cells to die immediately. Afterward, we see only fragments where healthy cells used to be.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/577687/original/file-20240223-20-xi71p2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Diagram showing blast pressure creating microbubbles in the brain after reflecting off surfaces, stretching and destroying cells in a process called cavitation." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/577687/original/file-20240223-20-xi71p2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/577687/original/file-20240223-20-xi71p2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/577687/original/file-20240223-20-xi71p2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/577687/original/file-20240223-20-xi71p2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/577687/original/file-20240223-20-xi71p2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/577687/original/file-20240223-20-xi71p2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/577687/original/file-20240223-20-xi71p2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=454&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This diagram depicts how blast pressure from a gun can result in brain trauma.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Alice Lux Fawzi and Manik Bansal</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Cell death is the physical root cause of brain injury. In the lab, when the cells that make up brain tissue are deformed at a magnitude and rate beyond what they can withstand, they die – either immediately, as in the case of blast-induced cavitation, or slowly over six to 24 hours, as in most brain injuries from blunt impacts such as concussions. </p>
<p>In low-level blast exposure, the cavitation bubbles are very small, and the trauma is contained to the small area around them. However, repeated exposure to blasts can lead to an accumulation of these microtraumas, eventually reaching a volume large enough to cause significant and irreversible neurological symptoms. </p>
<p>Although evidence is mounting, it has yet to be fully proven that cavitation directly causes blast-induced traumatic brain injury. The hypothesis fits with <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27291520/">post-mortem analyses</a> of the brains of service members with a history of blast exposure. It also fits with the physics that link blast exposure to injury from tissue deformation. </p>
<p>Understanding the connection between blasts and cellular damage in the brain will help researchers develop better ways to protect against repetitive blast-induced traumatic brain injury.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220267/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alice Lux Fawzi receives funding from the U. S. Office of Naval Research under the PANTHER Program.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christian Franck receives funding from the U.S. Office of Naval Research under the PANTHER program. </span></em></p>The people manning the guns are also at risk of injury from the force of the weapon.Alice Lux Fawzi, PANTHER Engineering Project Manager and Associate Director of the Center for Traumatic Brain Injury, University of Wisconsin-MadisonChristian Franck, Bjorn Borgen Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Director of the Center for Traumatic Brain Injury, University of Wisconsin-Madison, University of Wisconsin-MadisonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2244992024-02-27T05:01:58Z2024-02-27T05:01:58ZExplainer: what are the protocols around the use of a firearm for NSW police?<p>As New South Wales police continue to investigate the alleged murders of Luke Davies and Jesse Baird, much attention has been paid to the alleged murder weapon - a police handgun. </p>
<p>Police allege the couple was murdered by Senior Constable Beau Lamarre-Condon last week, which has in turn provoked debate around the protocols around how, why and when police are able to use firearms.</p>
<h2>How and when do officers have access to a gun?</h2>
<p>Police firearms are stored in a standalone firearms room in a police station. Any time an officer enters the firearms room, their identity is recorded along with the time and date. </p>
<p>The room can also have CCTV in it, depending on the age of the building and its electronic infrastructure. In the room is an industrial-made firearms safe that is specifically made to store firearms.</p>
<p>Once in the room, officers have a key to the safe so they can access their firearm. Each firearm within the safe is individually locked and secured so no police can access anyone else’s firearm. This is due to the design of the gun safe, which must meet Australian Standards in safe storage of firearms and NSW legislation on the <a href="https://www.police.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0004/131179/Safe_Storage_Level_Two_-_FACT_Sheet.pdf">safe storage of firearms</a>.</p>
<p>Police access their firearm and carry out a set of drills to ensure it is in working order. They then place the weapon in their holster while in the room, and then leave. At the end of the shift, they return their firearm, going through the same procedure.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1762026645181841809"}"></div></p>
<h2>Are they ever able to access a weapon off-duty?</h2>
<p>Police do not, generally speaking, have access to their firearms when off-duty. In rare circumstances, an officer may be allowed to store their weapon at home, but the threshold to obtain permission for this is very high. It will only be granted when there is credible evidence an officer’s life is in danger, generally from organised crime syndicates or criminals with a history of extreme violence towards police. Any request must be supported by several senior police. </p>
<p>There are jobs police can undertake called “user pays” events. These have been around for over 25 years, and it simply means that outside organisations pay police to be at an event that requires extra security. Police have the same legislative powers when working at a user-pays event as they do with their regular duties, and also routinely carry a firearm.</p>
<p>If police are working “user pays”, they access their firearm in exactly the same manner as for a standard shift. However, when they complete their user-pays shift, they can return their firearm to the closest police station to where they live. They must follow the same procedure to secure their firearm.</p>
<p>Because the officer’s firearm is not being returned to their usual police station, the local officer in charge, usually an inspector of police, needs to give access to that police station’s gun safe as an additional layer of accountability. The officer’s firearm can also be double locked. </p>
<p>There will be a record made at that police station that an officer has placed his/her firearm in that station’s safe. Police firearms are not always checked to see if it has been discharged. This is due to the massive amount of administrative and policing time this would take. </p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/police-body-cameras-may-provide-the-best-evidence-but-need-much-better-regulation-159631">Police body cameras may provide the best evidence – but need much better regulation</a>
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</em>
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<h2>How do police have to account for the weapons and the bullets?</h2>
<p>Each officer is allocated a firearm from the day they finish their police academy training. That firearm is the responsibility of that officer for the duration of their career. </p>
<p>Police can voluntarily surrender their firearm or have their firearm taken from them if, for example, they are on restricted duties such as administrative jobs or if they have been found to have misused it. If it is surrendered, the firearm is taken to the ballistics unit. The officer will then never have access to that firearm again.</p>
<p>Pre-planned audits are carried out on police firearms several times a year, along with random audits that are not necessarily known to police. These spot checks are undertaken by officers who are senior to the individual police officer to whom that firearm is allocated. </p>
<p>All audits include checking firearm serial numbers, the number of bullets and the number of magazines each officer has in their organisational records. So any missing bullets would be noticed, but perhaps not right away.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/australia-had-a-record-number-of-police-shootings-in-the-past-year-should-we-be-concerned-169354">Australia had a record number of police shootings in the past year. Should we be concerned?</a>
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</em>
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<h2>Should there be tighter controls on police access to firearms?</h2>
<p>The process to gain access to an officer’s firearm is time-consuming, not only due to accessing the firearm itself but complying with the policies and procedures around it. It can take up to 15 minutes per officer to access and holster their firearm in a busy police station, given only one officer can access their firearm at any one time. </p>
<p>Any idea that an officer’s access to their firearm is easy, quick and they are not accountable for it is incorrect. But there may be ways to improve the procedures, and depending on the outcome of the investigation, police may need to review these.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/224499/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vincent Hurley is a former NSW police officer who was attached to police internal affairs (now called professional standards command) during his career.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alex Simpson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The alleged murders of Luke Davies and Jesse Baird have shone a spotlight on when, why are how police can access their firearms.Vincent Hurley, Lecturer in Criminology. Police and policing. Dept of Security Studies & Criminology, Macquarie UniversityAlex Simpson, Senior Lecturer in Criminology, Macquarie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2235982024-02-16T13:19:53Z2024-02-16T13:19:53ZMexico is suing US gun-makers for arming its gangs − and a US court could award billions in damages<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/575682/original/file-20240214-30-2tfucu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=45%2C13%2C4315%2C2857&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A sign in Laredo, Texas, reminds motorists not to smuggle guns into Mexico.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/sign-warns-motorists-not-to-smuggle-weapons-or-ammunitions-news-photo/91474155">Gilles Mingasson/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The government of Mexico is <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2024/01/23/us-appeals-court-allows-mexicos-10-billion-lawsuit-against-us-gunmakers-to-proceed/?sh=7f16abcb3071">suing U.S. gun-makers</a> for their role in facilitating cross-border gun trafficking that has <a href="https://stopusarmstomexico.org/invisible-weapons-indelible-pain/">supercharged violent crime</a> in Mexico.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/mexico-smith-wesson-complaint.pdf">The lawsuit seeks US$10 billion</a> in damages and a court order to force the companies named in the lawsuit – including Smith & Wesson, Colt, Glock, Beretta and Ruger – to change the way they do business. In January, a federal appeals court in Boston <a href="https://tlblog.org/first-circuit-allows-some-of-mexicos-claims-against-gun-manufacturer-to-move-forward/">decided</a> that the industry’s immunity shield, which so far has protected gun-makers from civil liability, does not apply to Mexico’s lawsuit.</p>
<p>As <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=yQUI6yEAAAAJ&hl=en">a legal scholar</a> who has <a href="https://press.umich.edu/Books/S/Suing-the-Gun-Industry2">analyzed lawsuits</a> against the gun industry for more than 25 years, I believe this decision to allow Mexico’s lawsuit to proceed could be a game changer. To understand why, let’s begin with some background about the federal law that protects the gun industry from civil lawsuits.</p>
<h2>Gun industry immunity</h2>
<p>In 2005, Congress passed the <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/chapter-105">Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act</a>, which prohibits lawsuits against firearm manufacturers and sellers for injuries arising from criminal misuse of a gun.</p>
<p>Importantly, <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4357413">there are limits</a> to this immunity shield. For example, it <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/7903">doesn’t protect</a> a manufacturer or seller who “knowingly violated a State or Federal statute <a href="https://theconversation.com/sandy-hook-lawsuit-court-victory-opens-crack-in-gun-maker-immunity-shield-113636">applicable to the sale or marketing</a>” of a firearm. <a href="https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/mexico-smith-wesson-complaint.pdf">Mexico’s lawsuit</a> alleges that U.S. gun-makers aided and abetted illegal weapons sales to gun traffickers in violation of federal law.</p>
<h2>Mexico’s allegations</h2>
<p>Mexico claims that U.S. gun-makers engaged in “<a href="https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/mexico-smith-wesson-complaint">deliberate efforts to create and maintain an illegal market for their weapons in Mexico</a>.”</p>
<p>According to the lawsuit, the manufacturers intentionally design their weapons to be attractive to criminal organizations in Mexico by including features such as easy conversion to fully automatic fire, compatibility with high-capacity magazines and removable serial numbers.</p>
<p>Mexico also points to industry marketing that promises buyers a tactical military experience for civilians. And Mexico alleges that manufacturers distribute their products to dealers whom they know serve as transit points for illegal gunrunning through illegal <a href="https://www.nssf.org/articles/beware-the-straw-purchase/">straw sales</a>, unlicensed sales at gun shows and online, and off-book sales disguised as inventory theft.</p>
<p>In short, Mexico claims that illegal gun trafficking isn’t just an unwanted byproduct of the industry’s design choices, marketing campaigns and distribution practices. Instead, according to the lawsuit, feeding demand for illegal weapons is central to the industry’s business model.</p>
<p>In response, <a href="https://perma.cc/RRT6-PVDZ">the gun-makers insist</a> that Mexico’s attempt to hold them legally responsible for the criminal activity of others is precisely the type of lawsuit that the federal immunity shield was designed to block. They argue that merely selling a product that someone later uses in a crime does not amount to a violation of federal law that would deprive a manufacturer of immunity. Additionally, the gun-makers assert that, even if Mexico’s lawsuit were not barred by the immunity law, they have no legal duty to prevent criminal violence that occurs outside the U.S. </p>
<h2>The next legal steps</h2>
<p>In January 2024, a federal appeals court in Massachusetts decided that Mexico’s allegations, if true, would deprive the gun-makers of immunity, and it <a href="https://tlblog.org/first-circuit-allows-some-of-mexicos-claims-against-gun-manufacturer-to-move-forward/">sent the case back to trial court</a>. Mexico now needs to produce evidence to prove its allegations that the industry is not only aware of but actively facilitates illegal gun trafficking. </p>
<p>Additionally, to win, Mexico will need to convince a Boston jury that the manufacturers’ design choices, marketing campaigns and distribution practices are closely enough connected to street crime in Mexico to consider the companies responsible for the problem. This is known as “<a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/proximate_cause">proximate cause</a>” in the law.</p>
<p>For their part, the gun-makers have asked the trial judge to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/gun-makers-ask-us-supreme-court-bar-mexicos-lawsuit-2024-02-09">put the case on hold</a> while they pursue an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. However, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/12/us/politics/supreme-court-sandy-hook-remington.html">the Supreme Court has been reluctant</a> to weigh in on gun industry cases until they have reached their conclusion in the lower courts, where most of them <a href="https://casetext.com/case/ileto-v-glock-inc-2">are dismissed</a> and a few <a href="https://apnews.com/article/sandy-hook-school-shooting-remington-settlement-e53b95d398ee9b838afc06275a4df403">have settled</a>. </p>
<h2>High stakes for the industry</h2>
<p>If Mexico does win at trial, its demand for $10 billion in damages could drive several of the nation’s largest firearm manufacturers into <a href="https://www.epiqglobal.com/en-us/resource-center/articles/when-mass-tort-meets-bankruptcy">bankruptcy</a>. Even if the case were to settle for much less, a victory by Mexico would provide a template for a wave of future lawsuits that could change the way the gun industry operates.</p>
<p>Similar theories about dangerous product designs, irresponsible marketing and reckless distribution practices in opioid litigation have transformed the pharmaceutical industry. Civil lawsuits have forced the drugmakers to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/08/business/mckinsey-opioids-oxycontin.html">take public responsibility</a> for a nationwide health crisis, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11606-021-06799-1">overhaul the way they do business</a> and <a href="https://www.opioidsettlementtracker.com/globalsettlementtracker">pay billions of dollars</a> in judgments and settlements.</p>
<p>Mexico’s lawsuit holds out the prospect that the gun industry could be next.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/223598/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Timothy D. Lytton has provided expert consulting services to law firms representing gun violence victims.</span></em></p>Mexico claims that US firearm manufacturers are fueling illegal cross-border gun trafficking and violent crime abroad.Timothy D. Lytton, Regents' Professor & Professor of Law, Georgia State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2207282024-01-12T18:29:42Z2024-01-12T18:29:42ZWayne LaPierre leaves a financial mess behind at the NRA − on top of the legal one that landed him in court<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/568942/original/file-20240111-29-i3s8bx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4442%2C3072&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Former NRA Leader Wayne LaPierre arrives for his civil trial at New York State Supreme Court on Jan. 8, 2024, in New York City.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/former-nra-leader-wayne-lapierre-arrives-for-his-civil-news-photo/1917197606?adppopup=true">Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Wayne LaPierre, the National Rifle Association’s longtime leader, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/05/nyregion/wayne-lapierre-resigns-nra.html">plans to retire by the end of January 2024</a>. He cited “<a href="https://home.nra.org/statements/nra-evp-wayne-lapierre-announces-resignation-from-nra/">health reasons</a>” when he announced his departure three days before the organization’s <a href="https://apnews.com/article/nra-national-rifle-association-wayne-lapierre-lawsuit-42f90bf1690c326afcd0b6cdc4234ef8">civil fraud trial</a> got underway in Manhattan.</p>
<p><a href="https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/2024/attorney-general-james-announces-settlement-former-nra-senior-strategist-eve">New York authorities have accused the NRA</a>, LaPierre and three of his current or former colleagues of squandering millions of dollars the gun group had obtained from its members. </p>
<p>As a <a href="https://fisher.osu.edu/people/mittendorf.3">nonprofit accounting scholar</a> who has <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-nras-financial-weakness-explained-108582">followed the NRA’s finances</a> for years, I believe the organization is not only at a legal crossroads but also at a financial one.</p>
<h2>NRA business model</h2>
<p>To see why the NRA finds itself in this difficult spot, it helps to first see how its business model allows for only a small margin of error. Despite the nonprofit’s <a href="https://home.nra.org/about-the-nra/">long history</a>– it was founded in 1871 by <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-nra-evolved-from-backing-a-1934-ban-on-machine-guns-to-blocking-nearly-all-firearm-restrictions-today-183880">Civil War veterans who fought for the Union</a> – the NRA has never had enough money stowed away to inoculate it from financial problems.</p>
<p>Consider the NRA’s circumstances in terms of its <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-nras-financial-weakness-explained-108582">unrestricted net assets</a>, which reflect the money an organization has available to spend after accounting for its commitments to donors.</p>
<p>Comparing this with the scale of an organization’s annual budget can provide a sense of how much of a rainy day fund is on hand.</p>
<p>In 2015, the NRA <a href="https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/530116130/201623149349300602/full">had unrestricted net assets</a> that constituted just 9% of its total expenses. In contrast, that same year, the AARP, another long-standing <a href="https://theconversation.com/hillary-clinton-is-starting-a-social-welfare-group-what-does-that-mean-78221">social welfare organization</a> with millions of members, <a href="https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/951985500/201622429349300037/full">had unrestricted net assets</a> that amounted to 87% of its expenses.</p>
<p>In other words, the NRA’s coffers reflected a circumstance more in line with an employee living paycheck to paycheck than an heir living off a trust fund. For this reason, the NRA has always relied on its members’ annual dues to cover its costs, and it is less able to weather financial storms that can last years.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/19/politics/nra-2020-campaign/index.html">The controversies over the NRA’s spending</a> and <a href="https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-campaigns-gun-politics-election-2020-lawsuits-949361ea529ea37139f401a64c7fa362">the organization’s political entanglements that have swirled around</a> since 2016 constitute that kind of turbulence.</p>
<h2>Declining financial fortunes</h2>
<p>Following its substantial spending spree during the 2016 election cycle, the NRA found itself needing to dig out of a hole, with a budget deficit of <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2017/11/audit-shows-nra-spending-surged-100-million-amidst-pro-trump-push-in-2016/">more than US$40 million</a>.</p>
<p>Subsequent years saw <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/inside-the-nras-finances-deepening-debt-increased-spending-on-legal-fees--and-cuts-to-gun-training/2019/06/14/ac9dc488-8e30-11e9-b08e-cfd89bd36d4e_story.html">fluctuations in spending</a> along with ongoing <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/nra-national-rifle-association-membership-revenue-2022/">challenges to generate sufficient revenues</a> to keep up with spending.</p>
<p>In recent years, the organization’s approach to its budget shortfall has been to cut costs, or at least some of its costs.</p>
<p>Spending on programming went from <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4823792-NRA-Audit-FY-2017">nearly $176 million in 2017</a> to just <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24074735-nra-audit-2021-2022">$73 million in 2022</a>, its most recent reporting year.</p>
<p>Its traditionally core programs have taken the biggest hit: Spending on education and training fell from <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4823792-NRA-Audit-FY-2017">$7.7 million</a> to <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24074735-nra-audit-2021-2022">$3.2 million</a>; law enforcement support dropped from <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4823792-NRA-Audit-FY-2017">$3.8 million</a> to <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24074735-nra-audit-2021-2022">$1.8 million</a>; recreational shooting slipped from <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4823792-NRA-Audit-FY-2017">$7.2 million</a> to <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24074735-nra-audit-2021-2022">$5.1 million</a>; and field services declined from <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4823792-NRA-Audit-FY-2017">$11.9 million</a> to <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24074735-nra-audit-2021-2022">$1.3 million</a>. </p>
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<h2>Back in the red</h2>
<p>The NRA hasn’t cut all of its spending, however.</p>
<p>During the same time frame, the NRA’s budget for <a href="https://theconversation.com/nras-path-to-recovery-from-financial-woes-leaves-the-gun-group-vulnerable-to-new-problems-201144">administrative legal costs ballooned</a>, from $4 million in 2017 to over $40 million in each of the past three reporting years, with this amount hitting $43.7 million in 2022.</p>
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<p>The organization’s shrinking programming budget helped eliminate its deficit, at least for a time.</p>
<p>Thanks to its reduced spending, the NRA was able to finish the year with a <a href="https://theconversation.com/nras-path-to-recovery-from-financial-woes-leaves-the-gun-group-vulnerable-to-new-problems-201144">surplus in both 2020 and 2021</a>. However, that surplus, which came from slashing costs – particularly those geared toward core programs for members – proved short-lived.</p>
<p>The organization has also seen the ranks of its members dwindle. Fewer members mean less revenue from dues. In 2022, <a href="https://thereload.com/nra-has-lost-over-a-million-members-since-corruption-allegations-surfaced/">revenues were down by more than $100 million</a> from their 2017 levels, a drop of more than one-third.</p>
<p>The declining revenues meant that, despite its trimmed-down budget, the NRA was back <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/01/national-rifle-association-wayne-lapierre-trial/677056/">in the red in 2022</a> and again facing a <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24074735-nra-audit-2021-2022">negative unrestricted balance in net assets</a>.</p>
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<h2>What’s next?</h2>
<p>The NRA, in short, is in a financial spiral. Its shrinking budget has begotten a shrinking member base, leading to an even smaller budget. It may be hard to stem.</p>
<p>The organization has <a href="https://www.thetrace.org/2023/11/nra-budget-spending-cuts-4h-boy-scouts/">pared what it spends on its programs</a> to the bone. </p>
<p>While there are no easy answers for what the organization can do about its financial predicament, it’s not the only pressing question the organization faces.</p>
<p>How long will the <a href="https://www.thetrace.org/2023/02/nra-membership-decline-corruption/">NRA’s remaining members</a> stay loyal to it? When will <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-11-05/nra-spending-more-on-lawyers-as-revenue-falls-membership-lags?embedded-checkout=true">high legal costs</a> subside enough to ease the budgetary pressures? What does a smaller NRA mean for its <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/nov/17/nra-gun-lobby-gun-control-congress">ability to flex its political muscle</a>?</p>
<p>Despite its many challenges, the NRA’s imminent changing of the guard does <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/01/national-rifle-association-wayne-lapierre-trial/677056/">offer an opportunity</a> to make more drastic shifts in its priorities, spending approaches and the pitches it makes to members and donors.</p>
<p>Further, with its large legal budget being the last remaining area ripe for cost cutting, perhaps the NRA’s next generation of leaders will set the stage for the organization to <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/nra-distances-longtime-leader-wayne-lapierre-opening-remarks-civil-tri-rcna133076">rid itself of its oversized legal burdens</a> and refocus on core programs.</p>
<p>What is clear, however, is that financial constraints will dictate much of whatever course the new leadership seeks to chart.</p>
<p><em>Earlier versions of these charts ran in a related article on <a href="https://theconversation.com/nras-path-to-recovery-from-financial-woes-leaves-the-gun-group-vulnerable-to-new-problems-201144">March 23, 2023</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220728/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brian Mittendorf does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The NRA’s new leaders have to make important decisions as they confront a shaky financial future.Brian Mittendorf, Professor of Accounting, The Ohio State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2168142023-11-14T13:24:49Z2023-11-14T13:24:49ZMass shootings often put a spotlight on mental illness, but figuring out which conditions should keep someone from having a gun is no easy task<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/557887/original/file-20231106-23-j6y1eu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=34%2C8%2C5687%2C3791&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine -- the worst in the state's history -- was carried out by a gunman with a known history of mental illness.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/MaineShooting/2b2097e7f3514fddb03d55ee1bd4db36/photo?hpSectionId=a91e5e04eacf4709a84586d6c00d3577&st=hpsection&mediaType=text,photo,video,graphic,audio&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=1758&currentItemNo=128">AP Photo/Matt York</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Every time the country is shaken by a tragic mass shooting and the loss of innocent lives, mental illness and its role in the actions of the mass shooter come under scrutiny.</p>
<p>Mental illness again became a central theme after the mass shooting in Maine on Oct. 25, 2023, in which records suggest that the shooter had a <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/who-is-robert-card-confirmed-details-maine-shooting-suspect-person-of-interest/">history of serious mental health issues</a>. Months before the tragedy, the family of gunman Robert Card, as well as Army Reserve staffers, had contacted law enforcement expressing high levels of concern about his mental health and noting his access to guns.</p>
<p>Since 1999, 19 states along with the District of Columbia have <a href="https://www.poynter.org/reporting-editing/2022/19-states-have-red-flag-laws-but-they-are-rarely-used-to-stop-gun-violence/">passed legislation</a>, commonly known as <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/michigan-governor-signs-red-flag-gun-law-as-questions-linger-over-enforcement">red flag laws</a>, that allow law enforcement and other people in a person’s life to petition for removal of firearms when there are imminent safety concerns about a gun owner. However, <a href="https://www.poynter.org/reporting-editing/2022/19-states-have-red-flag-laws-but-they-are-rarely-used-to-stop-gun-violence/">reports suggest that this law is rarely used</a>.</p>
<p>Maine, though, has what’s known as a <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/boston/news/yellow-red-flag-gun-laws-massachusetts-maine/">yellow flag law</a>. It requires reporting to local law enforcement that a person poses an imminent threat, but it then relies on the police to take the person into custody, order a mental health evaluation and request a court order to have that person’s guns removed. The yellow flag law <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/05/us/robert-card-lewiston-shooting-maine-yellow-flag-law/index.html">was not used</a> in Card’s case.</p>
<p>The relationship between mental illness and guns, and risk mitigation, is complicated. Specifically, there is no clear and uniform consensus on who should determine when to restrict access to firearms – should it be a psychiatrist, an independent forensic psychiatrist, a committee of psychiatrists or a judge? The majority of people with mental illness <a href="https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/mental-illness">do not seek treatment</a>. </p>
<p>In that light, it might make sense to mandate a psychiatric examination into the background check process for purchasing a gun. As severe mental illness can start at any point in life, will gun owners need periodic psychiatric assessment, akin to a vision exam for renewing a driver’s license? If so, who will pay for the visits? </p>
<p>I am a <a href="https://www.starclab.org">trauma psychiatrist</a> who regularly deals with the outcome of gun violence, whether in victims or first responders. In my book “<a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781538170380/Afraid-Understanding-the-Purpose-of-Fear-and-Harnessing-the-Power-of-Anxiety">Afraid</a>: Understanding the Purpose of Fear and Harnessing the Power of Anxiety,” I have examined mental health issues related to gun violence and the social consequences of mass shootings.</p>
<figure>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Maine has a ‘yellow flag’ law aimed at restricting access to firearms when a person is deemed potentially dangerous.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The complexity of defining mental illness</h2>
<p>The term <a href="https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/mental-illness">“mental illness”</a> covers a wide range of conditions, and there are more than 200 diagnoses listed in the most recent version of the <a href="https://www.psychiatry.org/psychiatrists/practice/dsm">Diagnostic Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders</a>, which is the gold standard for psychiatric diagnosis in the U.S. Mental illness includes diverse conditions like phobias, <a href="https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/social-anxiety-disorder/symptoms-causes/syc-20353561">social anxiety disorder</a>, <a href="https://adaa.org/learn-from-us/from-the-experts/blog-posts/consumer/what-trauma-what-ptsd-who-affected-and-how-get">post-traumatic stress disorder</a>, <a href="https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/trichotillomania/#">hair-picking disorder</a>, <a href="https://www.psychiatry.org/patients-families/gambling-disorder/what-is-gambling-disorder">gambling disorder</a>, <a href="https://www.psychiatry.org/patients-families/schizophrenia/what-is-schizophrenia#">schizophrenia</a>, <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/aging/dementia/index.html#">dementia</a>, various forms of <a href="https://www.psychiatry.org/patients-families/depression/what-is-depression">depression</a> and personality disorders, such as antisocial personality disorder.</p>
<p>Mental illnesses are also very common: Nearly <a href="https://www.nami.org/learn-more/mental-health-by-the-numbers">1 in 5 people experience clinical depression</a> during their lives; 1 in 5 people experience an anxiety disorder; <a href="https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/schizophrenia.shtml">1 in 100 experience schizophrenia</a>; and <a href="http://www.ptsdunited.org/ptsd-statistics-2/">nearly 8 in 100</a> of the general population experiences PTSD. People with higher exposure to trauma, <a href="https://www.ptsd.va.gov/professional/PTSD-overview/epidemiological-facts-ptsd.asp">such as veterans</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-aching-blue-trauma-stress-and-invisible-wounds-of-those-in-law-enforcement-146539">first responders</a>, have higher rates of PTSD, up to about 30%. </p>
<p>So when suggesting that gun access should be restricted for people with mental illness, does that mean all of these conditions? Or just some, or some in defined circumstances? For example, should all veterans with PTSD or those with social anxiety disorder have their guns removed? Neither of these conditions is known to commonly impair judgment. </p>
<p>Defining the specific conditions that can impair judgment or significantly increase risk of harm to self or others is an important step in this process, which needs serious involvement of mental health professionals, stakeholders, law enforcement and policymakers. </p>
<h2>Knowing when a person could be a risk of harm</h2>
<p>The majority of mental illnesses <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2686644/">do not pose a risk</a> to others. When there is a risk, in the majority of cases when someone is involuntarily admitted to a psychiatric inpatient unit, it is not because the person poses a risk to others. Rather, it is more often the case that the person is at <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2686644/">risk of self-harm</a>, as in the case of a depressed, suicidal patient. Sadly, people with severe mental illness are <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2020.563860">often the victims of violence and abuse</a>.</p>
<p>In psychiatric disorders, concerns typically arise in acutely psychotic patients with paranoid delusions that convince them to harm others. This may happen in – but is not limited to – schizophrenia, dementia, severe <a href="https://www.webmd.com/depression/psychotic-depression">psychotic depression</a> or <a href="https://www.healthline.com/health/bipolar-disorder/bipolar-psychosis">psychotic bipolar illness</a>.</p>
<p>These conditions are rather strongly associated with <a href="https://psychiatryonline.org/doi/pdf/10.5555/appi.books.9781615371099">increased risk of suicide</a>, not homicide. Therefore, more realistic gun laws in regards to mental illness could also save many lives from suicide.</p>
<p>Substance use is a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093%2Fepirev%2Fmxaa006">major contributor to violence</a> in mental illness, and it needs to be included in the calculations when it comes to gun restriction. Other situations with increased risk of harm to others are personality disorders with a high level of impulsivity or lack of remorse, such as <a href="https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/antisocial-personality-disorder/symptoms-causes/syc-20353928">antisocial personality disorder</a>. </p>
<p>But the reality is that most people with personality disorders do not seek treatment and are not known to mental health providers. </p>
<p>It is also worth noting that most countries have a similar prevalence of severe mental illness compared with the U.S., yet they have <a href="https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/mental-disorders#">much lower rates of mass murder</a> than the U.S.</p>
<h2>The harms of using ‘mental illness’ so vaguely</h2>
<p>Every time <a href="http://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2017/10/06/doctors-need-to-speak-up-against-the-use-of-mental-illness-as-an-insult/">mental illness is linked by the media or politicians to acts of violence</a>, the highly charged emotions of the moment can affect those with mental illness and their families, and that can perpetuate stigma.</p>
<p>When “mental illness” is <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/18/health/a-misguided-focus-on-mental-illness-in-gun-control-debate.html">vaguely addressed in gun debates</a>, those with a psychiatric condition such as anxiety or phobia but without an increased risk of violence or impairment in judgment may avoid seeking treatment.</p>
<h2>Mental illness gun laws that can have real preventive impact</h2>
<p>In my view, to turn the focus on the role of mental illness in gun violence into meaningful actions, the following steps are needed:</p>
<p>– Clear, uniform criteria need to be established on when mental illness justifies restriction of access to firearms. Would this be specific mental disorders or specific mental disorders in crises? This requires defining signs of imminent threat to self or others, and also defining how and when a person is relieved of that status. A great deal of discussion and coordination will be needed between mental health, legal and law enforcement experts.</p>
<p>– As it was noted before, the majority of patients with mental illness do not seek care. A comprehensive preventive plan would necessitate screening everybody who applies to purchase a firearm. This step ensures meaningful screening, as well as avoiding discrimination. Other countries such as Japan, Canada, New Zealand and Austria <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/02/world/international-gun-laws.html">have such requirements</a>.</p>
<p>– Since potentially dangerous psychiatric conditions can begin at any age in an otherwise healthy person, regular mental health screening for gun owners would be justified, similar to eye exams for drivers.</p>
<p>– There should be clear mechanisms for determining lack of mental fitness for access to firearms when concerns are raised by those who know the person or by law enforcement. Red flag gun laws are a good beginning for this path.</p>
<p>The bottom line is that determining who may or may not have access to firearms based on mental illness, as outlined, is indeed very challenging and requires more serious work. And the common denominator in all these tragedies still is the access to assault rifles.</p>
<p><em>This is an updated version of <a href="https://theconversation.com/mental-illness-and-gun-laws-what-you-may-not-know-about-the-complexities-92337">an article</a> that was originally published on Feb. 26, 2018.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/216814/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Arash Javanbakht does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Red flag laws are an important step in the right direction, but much more work is needed to determine the role of mental health in the lead-up to and aftermath of mass shootings.Arash Javanbakht, Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Wayne State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2171612023-11-06T22:07:05Z2023-11-06T22:07:05ZSupreme Court considers whether to uphold law that keeps guns out of the hands of domestic abusers<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/557878/original/file-20231106-17-yaa2gd.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=25%2C0%2C5582%2C3732&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Will the federal law prohibiting the possession of firearms by someone subject to a domestic violence restraining order survive?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/wooden-judge-gavel-and-hunting-rifle-over-usa-flag-royalty-free-image/1321809033?phrase=guns+supreme+court&adppopup=true"> iStock / Getty Images Plus</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Should it be legal to take away the guns of people who are under a domestic violence protective order, which aims to shield victims from their abusers?</p>
<p>That’s the question posed in one of the biggest cases of the current Supreme Court term, focused on the <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/united-states-v-rahimi/">limits of individual gun rights</a>. The case was argued before the justices on Nov. 7, 2023.</p>
<p>The case, <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/united-states-v-rahimi/">U.S. v. Rahimi</a>, comes in the wake of <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-constitutional-revolution-is-underway-at-the-supreme-court-as-the-conservative-supermajority-rewrites-basic-understandings-of-the-roots-of-us-law-212944">revolutionary changes in doctrine</a> over the past two court terms. Now, justices must grapple with how far the new principles will reach.</p>
<p>Two years ago, the court began what many consider to be a <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-constitutional-revolution-is-underway-at-the-supreme-court-as-the-conservative-supermajority-rewrites-basic-understandings-of-the-roots-of-us-law-212944">constitutional revolution</a>. </p>
<p>The new supermajority of six conservative justices rapidly <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-supreme-court-is-back-in-session-with-new-controversial-cases-that-stand-to-change-many-americans-lives-heres-what-to-expect-190819">introduced new doctrines</a> across a range of controversies, including <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-revolutionary-ruling-and-not-just-for-abortion-a-supreme-court-scholar-explains-the-impact-of-dobbs-185823">abortion</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/supreme-court-sweeps-aside-new-yorks-limits-on-carrying-a-gun-raising-second-amendment-rights-to-new-heights-183486">guns</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/religion-at-the-supreme-court-3-essential-reads-163712">religion</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/supreme-court-chief-justice-john-roberts-uses-conflicting-views-of-race-to-resolve-americas-history-of-racial-discrimination-209670">race</a>.</p>
<p>When the court announces a new principle – for example, a limit on the powers of a specific part of government – citizens and lawyers are not sure of the full ramifications of the new rule. How far will it go? What other areas of law will come under the same umbrella?</p>
<p>In a <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-seismic-change-has-taken-place-at-the-supreme-court-but-its-not-clear-if-the-shift-is-about-principle-or-party-190815">revolutionary period</a>, aggressive litigants will push the boundaries of the new doctrine, attempting to stretch it to their advantage. After a period of uncertainty, a case that defines the limits on the new rule is likely to emerge.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549346/original/file-20230920-31-ewmu37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Guns lying on glass display shelves." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549346/original/file-20230920-31-ewmu37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/549346/original/file-20230920-31-ewmu37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549346/original/file-20230920-31-ewmu37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549346/original/file-20230920-31-ewmu37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549346/original/file-20230920-31-ewmu37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549346/original/file-20230920-31-ewmu37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/549346/original/file-20230920-31-ewmu37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Semi-automatic firearms are seen displayed on shelves in a gun store in Austin, Texas.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/semi-automatic-firearms-are-seen-displayed-on-shelves-in-news-photo/1638819814?adppopup=true">Brandon Bell/Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Focus on guns</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/united-states-v-rahimi/">U.S. v. Rahimi</a> may be the limiting case for gun rights, identifying the stopping point of the recent changes in Second Amendment doctrine.</p>
<p>Zackey Rahimi is a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/12/us/supreme-court-guns-domestic-violence-orders.html">convicted drug dealer and violent criminal</a> who also had a restraining order in place after assaulting his girlfriend. The court will decide whether the federal law prohibiting the possession of firearms by someone subject to a domestic violence restraining order violates the Second Amendment.</p>
<p>In the 2022 case of <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-843_new_m648.pdf">New York Rifle & Pistol v. Bruen</a>, the court announced a <a href="https://theconversation.com/supreme-court-sweeps-aside-new-yorks-limits-on-carrying-a-gun-raising-second-amendment-rights-to-new-heights-183486">new understanding of the Second Amendment</a>. The amendment had long been understood to recognize a limited right to bear arms. Under the Bruen ruling, the amendment instead describes an individual right to carry a gun for self-protection in most places in society, expanding its range to the level of other constitutional rights such as freedom of religion or speech, which apply in public spaces.</p>
<p>However, the court’s conservative justices also tend to argue that constitutional rights are <a href="https://www.justice.gov/archive/ag/speeches/2002/080702eighthcircuitjudgesagremarks.htm">balanced by responsibilities</a> to promote a functional society, a concept known as “<a href="https://www.encyclopedia.com/politics/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/ordered-liberty">ordered liberty</a>.” The practical question is how to know the proper balance between liberty and order. If the right to carry a gun can be regulated but not eradicated, limited but not eliminated, where is the line? </p>
<p>The court’s <a href="https://fedsoc-cms-public.s3.amazonaws.com/update/pdf/L7yMmAwNeVF5wkGkXuhUm6j6paw0YFfP4OOv8UZz.pdf">answer</a> in Bruen is <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/07/26/scotus-history-is-from-motivated-advocacy-groups-00047249">history</a> – a current law does not have to match a specific historical one exactly, but it has to be similar in form and purpose. Whatever gun regulations Americans allowed <a href="https://guides.newman.baruch.cuny.edu/Americanhistory1/earlyrepublic">during the early republic</a> – the critical period from around the 1780s to around the 1860s at the time of the Civil War – are allowable now, with the exception of any that would violate principles added to the Constitution more recently, such as racial equality under the 14th Amendment. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/557892/original/file-20231106-15-4pw1ho.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A large white stone building with eight columns at the top of white stone stairs." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/557892/original/file-20231106-15-4pw1ho.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/557892/original/file-20231106-15-4pw1ho.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/557892/original/file-20231106-15-4pw1ho.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/557892/original/file-20231106-15-4pw1ho.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/557892/original/file-20231106-15-4pw1ho.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/557892/original/file-20231106-15-4pw1ho.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/557892/original/file-20231106-15-4pw1ho.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The Supreme Court has expanded the rights of gun owners in recent years.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/the-supreme-court-of-the-united-states-building-seen-in-news-photo/1696127092?adppopup=true">Celal Gunes/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>Justice Clarence Thomas, the author of the Bruen ruling, described it this way: The government must “identify a well-established and representative <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-843_new_m648.pdf#page=27">historical analogue, not a historical twin</a>.” Thomas argued in Bruen that no such historical analogue existed for the limits New York imposed, invalidating the state’s ban on concealed carry permits.</p>
<p>The Rahimi case will provide a critical test of this historical approach to the boundaries of constitutional rights. </p>
<p>Historians have <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22-915/275858/20230821165213803_22-915%20tsacProfessorsOfHistoryAndLaw.pdf">presented evidence</a> that there were widespread laws and practices during the early republic limiting gun possession by individuals, like Rahimi, who were judged to be dangerous. However, those dangers did not include domestic violence, which was not deemed the same important concern then that it is now.</p>
<p>The court may consider the laws prevalent in the early republic, which regulated those who “<a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22-915/275858/20230821165213803_22-915%20tsacProfessorsOfHistoryAndLaw.pdf#page=27">go armed offensively</a>” or “<a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22-915/275858/20230821165213803_22-915%20tsacProfessorsOfHistoryAndLaw.pdf#page=28">to the fear and terror of any person</a>,” to be analogous to contemporary laws restraining those under a domestic violence restraining order. If so, the ruling will likely uphold Rahimi’s conviction and limit gun rights. </p>
<p>On the other hand, if the court reads those historical standards as more narrow and specific than the contemporary ban on gun possession while under a restraining order, those limits will be struck down.</p>
<h2>The future of gun regulations</h2>
<p>During the Nov. 7 oral arguments, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/supreme-court-second-amendment-11-07-23/index.html">Justice Elena Kagan noted</a> that many of the restrictions now legally imposed on the mentally ill, felons or dangerous people were not on the books during the early republic. </p>
<p>For the majority of justices who are likely to maintain the Bruen standard, the competing positions on how to apply the court’s new historical method were clear. The justices must decide whether the constitutional requirement in Rahimi’s case is a specific historical firearm ban in response to domestic violence or a more general firearm ban in response to threatening behavior. </p>
<p>The more specific kind of ban did not exist “while the founders still walked the Earth,” as Justice Sonia Sotomayor phrased it during oral argument, but the second kind of law did. </p>
<p>Whether the court considers the restrictions on Rahimi to be in the first or second category is the core question, which will also <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/supreme-court-hears-major-gun-case-right-accused-domestic-abusers-poss-rcna123799">determine the future of many gun regulations</a>. </p>
<p><em>This story was updated Nov. 7, 2023, after oral arguments. It incorporates <a href="https://theconversation.com/supreme-court-supermajority-will-clarify-its-constitutional-revolution-this-year-deciding-cases-on-guns-and-regulations-212952">sections of a previous story</a> about the Supreme Court published on Sept. 26, 2023.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/217161/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Morgan Marietta does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>An important tool in the fight against domestic violence is under scrutiny in a major US Supreme Court case.Morgan Marietta, Professor of Political Science, University of Texas at ArlingtonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2151332023-10-16T12:31:43Z2023-10-16T12:31:43ZGun deaths among children and teens have soared – but there are ways to reverse the trend<p>Firearm injuries are now <a href="https://doi.org//10.1056/NEJMc2201761">the leading cause of death</a> among U.S. children and teens following a huge decadelong rise.</p>
<p>Analyses published on Oct. 5, 2023, by a research team in Boston found an <a href="https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2023-063411">87% increase in firearm-involved fatalities</a> among Americans under the age of 18 from 2011 to 2021.</p>
<p>Such an increase is obviously very concerning. But <a href="https://ssw.umich.edu/faculty/profiles/tenure-track/rlsokol">as scholars</a> <a href="https://sph.umich.edu/faculty-profiles/zimmerman-marc.html">of adolescent health</a> <a href="https://medicine.umich.edu/dept/emergency-medicine/patrick-carter-md">and firearm violence</a>, we know there are many evidence-based steps that elected officials, health care professionals, community leaders, school administrators and parents can implement to help reverse this trend.</p>
<h2>Trends in firearm deaths</h2>
<p>The latest study is based on data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This data also provides information on whether firearm deaths were the result of homicide, suicide or unintentional shootings.</p>
<p>We have seen <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/04/06/gun-deaths-among-us-kids-rose-50-percent-in-two-years/">increases over time</a> in all three areas. The steepest increase has been in the rate of firearm homicides, which <a href="https://wisqars.cdc.gov/reports/">doubled over the decade</a> to 2021, reaching 2.1 deaths per 100,000 children and teens, or about 1,500 fatalities annually. Firearm-involved suicides have also increased steadily to 1.1 deaths per 100,000 children and teens in 2021.</p>
<p>Whereas the proportion of youth firearm-involved deaths due to unintentional shootings is typically highest during childhood, the <a href="https://wisqars.cdc.gov/reports/">share of gun deaths</a> due to suicide peaks in adolescence.</p>
<p>In 2021, homicide was the most common form of firearm-involved deaths in almost every age group under the age of 18, with an exception of 12- and 13-year-olds, in which suicide was the leading cause of firearm fatalities.</p>
<p>Racial disparities in firearm deaths, which have been present for multiple generations, are <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/firearm-deaths/index.html">also expanding</a>, research shows.</p>
<p>Black children and teens are now dying from firearms at around <a href="https://wisqars.cdc.gov/reports/">4.5 times the rate</a> of their white peers. </p>
<p>This disparity is the consequence of structural factors, including the effects of systemic racism and economic disinvestment within many communities. Addressing racial disparities in firearm-involved deaths will require supporting communities and <a href="https://doi.org//10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.12425">disrupting inequity by</a> addressing long-term underfunding in Black communities and punitive policymaking.</p>
<p>More research is needed to fully understand why firearm-involved deaths are universally increasing across homicide, suicide and unintentional deaths. The COVID-19 pandemic and its <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amepre.2021.08.026">exacerbation of social inequities and vulnerabilities</a> likely explain some of these increases. </p>
<h2>How to reduce gun fatalities</h2>
<p>Reducing young people’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-easy-access-to-guns-at-home-contributes-to-americas-youth-suicide-problem-187744">access to unsecured and loaded firearms</a> can prevent firearm-involved deaths across all intents — including suicide, homicide and unintentional shootings.</p>
<p>Gun-owning parents <a href="https://doi.org//10.1001/jamapediatrics.2019.1078">can help</a> by storing all firearms in a secure manner – such as in a locked gun safe or with a trigger or cable lock – and unloaded so they are not accessible to children or teens within the household.</p>
<p>Data shows that only one-third of firearm-owning households with teens in the U.S. currently <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10865-021-00242-w">store all their firearms unloaded and locked</a>.</p>
<p>In addition to locking household firearms, parents should consider storing a firearm away from the home, such as in a gun shop or shooting range, or temporarily transferring ownership to a family member if they have a teen experiencing a mental health crisis.</p>
<p>Families, including those that don’t own firearms, should also consider how firearms are stored in homes where their children or teens may spend time, such as a grandparent’s or neighbor’s house.</p>
<p>Community-based and clinical programs that provide counseling on the importance of locked storage and provide free devices are effective in improving the ways people store their firearms. In addition, researchers have found that states with <a href="https://everytownresearch.org/rankings/law/secure-storage-or-child-access-prevention-required/">child access prevention laws</a>, which impose criminal liability on adults for negligently stored firearms, are associated with <a href="https://doi.org//10.1001/jamapediatrics.2019.6227">lower rates of child and teen firearm deaths</a>.</p>
<p>Reducing the number of young people who carry and use firearms in risky ways is another key step to prevent firearm deaths among children and teens. Existing hospital- and community-based prevention services support this work by identifying and enrolling youth at risk in programs that reduce violence involvement, the carrying of firearms and risky firearm behaviors. </p>
<p>While researchers are currently testing such programs to understand how well they work, early findings suggest that the most promising programs include a combination of reducing risky behaviors – through, for example, nonviolent conflict resolution; enhancing youth engagement in pro-social activities and with positive mentors; and supporting youth mental health.</p>
<h2>Support structures</h2>
<p>In addition to ongoing focused prevention efforts, hospital-, school- and community-based interventions that support youth in advancing social, emotional, mental, physical and financial health can reduce the risk of firearm deaths. Such measures include both <a href="http://doi.org//10.2105/AJPH.2021.306311">creating opportunities for children and teens</a> – building playgrounds, establishing youth programs and providing access to the arts and green spaces – and <a href="https://doi.org//10.2105/AJPH.2016.303434">community-level improvements</a>, such as improved public transportation, economic opportunities, environmental safety conditions and affordable and quality housing. Allocating resources toward these initiatives is an investment in every community member’s safety.</p>
<p>Over the past decade, we have seen an 87% increase in firearm-involved fatalities among children and teens in the United States. But we also have the strategies and tools to stop and reverse this troubling trend.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/215133/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rebeccah Sokol receives funding from the National Institutes of Health and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to conduct research to prevent violence.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marc A. Zimmerman receives funding from NIH, CDC, BJA, & foundations. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Patrick Carter receives funding from NIH and CDC for conducting firearm-related prevention research. </span></em></p>Fatalities from gun homicides, suicides and accidents are all up for Americans ages 18 and under.Rebeccah Sokol, Assistant Professor of Social Work, University of MichiganMarc A. Zimmerman, Professor of Public Health, University of MichiganPatrick Carter, Co-Director, Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention; Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine, University of MichiganLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2074042023-07-17T15:04:00Z2023-07-17T15:04:00ZA 1-minute gun safety video helped preteen children be more careful around real guns – new research<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537385/original/file-20230713-29-yv0v92.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=133%2C0%2C3420%2C2423&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A little training helped kids make safer choices when they stumbled across a gun.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/child-found-pistol-in-drawer-at-home-royalty-free-image/940915496">M-Production/iStock via Getty Images Plus</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/research-brief-83231">Research Brief</a> is a short take about interesting academic work.</em> </p>
<h2>The big idea</h2>
<p>Children who watched a 1-minute-long gun safety video were more cautious when they found a real handgun hidden in a drawer in our lab compared to children who watched a car safety video, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jamapediatrics.2023.2397">according to our randomized clinical trial</a> published in the journal JAMA Pediatrics. <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=LUrHrxcAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">We</a> <a href="https://sophiekja.com">observed</a> this difference even though children saw the gun safety video a week earlier at home and even after they had watched scenes from a violent movie in our lab.</p>
<p>We tested 226 children ages 8 to 12. By the flip of a coin, children watched either a gun safety video or car safety video alone at home. Both safety videos featured The Ohio State University Chief of Police in full uniform. Younger children tend to respect authority figures, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1348/135532500167967">especially those in uniform</a>.</p>
<p>Then a week later, pairs of kids – who were friends or siblings, for example – came to our lab at Ohio State to participate in what we told them was a study about what children do for entertainment.</p>
<p>First, the child volunteers watched scenes from a PG-rated violent movie. After 20 minutes, they went to a playroom furnished with toys and games like Lego and checkers. The room also contained a file cabinet with two disabled 9 mm handguns hidden in the bottom drawer. We told the kids they could play with any of the toys and games in the room and then left them alone. A hidden camera videotaped the children’s behavior.</p>
<p>By the end of 20 minutes, 96% of the children had found the guns. Children are naturally curious, and <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2021/12/09/health/gun-safety-tips-for-home-parents-children-wellness/index.html">adults often underestimate their ability</a> to find guns hidden in the home.</p>
<p><iframe id="UtRqp" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/UtRqp/5/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Kids who saw the gun safety video (compared to the car safety video) were more likely to tell an adult (33.9% of kids vs. 10.6% of kids), less likely to touch a gun (39.3% vs. 67.3%) and held it for less time if they did touch it (42.0 seconds vs. 99.9 seconds). They were also less likely to pull the trigger (8.9% vs. 29.8%), and pulled the trigger fewer times if they did pull it (4.2 vs. 7.2). </p>
<p>Risk factors that raised the likelihood of engaging in unsafe behavior around the guns included being male, watching age-inappropriate PG-13 and R-rated movies, and interest in guns, as reported by parents.</p>
<p>We also identified several protective factors that made children less likely to engage in unsafe behavior around the guns. One was previous exposure to gun safety material in a course or video. Another was having guns in the home, which makes sense because surveys find that parents with guns are <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2017/06/26/among-u-s-gun-owners-parents-more-likely-than-non-parents-to-keep-their-guns-locked-and-unloaded/">more likely to talk to their children about gun safety</a> than parents without guns. Finally, having negative attitudes about guns, like believing they’re not cool or fun, made kids less likely to engage in unsafe behavior in our study.</p>
<h2>Why it matters</h2>
<p>In 2020 in the U.S., <a href="https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMc2201761">guns killed more people ages 1 through 19</a> than any other cause, including motor vehicle crashes, drug overdoses and poisoning. And the rate of gun-related deaths among U.S. children has been increasing for about a decade. Gun deaths among U.S. children under 18 <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/04/06/gun-deaths-among-us-kids-rose-50-percent-in-two-years/">increased from 1,732 in 2019</a> to 2,590 in 2021.</p>
<p>Gun safety videos might be a relatively simple but effective option to help decrease these gun-related deaths and injuries.</p>
<h2>What still isn’t known</h2>
<p>Participants in this study watched the safety video about a week before they came to our lab. Future longitudinal research is needed to establish how long the protective effects of firearm safety videos might last.</p>
<p>To see if our results apply in other situations, future research should also be conducted in a more naturalistic setting – like the home – and with children of a variety of ages and from geographical locations beyond Ohio.</p>
<h2>What other research is being done</h2>
<p>Other research on children and gun safety primarily focuses on access to guns and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jamapediatrics.2019.1494">responsible, safe</a> <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.293.6.707">and secure gun storage</a>. The <a href="https://www.aap.org/en/advocacy/state-advocacy/safe-storage-of-firearms/">American Academy of Pediatrics recommends</a> that gun owners store their firearms unloaded, locked up and separate from ammunition.</p>
<p><em>This article has been updated to clarify the ages of those included in the statistics about gun-related deaths.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/207404/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Kids were more likely to tell an adult and less likely to touch or hold a handgun that they discovered if they’d recently watched a short video about gun safety.Brad Bushman, Professor of Communication, The Ohio State UniversitySophie L. Kjaervik, Ph.D. Candidate in Communication, The Ohio State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2055532023-06-26T12:21:26Z2023-06-26T12:21:26ZTaking students to the range to learn about gun culture firsthand<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530147/original/file-20230605-22195-gqn7mv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3404%2C1798&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'Sociology of Guns' students during a gun range field trip.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sandra Stroud Yamane</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Text saying: Uncommon Courses, from The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/uncommon-courses-130908">Uncommon Courses</a> is an occasional series from The Conversation U.S. highlighting unconventional approaches to teaching.</em> </p>
<h2>Title of course:</h2>
<p>“Sociology of Guns”</p>
<h2>What prompted the idea for the course?</h2>
<p>I grew up in the liberal culture of the San Francisco Bay Area and never touched a firearm until I was 42 years old, living in North Carolina and <a href="https://sociology.wfu.edu/people/faculty/david-yamane">teaching sociology at Wake Forest University</a>.</p>
<p>For the past 10-plus years I have been deeply immersed in American gun culture both professionally and personally. I have both studied and am a member of the Liberal Gun Club, National Rifle Association and other gun-related groups.</p>
<p>Having one foot outside and one foot inside gun culture allows me to see the social life of guns from different perspectives. Wanting to convey this diversity to others prompted me to construct and teach this course for the first time in 2015. This fall, I will teach the course for the ninth consecutive academic year.</p>
<h2>What does the course explore?</h2>
<p>Rather than focusing exclusively on gun violence and politics, my course looks more broadly at guns in society.</p>
<p>The class begins by literally putting firearms in students’ hands.</p>
<p>The first class meeting is at a gun range, where students have the opportunity – but are not required – to shoot three semi-automatic firearms: a .22 pistol, a Glock 17 9 mm pistol and an AR-15 style .223 caliber rifle. The field trip is a source of insight that carries through the entire semester.</p>
<p>Substantively, the course builds on the students’ firsthand experience of guns by exploring the multifaceted role they play in society. It puts guns in historical, legal and global contexts. The intention is to provide students with a greater understanding of the lawful possession and use of guns, gun crime and injuries, and the future of gun politics.</p>
<p>Guest speakers vary from semester to semester but include leaders of various gun owner groups, professional gun educators and trainers, and representatives of gun violence prevention organizations.</p>
<h2>Why is this course relevant now?</h2>
<p>It often feels as though the United States is being torn apart by cultural and political divisions over guns. As Mark Joslyn argues in “<a href="https://www.choice360.org/choice-pick/the-gun-gap-rotw-4-5-21/">The Gun Gap</a>,” the different social worlds inhabited by gun owners and non-owners shape not just their fundamental orientations to guns, risk and policy, but their very understanding of what constitutes a good society.</p>
<p>I believe that we as a society cannot repair this divide until people begin to talk to each other about their differences with the goal of mutual understanding. These conversations should be built on a solid foundation of empirical knowledge about the role guns actually play in society - both positive and negative.</p>
<h2>What’s a critical lesson from the course?</h2>
<p>The trip to the gun range stands out because it offers direct exposure to gunfire. As expected, <a href="https://guncurious.wordpress.com/2023/06/23/collected-posts-on-sociology-of-guns-seminar/">student responses vary</a>. Most enjoy it. Some dislike it. No one is indifferent. All are better able to relate to the course material because of it.</p>
<p>In particular, those who were personally repulsed by guns prior to the field trip often come to see why guns can be attractive to others. Those who had lacked exposure often become gun curious. And the few gun enthusiasts I get in my course do not just have their enthusiasm reinforced; they also understand why others see guns differently. </p>
<p>Reflecting on the field trip experience over the course of the semester through the lens of scholarship on guns turns the heat of gunfire on the range into the light of comprehension in the classroom.</p>
<h2>What materials does the course feature?</h2>
<p>“<a href="https://lgolens.com/anthropillar/">The Liberal Gun Owners Lens, Pillar 1: The Human-Weapon Relationship</a>” – which explains the deep anthropological connection between <em>Homo sapiens</em> and projectile weaponry. </p>
<p>“<a href="https://wwnorton.com/books/9780393345834">Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America_</a>,” – Adam Winkler’s magnificent book on the historical and legal context of guns.</p>
<p>“<a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162231156292">Gun Culture 2.0: The Evolution and Contours of Defensive Gun Ownership in America</a>” – my comprehensive summary of the history and development of gun culture in the United States.</p>
<p>“<a href="https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmsa1916744">Handgun Ownership and Suicide in California</a>” and “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0011392115617227">Race and Mass Murder in the United States</a>” – articles that address negative outcomes with guns in society.</p>
<h2>What will the course prepare students to do?</h2>
<p>“Sociology of Guns” teaches students to approach this fraught topic in a more objective and nuanced manner encompassing both the everyday uses and abuses of firearms. This knowledge then helps students better understand their own personal beliefs about and relationship to guns. </p>
<p>Taken together, these lessons prepare students to make informed choices for the rest of their lives about being involved with guns – or not – as well as the place of guns in the communities in which they will live.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/205553/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Yamane has received funding from The Louisville Institute for the Study of American Religion to study church security. He is a member of the Liberal Gun Club, National African American Gun Association, and National Rifle Association and financially supports the Liberal Gun Owners 501c4 and Walk the Walk America 501c3 organizations.</span></em></p>In this course, a gun range becomes a classroom for students to explore their previously held beliefs about firearms.David Yamane, Professor of Sociology, Wake Forest UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2061612023-06-23T12:48:18Z2023-06-23T12:48:18ZJa Morant shows how a ‘good guy with a gun’ can never be Black<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533247/original/file-20230621-22-uh7sna.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C4%2C2986%2C1989&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The NBA suspended Ja Morant for 25 games after he posted a video of himself brandishing a gun.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/ja-morant-of-the-memphis-grizzlies-brings-the-ball-upcourt-news-photo/1485941791?adppopup=true">Justin Ford/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>“Man enough to pull a gun, be man enough to squeeze it,” rapped NBA superstar Allen Iverson on his song “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2skYVPGExgY">40 Bars</a>.” </p>
<p>This was two weeks prior to the 2000-01 NBA season, one in which Iverson would be named league MVP. Ja Morant, the 23-year-old star point guard for the Memphis Grizzlies, was barely 1 year old.</p>
<p>Today, Morant’s game conjures <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYbs4adAyds">that of the electrifying Iverson</a>. With colorfully dyed dreadlocks, an infectious smile and <a href="https://www.si.com/fannation/sneakers/news/the-nike-ja-1-day-one-sold-out-quickly-online">a signature sneaker</a>, Ja represents the next generation of NBA superstars.</p>
<p>But his bursting athletic brilliance, so evocative of Iverson, comes with a cost: the perceived menace of the Black gangster.</p>
<p>On March 4, 2023, Morant posted an <a href="https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/35782987/nba-investigating-ja-morant-displays-gun-instagram-video">Instagram Live video</a> of him displaying a gun at a Denver strip club. Colorado is an open carry state, but it’s illegal to carry a firearm while under the influence of alcohol. Though Morant was never charged for a crime, the NBA suspended him eight games for “<a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/colorado/news/nba-hands-down-8-game-suspension-ja-morant-gun-incident-shotgun-willies/">conduct detrimental to the league</a>.” </p>
<p>Then, on May 14, 2023, <a href="https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/ja-morant-addresses-latest-gun-controversy-i-take-full-accountability-for-my-actions/">another Instagram Live video</a> surfaced of Morant holding a gun in a parked car with his friends while dancing to rap music. In response, <a href="https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/37863825/sources-grizzlies-ja-morant-suspended-25-games-nba">the NBA suspended Morant for 25 games</a> to start this upcoming season for “engaging in reckless and irresponsible behavior with guns.”</p>
<p>I’m not looking to defend Morant’s behavior. It was careless, and he could have harmed himself and others.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.cla.purdue.edu/directory/profiles/aaron-dial.html">But as a scholar of Black popular culture</a>, I can’t help but wonder what the reaction would have been if Morant were white.</p>
<p>To many politicians and activists in the gun-obsessed U.S., the freedom to own and flaunt firearms is a sacred right. And yet throughout the nation’s history, gun ownership among Black Americans has elicited fear and recrimination. Even when folks who look like Morant innocuously and legally possess a gun, they find themselves too easily typecast as villains. </p>
<h2>Disciplining ‘thugs’ and ‘children’</h2>
<p>The NBA has long had a fraught relationship with its Black superstars.</p>
<p>When global sports icon Michael Jordan <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nba/2022/03/22/ap-was-there-michael-jordan-retires-for-3rd-final-time/49970153/">retired from basketball in 2003</a>, the league found itself in a period of transition.</p>
<p>How would it continue to fill arenas, satisfy advertisers and spread its vision of a global game without its brightest star? </p>
<p>Not only did the NBA need a new crop of superstars to mitigate Jordan’s exit, but it also needed a fresh attitude. In response, the league turned to the <a href="https://stanforddaily.com/2018/03/08/the-answer-to-the-nbas-stance-on-hip-hop/">marketing juggernaut of hip-hop and Black culture</a>.</p>
<p>Players openly professed their love for rap music, with stars like <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/music-news/shaquille-oneal-rap-return-king-talk-nba-playoffs-1235405566/">Shaquille O'Neal</a>, <a href="https://deadline.com/2021/05/kobe-bryant-los-angeles-lakers-rap-album-hall-of-fame-induction-1234757106/">Kobe Bryant</a>, Iverson <a href="https://ballislife.com/nba-players-music-albums/">and others</a> recording and releasing music. Players wore oversized T-shirts, baggy jeans and New Era fitted caps as they traveled. You’d see durags and iced-out diamond chains during postgame interviews. </p>
<p>At first, the league saw opportunity – an opening to usher in a new <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBA_Street">post-Jordan</a> <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Assist-Relationship-Strategies-Communication/dp/1572734086">audience</a>. </p>
<p>However, in 2004, two events prompted a backlash.</p>
<p>First, there was the notorious “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EP7xRieiZm0">Malice at the Palace</a>,” during which players for the Indiana Pacers went into the stands to fight fans who had provoked them at Detroit’s Palace of Auburn Hills stadium.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Basketball fan grabbing arm and tusseling with basketball player." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533250/original/file-20230621-11103-foropp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533250/original/file-20230621-11103-foropp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533250/original/file-20230621-11103-foropp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533250/original/file-20230621-11103-foropp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533250/original/file-20230621-11103-foropp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533250/original/file-20230621-11103-foropp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533250/original/file-20230621-11103-foropp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Indiana Pacers forward Ron Artest fights with a fan during a brawl at a game against the Detroit Pistons, in Auburn Hills, Mich., on Nov. 19, 2004.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/NBAat75APWasThereMaliceatthePalace/e858811ee860456d882be6320dc9ec41/photo?Query=pistons%20pacers%20brawl&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=68&currentItemNo=2">Duane Burleson/AP Photo</a></span>
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<p>A year later, there was an infamous Team USA dinner in Serbia. <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2005/10/23/opinions-on-the-nbas-dress-code-are-far-from-uniform/d8110301-49b4-4151-b0c2-42c2c5f30ae8/">As The Washington Post reported</a>, “Iverson and some of his fellow National Basketball Association professionals arrived wearing an assortment of sweat suits, oversize jeans, shimmering diamond earrings and platinum chains … Larry Brown, the Hall of Fame coach of the U.S. team, was appalled and embarrassed.”</p>
<p>Former commissioner David Stern went on to institute <a href="https://www.espn.com/nba/news/story?id=2194537">a controversial dress code for NBA players</a>, banning, among other things, baggy clothing, along with the display of gaudy jewelry. But Los Angeles Lakers coach Phil Jackson exposed the ban’s quiet truth. </p>
<p>“The players have been dressing in prison garb the last five or six years,” <a href="https://www.espn.com/nba/news/story?id=2197012">he said</a>. “All the stuff that goes on, it’s like gangster, thuggery stuff.”</p>
<p>The NBA decided its foray into the marketing of hip-hop with basketball required a paternalist brand of discipline to keep its players’ “street cool” in line and avoid the poisonous image of Black criminality.</p>
<p>And like Jackson all those years ago, ESPN’s Tim MacMahon, on the network’s <a href="http://www.espn.com/espnradio/podcast/archive/_/id/10528553">Lowe Post basketball podcast</a>, criticized Morant with not so subtle racial undertones.</p>
<p>“Ja Morant is a child,” he announced. “This guy is so worried about being cool: ‘Look at me, man: Life is like a rap video.’”</p>
<h2>The NBA’s gun culture</h2>
<p>Ja Morant isn’t the first NBA player to find himself in trouble for wielding firearms. </p>
<p>In 2006, <a href="https://www.sfgate.com/sports/article/NBA-suspends-Jackson-for-seven-games-2581301.php#:%7E:text=After%20all%20the%20legal%20and,finally%20caught%20up%20with%20him.">Stephen Jackson</a> was suspended just seven games for firing a gun after an altercation at an Indianapolis strip club. In 2010, <a href="https://www.espn.com/nba/news/story?id=4802267">Gilbert Arenas and Javaris Crittenton </a> were suspended for 50 and 38 games, respectively, after pulling guns on each other in the Washington Wizards team facilities. And in 2014, <a href="https://www.sbnation.com/nba/2014/8/7/5979817/raymond-felton-suspension-gun-charges-mavericks">Raymond Felton</a> was suspended four games after pleading guilty to charges stemming from an incident where he threatened his estranged wife with a gun. </p>
<p>Like Ja, all these players are Black. But unlike his situation, these incidents were violent, criminal offenses.</p>
<p>The closest analogues to Morant are Chris Kaman and Draymond Green. <a href="https://www.sportskeeda.com/basketball/news-flexing-guns-used-school-shootings-pictures-chris-kaman-posing-guns-spark-ja-morant-double-standards-claim">Kaman</a>, a former center who is white, posted pictures of his arsenal to social media in 2012, 2013 and 2016. In 2018, during a trip to Israel, Golden State Warriors star forward <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/draymond-green-warriors-israel-rifle-photo-outrage/">Draymond Green</a> posed with an assault weapon. Neither Kaman nor Green was suspended for their posts. </p>
<p>The metaphor of guns also saturates the league in ways that <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-warspeak-permeating-everyday-language-puts-us-all-in-the-trenches-121356">reflect the country’s obsession with firearms</a>. </p>
<p>The alias of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrei_Kirilenko">Andrei Kirilenko</a>, a former All-Star for the Utah Jazz, was “AK- 47.” Fans anointed Lakers guard <a href="https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/lakers-guard-austin-reaves-wants-to-get-rid-of-ar-15-nickname/">Austin Reaves</a> with the nickname “AR-15” until he denounced it after <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2023/05/24/uvalde-school-shooting-what-to-know/">the tragic mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas</a>. NBA superstar Kevin Durant’s <a href="https://www.instagram.com/easymoneysniper/">Instagram handle</a> is “easymoneysniper.” Watch Hall of Fame broadcaster Mike Breen announce a game, and you’ll inevitably hear <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtIx03UmiiE">his famous catch phrase</a>, “BANG.” </p>
<h2>Was this ever about guns?</h2>
<p>After Morant’s most recent incident, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j03cKLDTo0Y">Adam Silver</a>, league commissioner, said, “I’m assuming the worst.” </p>
<p>But why is Morant, according to Silver, all of a sudden a poor role model to “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-6-xiD8Xkk">millions of kids, globally</a>,” especially when <a href="https://www.kcra.com/article/former-nfl-player-says-posing-with-gun-in-daughters-prom-photo-was-a-joke/19915571">former</a> <a href="https://www.thedodo.com/pro-baseball-player-is-trolled-803649064.html">and</a> <a href="https://torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/lilley-carey-price-is-showing-how-far-reaching-trudeaus-hunting-gun-ban-will-go">current</a> athletes have done the same without punishment? </p>
<p>To me, the answer is simple: In America, armed Black folks conjures pathological criminality.</p>
<p>Guns, since the nation’s inception, have fortified <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-good-guy-with-a-gun-became-a-deadly-american-fantasy-117367">a uniquely American masculine fantasy</a>: the revolutionary and the cowboy, the cop and the soldier, the spy, the hunter, the gangster – all coalesce around the presumed thrill of the trigger. These fantasies reflect the <a href="https://www.npr.org/2012/12/21/167824766/nra-only-thing-that-stops-a-bad-guy-with-a-gun-is-a-good-guy-with-a-gun">National Rifle Association’s</a> most pernicious and oddly patriotic lie: “The only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.”</p>
<p>At the same time, Historian Carol Anderson’s book “<a href="https://www.professorcarolanderson.org/the-second">The Second: Race and Guns in a Fatally Unequal America</a>” explores how the imagined danger of armed Black people has long pervaded the national psyche. </p>
<p>In her telling, this story begins in Morant’s home state of South Carolina, where the <a href="https://www.usccr.gov/files/pubs/2020/04-06-Stand-Your-Ground.pdf">Negro Act of 1722</a> and the <a href="https://calendar.eji.org/racial-injustice/may/10">Negro Slave Act of 1740</a> argued Blacks were “instinctually criminal” and abolished their access to weapons and right to self-defense.</p>
<p>So if people are so sure of Morant’s villainy, I ask without a hint of snark: What does responsible Black gun ownership look like?</p>
<p>Does it look like Huey Newton, Bobby Seale and the Black Panther Party, whose armed protests were the impetus behind <a href="https://www.history.com/news/black-panthers-gun-control-nra-support-mulford-act">California’s stricter gun laws – legislation that was backed by the NRA</a>? </p>
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<img alt="Black and white photo of Black men and women congregating, with some men holding guns." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533252/original/file-20230621-3564-twpfqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/533252/original/file-20230621-3564-twpfqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=430&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533252/original/file-20230621-3564-twpfqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=430&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533252/original/file-20230621-3564-twpfqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=430&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533252/original/file-20230621-3564-twpfqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=540&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533252/original/file-20230621-3564-twpfqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=540&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/533252/original/file-20230621-3564-twpfqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=540&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Armed members of the Black Panther Party stand in the corridor of California’s capitol in May 1967.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/HueyNewton/176d2c81ae1648cda9038c36e3aa7b15/photo?Query=black%20panthers%20guns&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=28&currentItemNo=0">Walt Zeboski/AP Photo</a></span>
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<p>Does it look like <a href="https://exhibits.stanford.edu/saytheirnames/feature/philando-castile">Philando Castile</a>? Do we see it in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/07/us/marissa-alexander-released-stand-your-ground.html">Marissa Alexander</a>, who was sent to prison after she fired a warning shot at her husband, who had threatened to kill her?</p>
<p>To me, this was never about guns – just as, back in the early 2000s, it was never about rap music or baggy clothing.</p>
<p>It’s about <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Feminist-Theory-From-Margin-to-Center/hooks/p/book/9781138821668">white paternalism</a>. It’s about how Black people can’t be trusted with weapons. It’s about how the country’s veneration of gun ownership as an inalienable right is seconded only by its commitment to rendering armed Blacks an existential danger to the civility and structure of America.</p>
<p>Blackness seems to disavow any possibility of being a “good guy,” gun or not. <a href="https://fox17.com/news/local/tennessee-lawmaker-proposes-2nd-amendment-bill-in-honor-of-hero-kyle-rittenhouse-kenosha-wisconsin-gun-rights-crime-courts-usa-news-politics">Kyle Rittenhouse</a> was a “good guy with a gun.” So, too, was <a href="https://psmag.com/news/george-zimmerman-hero-77272">George Zimmerman</a>. Both meted out extrajudicial killings, and both emerged unpunished.</p>
<p>According to this warped, uniquely American fantasy, “good guys with guns” can never look like Ja Morant – and good guys can always kill bad guys.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/206161/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>A. Joseph Dial does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>America’s veneration of gun ownership is seconded only by its commitment to rendering armed Blacks as an existential danger to the civility and structure of America.A. Joseph Dial, DISCO Network Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Purdue UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2069602023-06-19T22:19:49Z2023-06-19T22:19:49ZCanada’s inaugural National Day Against Gun Violence promotes prevention and healing<p>This month, the Canadian federal government publicly announced the first <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-national-day-against-gun-violence-1.6861618">National Day Against Gun Violence</a>, to be held annually on the first Friday of June. Simultaneously, Ontario was also the first province to take action moving towards recognition of a gun violence awareness day. These declarations represent a significant step to mitigate the growing risk of gun violence.</p>
<p>While gun violence problems in Canada are not as acute as those in the United States, <a href="https://www.healthdata.org/acting-data/gun-violence-united-states-outlier">Canada ranks as third among high-income countries for rates of firearm homicides</a>. To reduce gun violence risks, the inaugural National Day Against Gun Violence <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/public-safety-canada/news/2023/06/statement-on-national-day-against-gun-violence.html">promotes prevention, intervention and healing</a>.</p>
<p>Writing as a mass shooting survivor from a 2022 incident in Vaughan, Ont., I have experienced situations where <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/vaughan-condo-shooting-resident-support-1.6819413">communities are unequipped to provide for the necessary trauma support</a>. The impacts of gun violence are not only in the immediate aftermath of the incident, but remain long after.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/i-research-mass-shootings-but-i-never-believed-one-would-happen-in-my-own-condo-in-vaughan-ont-196863">I research mass shootings, but I never believed one would happen in my own condo in Vaughan, Ont.</a>
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<p>Gun violence survivors learn to accommodate memories of the violence in their lives. But that comes <a href="https://www.socialworktoday.com/archive/JF20p10.shtml">at the cost of the survivor’s psycho-social, medical and mental health</a>.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Prime Minister Trudeau announces the inaugural National Day Against Gun Violence.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Chicago origins</h2>
<p>The origins of the first Friday in June as U.S. Gun Violence Awareness Day are related to a specific shooting in Chicago. Fifteen-year-old <a href="https://abc7chicago.com/hadiya-pendleton-shooting-chicago-gun-violence-kenwood/12749117/">Hadiya Pendleton</a> was shot and killed at <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/chicago/news/harsh-park-pendleton-murder/">Harsh Park</a> in the city’s South Side, on Jan. 29, 2013. She was one of at least <a href="https://www.npr.org/2013/12/31/258413771/despite-the-headlines-chicagos-crime-rate-fell-in-2013">412 gun violence deaths in Chicago that year</a>. </p>
<p>Pendleton’s death gained <a href="https://www.goodmorningamerica.com/news/story/obama-center-honors-hadiya-pendleton-chicago-girl-shot-82518056">symbolic national attention</a>, as she had recently performed as a majorette in Barack Obama’s second inauguration celebration in Washington, D.C. </p>
<p>Given that this shooting occurred less than one mile from Obama’s Chicago home, <a href="https://www.npr.org/2013/02/10/171609578/first-lady-among-mourners-at-funeral-for-slain-chicago-teen">the presidential family took a special interest in this tragedy</a>. </p>
<p>That attention from the highest levels of government, along with grassroots anti-gun actions in Chicago neighbourhoods, resulted in a <a href="https://wearorange.org/">social movement to recognize the toll of gun violence</a>.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/532771/original/file-20230619-25476-oh4l8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="a group of people holding papers with a young girl's face printed on them" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/532771/original/file-20230619-25476-oh4l8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/532771/original/file-20230619-25476-oh4l8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/532771/original/file-20230619-25476-oh4l8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/532771/original/file-20230619-25476-oh4l8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/532771/original/file-20230619-25476-oh4l8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/532771/original/file-20230619-25476-oh4l8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/532771/original/file-20230619-25476-oh4l8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Protesters hold up copied photos of Hadiya Pendleton at the scene where she was killed during an anti-gun violence march and rally Friday, Feb. 1, 2013, in Chicago.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)</span></span>
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<h2>Canadian impact</h2>
<p>The National Day Against Gun Violence in Canada did not derive from a particular shooting incident. Rather, it grew out of the recognition that <a href="https://time.com/6258603/canada-gun-violence-rise-us/">too many Canadians are being impacted by gun violence</a>, and is related to a combination of factors. </p>
<p>Long-standing concerns of community-based organizations and citizens catalyzed action. Organizations ranging from the <a href="https://www.danforthfamilies.com/post/statement-from-danforth-families-for-safe-communitiesthe-first-national-day-against-gun-violence-in">Danforth Families for Safe Communities</a> to the <a href="http://zerogunviolence-movement.com/">Zero Gun Violence Movement</a> support this nascent social movement. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/Cs_0HAIuXva","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<p>Another contributing factor was the support from the Toronto Raptors. Professional sports franchises have often acted as community leaders to support communities in crisis. As a part of their community engagement portfolio, <a href="https://www.nba.com/raptors/news/raptors-start-petition-to-observe-national-gun-violence-awareness-day-in-canada">the Raptors’ organization has been working towards having a nonpolitical day of awareness for gun violence since 2022</a>.</p>
<p>Media coverage of the inaugural day reflected the reality that any discussion regarding the role of guns in Canadian society is a political lightning rod. Reports on the first National Day Against Gun Violence also mentioned the unconnected issue of <a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/trudeau-government-proclaims-annual-day-against-gun-violence">Conservative Party opposition to recent gun legislation promoted by the Liberal Party</a>.</p>
<h2>Formal recognition</h2>
<p>On June 1, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yeG0T1apeBo">Prime Minister Justin Trudeau visited the Raptors’ practice facility to announce Canada’s first National Day Against Gun Violence</a>. His announcement was backstopped by a <a href="https://www.canadagazette.gc.ca/rp-pr/p2/2023/2023-05-24/html/si-tr16-eng.html">formal Federal Government Proclamation</a>.</p>
<p>In addition, Ontario was the first province to take concurrent action with a formal Day Against Gun Violence. The day before, <a href="https://www.chrisglovermpp.ca/">MPP Chris Glover</a> made a public announcement on the steps of the Ontario legislature, accompanied by a coalition of community members concerned with and impacted by gun violence. </p>
<p>Similarly, the symbolic announcement was backstopped by <a href="https://www.ola.org/en/legislative-business/bills/parliament-43/session-1/bill-119">Ontario Bill 119</a>, a private members bill in its first reading.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/532289/original/file-20230615-21-l2j8qv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A group of people surround a podium" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/532289/original/file-20230615-21-l2j8qv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/532289/original/file-20230615-21-l2j8qv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/532289/original/file-20230615-21-l2j8qv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/532289/original/file-20230615-21-l2j8qv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/532289/original/file-20230615-21-l2j8qv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=568&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/532289/original/file-20230615-21-l2j8qv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=568&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/532289/original/file-20230615-21-l2j8qv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=568&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Toronto community members who were impacted by gun violence introduce the first Provincial Day Against Gun Violence in Ontario at Queen’s Park on June 2, 2023.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(J. Rozdilsky)</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<h2>Disaster mitigation</h2>
<p>Living with persistent gun violence results in community-level stress and trauma. The increasing number of Canadians who are being directly and indirectly impacted by gun violence is a <a href="https://globalresilience.northeastern.edu/disaster-unfolding-in-slow-motion-drastic-effect-of-gun-violence-on-resilience/">disaster unfolding in slow motion</a>.</p>
<p>The inaugural National Day Against Gun Violence in Canada can be considered as a form of disaster mitigation. In general, <a href="https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/mrgnc-mngmnt/dsstr-prvntn-mtgtn/bt-dsstr-mtgtn-en.aspx">disaster mitigation</a> includes a wide variety of measures taken before a disastrous event occurs. In this case, mitigation will not eliminate gun violence, but it can act to reduce it, prevent it from occurring, or help in better preparing for its aftermath. </p>
<p>In the coming years, Canada’s National Day Against Gun Violence will evolve and take on its own meanings. It has the potential to reduce risks associated with gun violence.</p>
<p>It remains as an open question as to how Canadians will treat this new day of awareness. Will it become a day of remembrance for gun violence victims? Or will it be a day where the growing contingent of gun violence survivors makes a call to action for safer communities? </p>
<p>Or will it just be another opportunity for political posturing by those who are either for or against Canada’s gun legislation?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/206960/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jack L. Rozdilsky does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Canada’s first National Day Against Gun Violence paves the way forward to help mitigate gun violence and promote healing for survivors.Jack L. Rozdilsky, Associate Professor of Disaster and Emergency Management, York University, CanadaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2040122023-04-21T16:48:34Z2023-04-21T16:48:34Z‘Stand your ground’ laws empower armed citizens to defend property with violence – a simple mistake can get you shot, or killed<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/522359/original/file-20230421-1621-lz4cxm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=87%2C43%2C7208%2C4812&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The door Ralph Yarl mistakenly rang, almost costing the teen his life.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/RalphYarlWrongHouse/3568a70c5dc6489fa0877b2216595cb2/photo?Query=Ralph%20Yarl&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=56&currentItemNo=15">AP Photo/Charlie Riede</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In one key respect, Ralph Yarl was fortunate. The wounds the 16-year-old suffered after being <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/19/us/yarl-gillis-shooting-missouri-ny.html">shot twice on April 13, 2023</a>, by the owner of the house whose doorbell he rang, thinking it was where he was due to pick up his two younger brothers, <a href="https://www.kshb.com/news/local-news/ralph-yarl-released-from-hospital-recovering-at-home-attorney-says">did not prove fatal</a>.</p>
<p>Others who have made similar mistakes have died. Take <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/the-killing-of-renisha-mcbride">Renisha McBride</a>, who sought help after wrecking her car in a Detroit suburb in 2013, or <a href="https://www.tampabay.com/news/crime/2022/10/19/new-details-emerge-shooting-death-19-year-old-university-tampa-student/">Carson Senfield</a>, who entered the wrong car in Tampa – thinking it was his Uber – on his 19th birthday. And then there is the case of 20-year-old <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/18/us/woman-shot-wrong-driveway-upstate-new-york/index.html">Kaylin Gillis</a>, a passenger in a car that turned around in a driveway in upstate New York on April 15, 2023. What these young people have in common is that they were killed in accidental encounters with armed property owners.</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.harvard.edu/carolinelight/home">scholar who has studied</a> America’s <a href="https://gened.fas.harvard.edu/classes/guns-us-love-story">love affair with guns and lethal self-defense</a>, I have explored the history of <a href="http://www.beacon.org/Stand-Your-Ground-P1254.aspx">laws that selectively shield citizens from criminal responsibility</a> when they use force and claim self-defense. Since 2005, these “<a href="https://giffords.org/lawcenter/gun-laws/policy-areas/guns-in-public/stand-your-ground-laws/">stand your ground</a>” laws have <a href="https://giffords.org/lawcenter/gun-laws/policy-areas/guns-in-public/stand-your-ground-laws/">spread to around 30 states</a>, transforming the United States’ legal landscape.</p>
<p>While preexisting <a href="https://theconversation.com/rittenhouse-verdict-flies-in-the-face-of-legal-standards-for-self-defense-171908">laws regarding justifiable use of force</a> allowed the use of lethal force for self-defense in some circumstances, they required that people first try to retreat from a perceived threat if it was safe to do so or to seek a nonlethal solution to a hostile encounter. Stand your ground laws, meanwhile, authorize defensive violence without a duty to retreat, wherever a person may legally be. Some also expand the circumstances in which someone could use lethal force to defend property.</p>
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<p>Although the laws appear to apply to all law-abiding citizens, research shows that they are <a href="https://firearmslaw.duke.edu/2022/01/the-dangerous-expansion-of-stand-your-ground-laws-and-its-racial-implications/">not equitably enforced</a>, and that they may be emboldening property owners to shoot first and question their actions later, even when there is no real threat of harm.</p>
<p>Certainly that seems to be the case with the shooting of Yarl. The wounding of the Black teen, who was simply trying to pick up his siblings, generated <a href="https://account.kansascity.com/paywall/stop?resume=274448350">widespread outrage</a>, especially when Kansas City Police Chief Stacey Graves suggested that investigators would consider whether the shooter – an 84-year-old white man – might have recourse to the state’s <a href="https://revisor.mo.gov/main/OneSection.aspx?section=563.031">stand your ground</a> law as a defense against prosecution.</p>
<p>Given that the encounter took place on the shooter’s property, there is a possibility the shooter could find legal protection in the “<a href="https://www.ncsl.org/civil-and-criminal-justice/self-defense-and-stand-your-ground">castle doctrine</a>,” which allows someone to use reasonable force – without first trying to retreat – in self-defense in their home. But he would still have to show reasonable cause for firing two shots at the unarmed teen standing at his front door.</p>
<h2>Defining ‘reasonable’ force</h2>
<p>It seems that in the case of Yarl, state prosecutors believe that the bar of reasonable cause was not met. Andrew D. Lester, the homeowner, has <a href="https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/ralph-yarl-shooting-investigation-04-17-23/index.html">since been charged</a> with two counts: assault in the first degree and armed criminal action.</p>
<p>This does not preclude the defense from invoking Lester’s right to “stand his ground” and use force in self-defense, if his lawyers can show Lester truly believed Yarl posed a real threat.</p>
<p>Missouri’s <a href="https://revisor.mo.gov/main/OneSection.aspx?section=563.031">stand your ground law</a>, in place since 2016, removes the duty to retreat anywhere a person may legally be, even beyond one’s “castle.” But you still need to prove that force is used reasonably, that it was not carried out in aggression or anger, and that there was a genuine fear for your life.</p>
<p>Indeed, the resolution of cases like the Yarl shooting turn on a highly subjective reckoning of what counts as reasonable force, and on which side – prosecution or defense – bears the burden of proof.</p>
<p>Traditional laws on the use of force place that burden on the alleged self-defender, who must prove that their actions were reasonable. But some other states with stand your ground laws, like Florida, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/23/opinion/a-stand-your-ground-expansion-that-expands-inequality.html">remove the burden of proof</a> from the defense, placing it on the prosecution.</p>
<p>This means that the prosecution must prove that the alleged self-defender was not truly fearful when using force. In some instances, as in the shooting of Senfield after he tried to enter a car he misidentified as his Uber, the stand your ground law becomes a shield against prosecution. <a href="https://www.wgrz.com/article/news/crime/case-closed-no-charges-carson-senfield-shooting-death/71-3732fef9-8390-40ba-8acd-6480353525dc">No charges have been filed</a> in that case, in large part because there were no other witnesses to contradict the shooter’s claim that he was in fear for his life when Senfield tried to enter his car.</p>
<h2>Increase in gun homicides</h2>
<p>Contrary to the <a href="https://www.salon.com/2017/03/02/stand-your-ground-everywhere-republicans-seek-to-expand-gun-immunity-laws-across-the-country/">claims of the framers and promoters</a> of stand your ground laws, there is <a href="https://giffords.org/lawcenter/gun-laws/policy-areas/guns-in-public/stand-your-ground-laws/">scant empirical evidence</a> that the laws prevent crime. In fact, <a href="https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/stand-your-ground.html">multiple studies</a> show just the opposite. </p>
<p>Research on public health and crime reveals a pernicious effect of stand your ground laws on public safety, showing a correlation with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.0077">increased rates of gun homicide</a>. One study, which includes an assessment of Missouri’s law, found that the passage of stand your ground laws correlates with an <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.0077">8% to 11% increase</a> in firearm homicide rates.</p>
<p>An <a href="https://everytownresearch.org/report/stand-your-ground-laws-are-a-license-to-kill/">analysis of stand your ground cases in Florida</a>, carried out by gun violence prevention group Everytown for Gun Safety, addressed the way removal of the duty to retreat encourages violent escalation; researchers suggested that over half the cases could have been resolved without loss of life. </p>
<p>Further, recent scholarship shows how stand your ground laws <a href="https://firearmslaw.duke.edu/2022/01/the-dangerous-expansion-of-stand-your-ground-laws-and-its-racial-implications/">intensify existing racial injustices</a> in the U.S. criminal legal system. <a href="https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/stand-your-ground-laws-and-racial-bias">A study by the think tank Urban Institute</a> found significant discrepancies in the rate at which homicides in stand your ground cases were deemed justified, depending on the race of the shooter and the race of the deceased. White shooters were significantly more likely to to be exonerated when their victim was Black, suggesting that – particularly in states with stand your ground laws – white people may feel more legally empowered to use lethal force and avoid prosecution, as long as their victims are Black.</p>
<h2>Encouraging armed citizenry</h2>
<p>In the Yarl case, the possible presence of racial bias has not <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/andrew-lester-kansas-city-man-accused-shooting-ralph-yarl-custody-rcna80147">escaped the attention of Kansas City prosecutors</a>. Lester’s grandson has <a href="https://nypost.com/2023/04/20/grandson-of-ralph-yarl-shooting-suspect-says-grandpa-has-racist-views/">described his grandfather</a> as a QAnon devotee with “racist tendencies and beliefs” that likely prompted his violent reaction to Yarl’s presence on his doorstep.</p>
<p>Against the backdrop of historical legacies of racial bias in the U.S., stand your ground laws intensify the risks of shooting deaths in an increasingly <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/interactive/2023/police-ar-15-gun-control/">gun-saturated public</a>. With laws that encourage armed citizens to use force against any perceived threat – real or imagined – even the most innocent mistakes and chance encounters can turn deadly.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/204012/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Caroline Light is affiliated with Street Philosophy Institute (SPI) and the Center for Antiracist Research (CAR) at Boston University. </span></em></p>Laws shielding from prosecution those who kill and maim citing self-defense have spread across the states and may be fueling a ‘shoot now, think later’ mindset among homeowners.Caroline Light, Senior Lecturer on Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality, Harvard UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2028082023-03-30T21:54:40Z2023-03-30T21:54:40ZNova Scotia’s Mass Casualty Commission calls for stricter gun control laws<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518587/original/file-20230330-1012-k6nvxx.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C6134%2C4021&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Friends, family and supporters of the victims of the mass killings in rural Nova Scotia in 2020 react at the release of the final report of the Mass Casualty Commission inquiry in Truro, N.S.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darren Calabrese</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/nova-scotia-s-mass-casualty-commission-calls-for-stricter-gun-control-laws" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>The final report of the Mass Casualty Commission investigating the <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/18-confirmed-killed-canada-s-deadliest-mass-shooting-officials-expect-n1188471">April 2020 mass shooting in Nova Scotia that left 22 people dead</a> makes several recommendations to meaningfully change Canada’s gun laws.</p>
<p>The commission’s <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/final-report/">seven-volume report</a> addresses its <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/about/mandate/">broad mandate</a>, which includes:</p>
<ul>
<li> Considering the “causes, context and circumstances giving rise to the tragedy.” </li>
<li> The police response to the shootings.</li>
<li> The role of gender-based and intimate partner violence.</li>
<li> Access to firearms.</li>
</ul>
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<p>The commission identifies many “<a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/files/documents/Turning-the-Tide-Together-Executive-Summary.pdf">lessons learned</a>” that inform its recommendations about firearms. It concludes that a priority “should be placed on reducing access to the most dangerous, high-capacity firearms and ammunition.” </p>
<p>It also concludes that current firearms laws don’t adequately protect against the unlawful transfer of guns upon the death of owners, and that effective border control requires a collaborative and co-ordinated approach among border agencies to potential weapons smuggling.</p>
<h2>Women at risk</h2>
<p>The commission also determined that the safety of women survivors of intimate partner violence is “put at risk by the presence of firearms and ammunition in the household.”</p>
<p>It also notes that firearm laws are inconsistently enforced, and that the current approach to gun control is hampered by inadequate community engagement with those involved in addressing gender-based violence and implementing firearms policy.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/mass-casualty-commission-report-details-the-nova-scotia-shooters-abuse-of-sex-workers-202228">Mass Casualty Commission report details the Nova Scotia shooter's abuse of sex workers</a>
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<p>The Mass Casualty Commission further recognizes that the public often lacks accurate knowledge about gun laws. </p>
<p>It warns that Canadian beliefs are “influenced by the United States discourse centred on a right to bear arms,” which “does not exist in our constitutional and legal structure.” The commission also laments that discourse about firearms “has become increasingly polarized.”</p>
<p>Finally, the commission finds that there is a lack of community knowledge about the impact of firearms-related harms, and that some people do not have safe and accessible ways to report concerns over guns.</p>
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<h2>Limiting access to some firearms</h2>
<p>These lessons learned shape the commission’s many recommendations, including:</p>
<ul>
<li>Better data collection to limit gun smuggling.</li>
<li>Setting limits on the stockpiling of ammunition by individual firearms owners.</li>
<li>Undertaking a nationwide public education program to increase public awareness of firearm laws.</li>
</ul>
<p>The lesson that a priority “should be placed on reducing access to the most dangerous, high-capacity firearms and ammunition” leads the commission to recommend that Ottawa:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Prohibit all semi-automatic handguns and all semi-automatic rifles and shotguns that discharge centre-fire ammunition and that are designed to accept detachable magazines with capacities of more than five rounds.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This recommendation is noteworthy given the recent heated debate over gun control. Since coming to power, the Liberals under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau have reformed Canada’s gun laws. For example, Ottawa banned the <a href="https://pm.gc.ca/en/news/news-releases/2022/10/21/freezing-market-handguns">sale and transfer of handguns</a> in 2022.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A dark-haired man with a solemn expression on his face enters a room." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518588/original/file-20230330-2194-g5ctxr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518588/original/file-20230330-2194-g5ctxr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518588/original/file-20230330-2194-g5ctxr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518588/original/file-20230330-2194-g5ctxr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518588/original/file-20230330-2194-g5ctxr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518588/original/file-20230330-2194-g5ctxr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518588/original/file-20230330-2194-g5ctxr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Prime Minister Justin Trudeau arrives in Truro, N.S., prior to the Mass Casualty Commission inquiry’s final report into the mass murders in rural Nova Scotia in 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darren Calabrese</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Later that year, the Liberals also introduced amendments to their current gun control bill, <a href="https://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/44-1/SECU/meeting-50/minutes">Bill C-21</a>, to prohibit some semi-automatic rifles and shotguns <a href="https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/may-2020/the-liberal-governments-incomplete-assault-style-rifle-ban/">not captured</a> in earlier prohibitions. </p>
<p>The amendments also included a revised firearms <a href="https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/firearms/classes-firearms">classification system</a> to prevent new models of firearms similar to those prohibited previously from entering the market.</p>
<h2>A non-partisan analysis</h2>
<p>The Bill C-21 amendments proved controversial partly because critics argued they were <a href="https://theline.substack.com/p/matt-gurney-memo-to-david-lametti">politically motivated</a>. The Liberals <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/ottawa-withdraws-firearms-law-amendments-1.6735828">withdrew them</a> in February, but the Mass Casualty Commission now recommends a similar effort to limit access to the kinds of semi-automatic weapons often employed by <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28971349/">mass shooters</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518592/original/file-20230330-16-rr9y4z.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A grey-haired man speaks into a microphone. A sign that reads Mass Casualty Commission is on the front of the podium." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518592/original/file-20230330-16-rr9y4z.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518592/original/file-20230330-16-rr9y4z.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518592/original/file-20230330-16-rr9y4z.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518592/original/file-20230330-16-rr9y4z.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518592/original/file-20230330-16-rr9y4z.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518592/original/file-20230330-16-rr9y4z.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518592/original/file-20230330-16-rr9y4z.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Commissioner Michael MacDonald delivers remarks in September 2022 at the end of the public hearings of the Mass Casualty Commission inquiry into the mass murders in rural Nova Scotia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This is significant, because the commission is a <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/about/the-commissioners/">non-partisan body</a>. The chair of the commission, Michael MacDonald, is a retired Nova Scotia chief justice. The other commissioners are Leanne J. Fitch, who served for seven years as Chief of Police for the Fredericton Police Force, and Kim Stanton, a lawyer and legal scholar.</p>
<p>The commission developed its recommendations after extensive study and analysis. It is the most ambitious, thorough and open study of a mass casualty in Canadian history. It collected and made publicly available an extensive set of primary source documents and it shared “<a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/documents/foundational-documents/">foundational documents</a>” containing key facts and events.</p>
<p>It also examined and <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/files/documents/COMM0063226.pdf">summarized national</a> <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/documents/commissioned-reports/#international-scan">and international</a> reports prepared in response to similar mass shootings. </p>
<p>It commissioned and published 23 <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/documents/commissioned-reports/">expert reports and technical reports</a> to help the commissioners better understand the issues related to its mandate. And it broadcast, recorded, transcribed and published <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/webcast/">its proceedings</a>.</p>
<p>Groups for and against gun control received status as participants in the commission. The <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/files/documents/Final-Written_CCGC.pdf">Coalition for Gun Control</a> was a participant, as were the <a href="https://masscasualtycommission.ca/files/documents/Final-Written_CCFR-CNFA.pdf">National Firearms Association and Canadian Coalition for Firearm Rights</a>. These groups provided written submissions, examined documents and spoke before the commission.</p>
<p>In the end, the commission found the evidence presented by those who support stronger gun laws more persuasive. Its final report asserts the importance of “affirming that gun ownership is a conditional privilege,” not a right.</p>
<p>The pressing question now is whether — and, if so, how quickly — the federal government will implement the Mass Casualty Commission’s gun policy recommendations.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/202808/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>R. Blake Brown was commissioned by the Mass Casualty Commission to write an Expert Report on the history of gun control.</span></em></p>The Mass Casualty Commission into the mass shooting in Nova Scotia in 2020 makes several recommendations to meaningfully change Canada’s gun laws.R. Blake Brown, Professor, History, Saint Mary’s UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2010702023-03-27T12:23:20Z2023-03-27T12:23:20ZWhy don’t parents like their kids to play with toy guns?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517278/original/file-20230323-28-6zjl2u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=1035%2C1107%2C6237%2C4190&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Even playing with a fake gun comes with risks.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/children-playing-with-water-gun-squirt-in-the-royalty-free-image/1280086198">sarote pruksachat/Moment via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/curious-kids-us-74795">Curious Kids</a> is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to <a href="mailto:curiouskidsus@theconversation.com">curiouskidsus@theconversation.com</a>.</em></p>
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<blockquote>
<p><strong>Why don’t parents like their kids to play with fake guns? – Henry, age 11, Somerville, Massachusetts</strong></p>
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<hr>
<p>A major reason parents don’t like kids to play with pretend guns is they’re afraid you’ll get hurt.</p>
<p>It can be hard for others to tell if a gun is real or just a toy. While you and your friends might be able to tell it’s a harmless game, others won’t be so sure. Someone could mistake your toy gun for a real gun, see you as a threat and try to defend themselves, hurting you in the process.</p>
<p><a href="https://wisqars.cdc.gov/reports/?o=MORT&y1=2020&y2=2020&t=0&i=0&m=20890&g=00&me=0&s=0&r=0&e=0&yp=65&a=5Yr&g1=0&g2=15&a1=0&a2=199&r1=INTENT&r2=NONE&r3=NONE&r4=NONE">Hundreds of children die because of gun violence each year</a> in the United States. Because of these numbers, people like us – <a href="https://epi.washington.edu/faculty/rivara-frederick/">a pediatrician</a> who has worked on firearm violence for 40 years and a <a href="https://psychiatry.uw.edu/profile/laura-prater/">firearm injury prevention researcher</a> – are very concerned about firearms that are not stored properly and the injuries they can cause.</p>
<p>Some of the toy guns available for kids and parents to buy look very much like real guns, including pistols and rifles. Because these toys look so real, kids who come across a real gun may not realize it’s dangerous and not a toy. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.107.6.1247">They may pick it up, fiddle around with it</a>, point it at a friend or themselves and pull the trigger. <a href="https://wisqars.cdc.gov/reports/?o=MORT&y1=2020&y2=2020&t=0&i=0&m=20890&g=00&me=0&s=0&r=0&e=0&yp=65&a=5Yr&g1=0&g2=15&a1=0&a2=199&r1=INTENT&r2=NONE&r3=NONE&r4=NONE">More than 100 children are killed</a> each year in the U.S. because they or a friend were handling a gun that unintentionally went off.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517279/original/file-20230323-2435-yuecbw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="boy playing with colorful water gun" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517279/original/file-20230323-2435-yuecbw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/517279/original/file-20230323-2435-yuecbw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517279/original/file-20230323-2435-yuecbw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517279/original/file-20230323-2435-yuecbw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517279/original/file-20230323-2435-yuecbw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517279/original/file-20230323-2435-yuecbw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/517279/original/file-20230323-2435-yuecbw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Certain kinds of games and play can influence how kids try to solve real world problems.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/boy-in-park-shooting-pump-action-water-pistol-royalty-free-image/103579216">moodboard/Image Source via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Violent games encourage violence</h2>
<p>Playing with toy guns can also affect the way you interact with the world and think about how to solve problems. Researchers have found that just seeing weapons can make people act more aggressively – this is called the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037//0022-3514.58.4.622">weapons effect</a>, and it applies to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jamapediatrics.2013.3824">toy guns</a>. After watching a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jamapediatrics.2017.2229">movie that contains a lot of gun violence</a>, kids tend to be more interested in playing with guns, too. These are reasons parents may want to limit kids’ exposure to movies and TV shows that feature guns and prefer for kids to play with nonweapon toys.</p>
<p>Playing games that involve violence can make you <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chc.2021.06.005">more comfortable with violence and aggression</a>. Kids can even <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.adolescence.2003.10.002">become more violent themselves</a>. Researchers have found that kids who play a lot of violent video games tend to show more <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2019.4319">signs of aggression</a> than those who don’t play them.</p>
<p>We worry that kids who play a lot of shooting video games and with toy guns will believe that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2013.09.004">settling arguments with violence and guns</a> is the right thing to do, when there are more constructive ways to resolve disputes.</p>
<h2>Real guns are not toys</h2>
<p>Adults who have firearms at home have a responsibility to keep them locked up and to prevent anyone from inappropriately accessing and using them. But some people who have firearms <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.1447">don’t lock them up</a>. Or they keep them loaded with ammunition, which is very unsafe. It is always best to treat a gun as if it is real and loaded.</p>
<p><a href="https://kidshealth.org/en/kids/gun-safety.html">What should kids do</a> if they find a firearm in their home or at a friend’s? The answer is very simple: Do not touch it. Leave it alone and tell an adult – even if you think it may be a toy. Checking it out yourself may cause the gun to go off accidentally and hurt someone if it turns out to be real.</p>
<p>The same is true at school. If you find a gun or hear classmates talking about a firearm, tell a teacher. Even if you worry your friends will get mad, telling a teacher could help prevent a serious or even deadly injury.</p>
<p>Parents who are responsible gun owners will teach their children about gun safety and how to handle and shoot them safely. But if you’re a school-age kid, you should never handle a gun by yourself.</p>
<p>Playing with or handling guns – real or fake – is dangerous and can be deadly.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Hello, curious kids! Do you have a question you’d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to <a href="mailto:curiouskidsus@theconversation.com">CuriousKidsUS@theconversation.com</a>. Please tell us your name, age and the city where you live.</em></p>
<p><em>And since curiosity has no age limit – adults, let us know what you’re wondering, too. We won’t be able to answer every question, but we will do our best.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201070/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Frederick Rivara receives funding from NIH. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Laura Prater does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Even fake guns can be dangerous if they are mistaken for real ones by the police or other armed adults.Frederick Rivara, Professor of Pediatrics, School of Medicine, University of WashingtonLaura Prater, Research Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, School of Medicine, University of WashingtonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2007932023-03-16T12:33:43Z2023-03-16T12:33:43Z54% of firearm deaths in the US are from suicide – and easy access to a gun is a key risk factor<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514028/original/file-20230307-18-j1qfg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Suicide deaths involving firearms have increased over last decade.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/old-semi-automatic-hand-gun-royalty-free-image/1249406015">Josiah S/iStock/Getty Images Plus</a></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514546/original/file-20230309-20-2qyuqj.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514546/original/file-20230309-20-2qyuqj.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=255&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514546/original/file-20230309-20-2qyuqj.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=255&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514546/original/file-20230309-20-2qyuqj.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=255&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514546/original/file-20230309-20-2qyuqj.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=321&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514546/original/file-20230309-20-2qyuqj.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=321&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514546/original/file-20230309-20-2qyuqj.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=321&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p>More than half – 54% – of all firearm deaths in the United States in 2021 were attributable to suicide, according to <a href="http://wonder.cdc.gov/mcd-icd10-expanded.html">February 2023 data</a> from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. </p>
<p>Suicide deaths involving firearms – the <a href="http://wonder.cdc.gov/mcd-icd10-expanded.html">most common means of suicide</a> in the U.S. – have increased 28% since 2012. Groups particularly at risk <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/258916/number-of-firearm-suicide-deaths-in-the-united-states-by-gender/">include men</a> <a href="https://www.mentalhealth.va.gov/suicide_prevention/data.asp">and veterans</a>, who are more likely to have access to and experience with firearms. Research also suggests that alcohol use is a significant risk factor for gun-related suicides, as opposed to suicides involving less lethal means. This is particularly true for <a href="https://www.doi.org/10.1136/injuryprev-2012-04031710.1136/injuryprev-2012-040317">young adults and middle-aged people</a>.</p>
<p>Access to firearms is a <a href="http://www.doi.org/10.7326/M13-1301">key risk factor for suicide</a> due to their high lethality. Suicide attempts that involve firearms end in death <a href="http://www.doi.org/10.7326/M19-1324">90% of the time</a>. Suicide is often an impulsive act, and when a person has access to swift and lethal means such as a firearm, there is limited opportunity to intervene or allow for a suicidal impulse to pass. </p>
<p>It is a common myth that once a person has made up their mind to die by suicide it is not possible to prevent them from doing so. In fact, most individuals who survive an attempt <a href="http://www.doi.org/10.1192/bjp.181.3.193">do not attempt suicide again</a>, and those who survive an initial attempt using one method are <a href="http://www.doi.org/10.1056/NEJM199112053252305">unlikely to switch</a> <a href="http://www.doi.org/10.1176/appi.ajp.2013.12091256">to a different method</a>.</p>
<p>These findings underscore the importance of <a href="http://www.doi.org/10.1146/annurev-publhealth-031811-124636">restriction of access to firearms</a> as a <a href="https://afsp.org/extreme-risk-protection-orders#what-the-research-shows">critical suicide prevention strategy</a>. </p>
<p>Research indicates that storing a firearm safely <a href="http://www.doi.org/10.1136/jech.2003.017343">reduces the risk</a> of the owner – as well as others, including any <a href="http://www.doi.org/10.1001/jamapediatrics.2019.1078">children living in the home</a> – dying by suicide. </p>
<p><a href="https://project2025.afsp.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Toolkit_Safe_Firearm_Storage_CLEARED_508_2-24-20.pdf">Firearm safety measures</a> include gun safes, lockboxes, storing firearms separate from ammunition, and either <a href="http://www.doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2019.305545">voluntarily</a> or involuntarily removing firearms from the home when a person has a mental health condition or other warning signs for suicide risk.</p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/red-flag-laws-saved-7-300-americans-from-gun-deaths-in-2020-alone-and-could-have-saved-11-400-more-185009">Nineteen states</a> – <a href="https://casetext.com/statute/california-codes/penal-code-pen/part-6-control-of-deadly-weapons-16000-34370/title-2-weapons-generally-17500-19405/division-32-gun-violence-restraining-orders-18100-18205">California</a>, <a href="https://law.justia.com/codes/connecticut/2018/title-29/chapter-529/section-29-38c/">Connecticut</a>, <a href="https://www.flsenate.gov/laws/statutes/2018/790.401">Florida</a> and <a href="https://mdcourts.gov/district/ERPO">Maryland</a> among them – as well as the <a href="https://oag.dc.gov/public-safety/dcs-red-flag-law-removing-guns-potentially">District of Columbia</a> have enacted so-called <a href="https://theconversation.com/red-flag-laws-saved-7-300-americans-from-gun-deaths-in-2020-alone-and-could-have-saved-11-400-more-185009">red flag laws</a>. These allow law enforcement, family members and sometimes school administrators or health care professionals to petition the court to remove a firearm from the home of a person at risk of harming themselves or others.</p>
<p>In addition to these measures, policymakers and care providers can address other risk factors for suicide as part of a comprehensive suicide prevention strategy. This includes <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30285348/">screening and identifying</a> people who are at high risk, treating underlying mental health conditions, improving <a href="https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/essays/mental-health-access-and-suicide.html">access to mental health care</a> and encouraging <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/suicide/factors/index.html">stronger family and community connections</a>. Prevention priorities also include reducing <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/suicide/factors/index.html">risk factors</a> such as exposure to violence, financial strain and chronic illness.</p>
<p>Another strategy is training friends, teachers, clergy, coaches and other community members in assessing suicide risk and referring individuals to resources. This <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/13811118.2018.1509749">has been shown</a> to increase both the likelihood that a trained helper offers needed assistance, as well as the likelihood that the person who is suffering seeks help.</p>
<p><em>If you or someone you know is in crisis, call 988 to speak with a trained listener. Veterans can press 1 after dialing 988 to connect directly to the Veterans Crisis Lifeline. Or, text HELLO to 741741. Both services are free, available 24/7, and confidential.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200793/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Heidi Zinzow receives funding from the National Science Foundation and Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. She has previously received funding from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration and National Institutes for Health.</span></em></p>Keeping weapons locked away and unloaded reduces the risk of death by suicide for gun owners and their children.Heidi Zinzow, Professor of Psychology, Clemson UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1922922023-02-14T13:27:19Z2023-02-14T13:27:19Z‘Closure is a myth’: A school psychologist explains how to help students and teachers deal with grief after a school shooting<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/509856/original/file-20230213-18-e7nzrr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=20%2C10%2C6689%2C4456&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Simply returning to a school where a shooting took place can be a struggle for many students.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/elementary-african-american-girl-with-mom-on-first-royalty-free-image/1152649948?phrase=fearful%20students&adppopup=true">fstop123 via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Whenever a school shooting takes place, such as the one that claimed the lives of three adults and three children at a Christian school in Nashville, Tennessee, on March 27, 2023, school officials often arrange for grief counseling services to be made available for whoever needs them. But what exactly do those services entail?</em></p>
<p><em>To answer that question, The Conversation reached out to Philip J. Lazarus, a school psychology professor at Florida International University who counseled students and educators affected by the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, which took place in Parkland, Florida, on Valentine’s Day, 2018.</em> </p>
<p><em>Below, Lazarus recounts some of the experiences he had as he provided grief counseling. He also offers insights on what students and educators need as the nation confronts record levels of shootings with <a href="https://theconversation.com/five-years-after-parkland-school-shootings-havent-stopped-and-kill-more-people-198224">higher and higher death tolls</a>.</em></p>
<h2>Shattered sense of security</h2>
<p>A few days after Parkland, a seventh grade boy at a nearby school told me his plan for how to make schools safer.</p>
<p>“We need to have a conveyor belt to check all kids for guns, then we need to have bulletproof windows on the outside, then we need to have bulletproof closets that we can all run into in case a shooter enters the building,” the boy told me at the time. “We need to put up a 10-foot barbed-wire fence outside the playground, and more police.”</p>
<p>I wondered if this is the future we as a society want. Five years later, more elements of that future are now here.</p>
<p>In Newport News, Virginia, for example, officials decided to install 90 walk-through <a href="https://www.13newsnow.com/article/news/local/mycity/newport-news/newport-news-school-board-update-richneck-elementary-shooting/291-649e59eb-8cf4-4352-bb8b-0d1a0128e3e7#:%7E:text=%E2%80%94%20All%20schools%20in%20Newport%20News,school%20officials%20announced%20Thursday%20afternoon.">metal detectors in schools across the district</a>. The measure comes in response to one of the most shocking cases of a school shooting – one in which a first grader reportedly shot and wounded his teacher, Abigail Zwerner, at Richneck Elementary School in Newport News on Jan. 6, 2023.</p>
<p>In Texas, tens of millions of dollars were spent on <a href="https://www.khou.com/article/news/local/texas/50-million-grant-program-ballistic-shields-texas-schools/285-d372fc47-1559-462f-b04b-3858fa468f37">providing schools with ballistic shields</a> for school police officers. Some schools have installed <a href="https://www.globenewswire.com/en/news-release/2022/07/12/2478202/0/en/National-Safety-Shelters-Partners-With-School-District-to-Improve-School-Security-With-Safety-Pods.html">bulletproof “safety pods”</a> to protect students against active shooters.</p>
<p>When tragedies like the ones in Parkland; Newport News; Uvalde, Texas; and Nashville take place, they don’t affect just the school itself – they affect surrounding schools as well. Which is why, when I returned a few days after the Parkland shooting from the National Association of School Psychologists convention in Chicago to Broward County, where I live and where the Parkland shooting took place, I connected with Frank Zenere, one of my former students, an adjunct lecturer at Florida International University and the crisis coordinator for Miami-Dade County Public Schools, as well as a team from Nova Southeastern University and another team of school psychologists from Volusia County to provide psychological intervention. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.nasponline.org/books-and-products/products/books/titles/school-crisis-the-prepare-model-2nd-edition">These interventions</a> included debriefing students, which means students talking about their reactions to the horrific event, short-term individual and group counseling, and consultation with school leaders and parents about how to handle children’s grief and how best to open reopen schools.</p>
<h2>Fears and uncertainty</h2>
<p>One thing all school-based mental health providers learn in crisis intervention is that all students have a story to tell, <a href="https://www.perlego.com/book/1554947/creating-safe-and-supportive-schools-and-fostering-students-mental-health-pdf?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&campaignid=15825112969&adgroupid=132780878835&gclid=CjwKCAiA3KefBhByEiwAi2LDHNSDG_QcZfbiJ63pweSIasQJ7H1YnMPpXNdarXVMFkKuc4CUspkLjBoCsDYQAvD_BwE">even if they have problems articulating their thoughts</a>.</p>
<p>The job of the mental health provider is to listen. However, listening is often not enough. After Parkland, some students in the surrounding area were afraid to enter their own schools. A few were concerned that they would be attacked by a copycat killer. Some students emotionally broke down. </p>
<p>One sixth grade boy I met at a nearby charter school was afraid to go into his school building, and I was contacted by the principal to help. The boy just stood outside. So, I walked up to him and started talking and asked him why he did not walk home if he was so afraid. He told me that his parents drove him to this charter school, and he lived more than 10 miles away. I asked him if I walked right next to him and did not leave his side if he would be willing to go inside the building. He agreed. We talked for about 30 minutes. He said, “My body does not feel well. It doesn’t feel right, it feels crazy inside, and I cannot describe it.” </p>
<p>I told him that his feelings were normal. Then he was asked to rate his level of well-being from 1 to 10 from when he arrived at school to now, with 1 meaning feeling great to 10 meaning feeling terribly scared and anxious. He responded that when he entered my temporary office in the school, it was an 11, and now after about 30 minutes of recounting his experiences, reactions and feelings with me, he was at a 5 or 6. </p>
<p>He told me that he was taking yoga classes, and I worked with that to his advantage. I taught him how to imagine yoga music reverberating through his body to help him calm down. I taught him how he could make the music go faster or slower, louder or softer, and how to regulate his breathing. This provided him a sense of control over his internal feelings. Through a series of other techniques, such as using deep breathing, he learned how to enter a highly relaxed state. He reported by the end of our 90-minute meeting that he was now a 2. </p>
<p>I asked him to practice what he had learned at least three times before he came to school the following day. The next day he saw me and rushed up and said, “I’m a 1.”</p>
<h2>Normalcy is elusive</h2>
<p>Sadly, as my colleague Frank told me, for many others the interventions will not be as easy or the responses as quick. </p>
<p>For example, young people directly affected by a tragedy, especially those in classrooms where students were killed, will require deep understanding, empathy and guidance from family, friends, teachers, religious leaders and mental health professionals as they struggle to cope. Some may require <a href="https://grievingstudents.org">years of therapy</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/10377761">Closure is a myth</a>. The trauma and grief may never go away. Yet young people can learn lessons from the past and move forward with help from their friends, families, faith, communities and mental health providers. For all those affected, their lives will never be the same, but with care and understanding from others and by focusing on the future, they can recover and thrive.</p>
<p><em>This article was updated to reflect a shooting that took place in Nashville, Tennessee, on March 27, 2023.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/192292/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Philip J. Lazarus does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Students may need a listening ear and reassurance in the aftermath of having witnessed a school shooting.Philip J. Lazarus, Associate Professor, Counseling, Recreation and School Psychology, Florida International UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1984862023-01-25T00:10:21Z2023-01-25T00:10:21ZTypical mass shooters are in their 20s and 30s – suspects in California’s latest killings are far from that average<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506204/original/file-20230124-16-st7p3u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=15%2C106%2C3531%2C2255&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Two deadly mass shootings have California on edge.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/APTOPIXCaliforniaShooting/067f0d30edf4470ab167896ccb42161b/photo?Query=Monterey%20Park%20Jae%20C.%20Hong&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=99&currentItemNo=37">AP Photo/Jae C. Hon</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The two men who <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/california-staggered-by-deadly-back-to-back-mass-shootings-2023-01-24/">shot dead 18 people in separate incidents</a> just days apart in California are the latest perpetrators in America’s long history of mass gun violence. But something about these public shootings, and the men held responsible, stands out.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.theviolenceproject.org/key-findings/">median age of mass shooters in the United States is 32</a>. Yet the man who is alleged to have <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/24/us/monterey-park-california-mass-shooting-tuesday/index.html">shot dead 11 people in Monterey Park</a> on Jan. 21, 2023, before turning the gun on himself <a href="https://www.npr.org/2023/01/24/1150818507/the-suspected-monterey-park-attacker-was-72-heres-why-older-shooters-are-rare">was 72 years old</a> – the <a href="https://www.theviolenceproject.org/key-findings/">oldest mass shooter in modern American history</a>, our records show. Meanwhile, the gunman who <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/24/us/half-moon-bay-california-shootings-tuesday/index.html">took the lives of seven more in Half Moon Bay</a> two days later was also <a href="https://apnews.com/article/northern-california-shootings-3eb00c19a36ad129ca7f0063f4b2aaf9">older than most</a> — 66, the third-oldest in history. </p>
<p><a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=iS4HAEMAAAAJ">We</a> are <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=hoHQX8MAAAAJ&hl=en">criminologists</a> who <a href="https://www.theviolenceproject.org">built a database</a> of 191 mass shooters using public data. The shooters in our records date back to 1966 and are coded on nearly 200 different variables, including age at the time of attack. Our research shows that mass shootings – <a href="https://www.theviolenceproject.org/methodology/">defined here</a> as events in which four or more people are killed in a public place with no underlying criminal activity – have become more frequent, and deadly, over time.</p>
<p><iframe id="dScJ5" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/dScJ5/5/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Prior to the January 2023 Californian shootings, mass shooters were also <a href="https://www.axios.com/2022/06/02/mass-shooting-killers-young-teens">getting younger overall</a>. From 1980 to 1989, the median age of mass shooters was 39. Over the next two decades, it was 33. And from 2010 to 2019, it was 29. </p>
<p>Since 2020, the median age of mass shooters has come down to just 22 years old — mostly young men and boys who were born into or came of age in an <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2014/06/12/political-polarization-in-the-american-public/">increasingly divided America</a> and carried out their attacks <a href="https://doi.org//10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.9393">amid the disruption of a global pandemic</a>.</p>
<h2>Older mass shooter behind deadliest assault</h2>
<p>Ages vary by shooting location, <a href="https://www.theviolenceproject.org/mass-shooter-database/">the data shows</a>. Though mass shooters at offices, warehouses and houses of worship skew older, shooters at K-12 schools, colleges and universities tend to be younger – in large part because many school shooters tend to be current or former students.</p>
<p>Prior to the tragic incidents in Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay, just six mass shooters in our study were over the age of 60. The oldest was a <a href="https://www.upi.com/Archives/1981/10/17/Mountain-town-shocked-by-shooting-outburst/9178372139200/">70-year-old who killed five people</a> at an auto parts store in Kentucky in 1981. The list also includes the perpetrator of the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history – a 64-year-old who <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/las-vegas-shooting/las-vegas-police-investigating-shooting-mandalay-bay-n806461">killed 60 people at a 2017 music festival</a> in Las Vegas.</p>
<p>The others were a 66-year-old who was supposed to turn himself in to serve a prison sentence but instead <a href="https://murderpedia.org/male.B/b/baker-william.htm">killed four people at the manufacturing plant</a> where he used to work in Illinois in 2001; a 64-year-old who <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2013/03/14/upstate-new-york-herkimer-mohawk-suspect-surrounded/1986913/">killed four barbershop and oil change shop patrons</a> in rural New York in 2013; a 62-year-old who <a href="https://www.fosters.com/story/news/local/2017/02/22/author-to-speak-at-library-about-colebrook-shooting/22146250007/">killed four people</a> in 1997 in New Hampshire, including two state troopers and a judge; and a 60-year-old <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-04-25-mn-990-story.html">who killed six at a shopping center</a> in Palm Bay, Florida, in 1987.</p>
<p>Nearly all of the over-60s perpetrators of mass shootings prior to the January 2023 Californian incidents were white men – just one was a nonwhite male. This differs in the Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay incidents, both of which are thought to have been carried out by Asian Americans.</p>
<h2>Less likely to leak details of attack</h2>
<p>Mass shooters over 60 also tend to have prior criminal records and to target their place of employment, or retail and outdoor locations in communities they knew well.</p>
<p>What separates the older mass shooters from their younger counterparts is that mass shooters in their 20s and 30s typically study previous mass shooters for inspiration and validation. Younger shooters also tend to <a href="https://doi.org//10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2021.33073">communicate intent to do harm</a> in advance. This practice, known as leakage, is often seen as a final cry for help. Younger shooters also tend to leave behind manifestos to communicate their anger and grievances to the world, the data shows. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.avb.2019.07.005">Analysis of their expressed motives</a> suggest they are seeking fame and notoriety for their actions. </p>
<p>None of the shooters aged 60 and above in our database did that – although investigations are ongoing in the back-to-back California cases. Instead, they tend to have experienced a recent stressor, such as a family conflict or debt. They are more likely to be motivated by legal, financial and interpersonal conflicts, not hate or fame-seeking like many of their younger counterparts.</p>
<p>But all perpetrators of mass shootings, young and old, have some things in common. Their mass shooting is intended to be their final act. Whether they die by suicide – as is <a href="https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-01-22/la-me-monterey-park-mass-shooting">seemingly the case with the alleged Monterey Park shooter</a>, are killed on scene, or <a href="https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-01-23/half-moon-bay-shooting-multiple-victims">sit and wait to be arrested like the Half Moon Bay suspect did</a>, mass shootings are a final act of hopelessness and anger. </p>
<p>They also have access to the firearms they need to commit these devastating crimes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198486/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jillian Peterson receives funding from the National Institute of Justice and the Joyce Foundation.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>James Densley has received funding from the National Institute of Justice and the Joyce Foundation. </span></em></p>Mass shooters over the age of 60 are rare, but often differ from younger gunmen in motives and actions prior to their attack.Jillian Peterson, Professor of Criminal Justice, Hamline University James Densley, Professor of Criminal Justice, Metropolitan State University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1983732023-01-24T18:40:32Z2023-01-24T18:40:32ZMonterey Park: A pioneering Asian American suburb shaken by the tragedy of a mass shooting<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506119/original/file-20230124-19-5f1ehp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=10%2C0%2C7309%2C4883&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A community in mourning.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/mourner-attends-a-candlelight-vigil-for-victims-of-a-mass-news-photo/1459049683?phrase=Monterey%20Park&adppopup=true">Qian Weizhong/VCG via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>For Americans of Asian descent, Monterey Park – a town near Los Angeles, located in the San Gabriel Valley – is a cultural center. </p>
<p>It embodies <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520345850/resisting-change-in-suburbia">the modern Asian American experience</a>; that is, a place where Asians in America can access and practice a diverse array of traditions and cultural pursuits in an environment where they are the norm, as opposed to marginal.</p>
<p>The tragic <a href="https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-01-22/la-me-monterey-park-mass-shooting">mass shooting of Jan. 21, 2023</a>, in which 11 people were killed by a gunman who later took his own life, has put an unwanted spotlight on a site held near and dear to the Asian diaspora in the U.S. As an <a href="https://www.usfca.edu/faculty/james-zarsadiaz">Asian American scholar who has written about the importance</a> of communities like Monterey Park, I know the trauma felt there will ripple across all of Asian America.</p>
<h2>Asian America’s ‘town square’</h2>
<p>Monterey Park is the <a href="https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/ethnoburb-the-new-ethnic-community-in-urban-america/">original Asian “ethnoburb”</a> – that is, a suburb featuring a large, palpable concentration of immigrants or refugees and their kin. Businesses and community spaces in the town often reflect the cultural sensibilities and needs of these populations.</p>
<p>In the case of Monterey Park, Chinese immigrants from Hong Kong, Taiwan and, later, Mainland China and Vietnam have shaped the suburb’s landscapes and lifestyles for decades.</p>
<p>Like other inner-ring <a href="https://calisphere.org/exhibitions/40/california-and-the-postwar-suburban-home/">suburbs of postwar Los Angeles</a>, Monterey Park offered modest, affordable homes. It appealed to white mainly middle-class buyers who wanted to be near, but not in, the city.</p>
<p>In the 1950s and 1960s, a handful of Latino and <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-04-19-ga-1788-story.html">Japanese American families</a> settled in the predominantly white community, making Monterey Park a relatively diverse suburb for the era. That diversity would only grow in the late 1970s when <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1999/08/20/us/frederic-hsieh-is-dead-at-54-made-asian-american-suburb.html">Frederic Hsieh</a> – a Chinese investor – purchased property in Monterey Park and dubbed it the future “Chinese Beverly Hills.” </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="A man in dark pants and a light blazer sits on a car in front of a building with 'Mandarin Realty Co. Inc' written on it." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506121/original/file-20230124-20-wyj60f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506121/original/file-20230124-20-wyj60f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=895&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506121/original/file-20230124-20-wyj60f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=895&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506121/original/file-20230124-20-wyj60f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=895&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506121/original/file-20230124-20-wyj60f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1124&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506121/original/file-20230124-20-wyj60f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1124&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506121/original/file-20230124-20-wyj60f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1124&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Real estate broker Fred Hsieh.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/FredHsieh/f9f6f4f194bc4b28b9baa876ec6936b8/photo?Query=Monterey%20Park&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:asc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=428&currentItemNo=5">AP Photo/Wally Fong</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Hsieh believed its location was ideal for like-minded immigrants in search of the suburban good life. And his transnational effort in making Monterey Park a magnet for Chinese families worked. During the 1980s, settlers from Hong Kong and Taiwan bought homes. Within a decade, Chinese restaurants, shops, language schools, and community organizations dotted Monterey Park’s hills and boulevards. </p>
<h2>Building a community</h2>
<p>While Asian Americans found a handful of sympathetic allies across racial lines in their efforts to turn Monterey Park into a vibrant immigrant community, they also <a href="https://www.latimes.com/local/la-xpm-2013-aug-03-la-me-english-signs-20130804-story.html">encountered critics</a> who claimed they did not “Americanize” enough. Naysayers condemned Chinese-language business signage or Asian-owned properties that transgressed Monterey Park’s aesthetic norms.</p>
<p>Over time, dissatisfied white <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-04-12-ga-991-story.html">suburbanites left Monterey Park</a>. Those who stayed built multiracial coalitions for the sake of moving forward. Today, <a href="https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/montereyparkcitycalifornia/PST045222">Monterey Park is two-thirds Asian</a>, with Chinese residents comprising the majority.</p>
<p>With the passage of time and the rapid growth of Asian settlers, Monterey Park became known as the “first suburban Chinatown.” With its overtly Asian strip malls and plazas, Monterey Park’s novelty is its difference – showcasing the diaspora all day, every day, in the most “typical” of American landscapes: the suburbs.</p>
<h2>Ripples of grief</h2>
<p>And now, Monterey Park must contend with what is also an all-too-familiar part of the American landscape: <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/gun-violence-7990">gun violence</a>.</p>
<p>Residents in Monterey Park – and in neighboring ethnoburbs like Alhambra, San Gabriel and Rosemead – have been left shaken. But the news and images from the mass shooting will haunt all Asian Americans because of the location’s familiarity. Monterey Park’s Lunar New Year celebrations were not unlike gatherings throughout the country: house parties with families and friends dressed to the nines, restaurants open long hours to serve the community, and dance halls packed with multigenerational revelers. Those tender moments were ruined in just minutes.</p>
<p>While the <a href="https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-01-23/jealousy-possible-motives-in-monterey-park-shooting">motives of the perpetrator</a> are under investigation, the tragedy in America’s “first suburban Chinatown” revealed that there is still much to do in keeping our communities safe. Moreover, for countless Asian Americans, grief has become all too familiar as <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/anti-asian-hate-crimes-increased-339-percent-nationwide-last-year-repo-rcna14282">anti-Asian hate crimes have risen</a> across the nation – sparking initial concern that the shooting might have been race-related.</p>
<p>Time will tell how Monterey Park recovers, but at least the community there can take comfort in knowing that millions of Asian Americans will be alongside their journey.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198373/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>James Zarsadiaz does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Once seen as the Chinese Beverly Hills, Monterey Park is now seen as Asian America’s ‘town square’ – the impact of a mass shooting there will ripple across the country.James Zarsadiaz, Associate Professor of History, University of San FranciscoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1983662023-01-23T21:15:26Z2023-01-23T21:15:26ZHorror and anguish are playing out on repeat following the latest mass shooting – and the mental health scars extend far beyond those directly affected<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505949/original/file-20230123-7861-4i7gf6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=26%2C142%2C5909%2C3737&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The mass shooting at a dance studio in Monterey Park, Calif., is the latest in an endless string of gun violence tragedies.
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/CaliforniaShooting/adecd28f335647b9a565166a7d3e540f/photo?Query=monterey%20park%20shooting&mediaType=photo&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=79&currentItemNo=36">AP Photo/Jae C. Hong</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Yet another <a href="https://ktla.com/news/local-news/monterey-park-shooting/suspect-dead-2/">community is stricken with grief</a> in the wake of the horrific shooting at Monterey Park, California, on Jan. 21, 2023, that left <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/01/23/monterey-park-mass-shooting/">11 people dead and 9 more wounded</a>. Families and friends of the victims, as well as those who were injured, are no doubt gripped with grief, anguish and despair. </p>
<p>In addition to those who are experiencing direct loss, such events also take a toll on others, including those who witnessed the shooting, first responders, people who were nearby and those who hear about it through the media.</p>
<p>I am a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=UDytFmIAAAAJ&hl=en">trauma and anxiety researcher and clinician</a>, and I know that the effects of such violence reach millions. While the immediate survivors are most affected, the rest of society suffers, too.</p>
<h2>First, the immediate survivors</h2>
<p>It is important to understand that no two people experience such horrific exposure in the same way. The extent of the trauma, stress or fear can vary. Survivors of a shooting may want to avoid the neighborhood where the shooting occurred or the context related to shooting, such as grocery stores, if the shooting happened at one. In the worst case, a survivor may develop post-traumatic stress disorder. </p>
<p>PTSD is a debilitating condition that develops after exposure to serious traumatic experiences such as war, natural disasters, rape, assault, robbery, car accidents – and, of course, gun violence. Nearly 8% of the <a href="https://www.ptsd.va.gov/understand/what/ptsd_basics.asp">U.S. population deals with PTSD</a>. <a href="https://www.ptsd.va.gov/professional/treat/essentials/dsm5_ptsd.asp">Symptoms include</a> high anxiety, avoidance of reminders of the trauma, emotional numbness, hypervigilance, frequent intrusive memories of trauma, nightmares and flashbacks. The brain switches to fight-or-flight mode, or survival mode, and the person is always waiting for something terrible to happen. </p>
<p>When the trauma is caused by people, as in a mass shooting, the impact can be profound. The rate of PTSD in mass shootings may be as high as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1176/ajp.151.1.82">36% among survivors</a>. Depression, another debilitating psychiatric condition, occurs in as many as <a href="https://theconversation.com/syrian-refugees-in-america-the-forgotten-psychological-wounds-of-the-stress-of-migration-96155">80% of people with PTSD</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505951/original/file-20230123-24-5g23yh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two women embrace each other, one with a tear-stained face, at a daytime gathering to honor the victims killed in the ballroom dance studio shooting in Monterey Park, California." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505951/original/file-20230123-24-5g23yh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505951/original/file-20230123-24-5g23yh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505951/original/file-20230123-24-5g23yh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505951/original/file-20230123-24-5g23yh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505951/original/file-20230123-24-5g23yh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505951/original/file-20230123-24-5g23yh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505951/original/file-20230123-24-5g23yh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jolie Slater, right, and Beth Paz, from Lake Avenue Church, embrace each other at a gathering held to honor the victims killed in the Jan. 21, 2023, ballroom dance studio shooting in Monterey Park, Calif.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/CaliforniaShooting/7027b43e6ead4afa93ae360e3de6f86e/photo?Query=monterey%20park%20shooting&mediaType=photo&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=79&currentItemNo=11">AP Photo/Jae C. Hong</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Survivors of shootings may also experience <a href="https://www.ptsd.va.gov/understand/types/mass_violence_help.asp">survivor’s guilt</a>, the feeling that they failed others who died or did not do enough to help them, or just guilt at having survived. </p>
<p>PTSD can improve by itself, but many people need treatment. There are effective treatments available in the form of psychotherapy and medications. The more chronic it gets, the more negative the impact on the brain, and the harder to treat.</p>
<p>Children and adolescents, who are developing their worldview and deciding how safe it is to live in this society, may suffer even more. Exposure to horrific experiences such as school shootings or related news can fundamentally affect the way people perceive the world as a safe or unsafe place, and how much they can rely on the adults and society in general to protect them. </p>
<p>They can carry such a worldview for the rest of their lives, and even transfer it to their children. Research is also abundant on the <a href="https://theconversation.com/howard-stern-talks-childhood-trauma-and-a-trauma-psychiatrist-talks-about-its-lasting-effects-118027">long-term detrimental impact</a> of such childhood trauma on a person’s <a href="https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubpdfs/long_term_consequences.pdf">mental and physical health</a> and their ability to function through their adult life.</p>
<h2>The effect on those close by, or arriving later</h2>
<p>PTSD can develop not only through personal exposure to trauma, but also via exposure to others’ severe trauma. Humans have survived as a species particularly because of the ability to fear as a group. That means we <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-science-of-fright-why-we-love-to-be-scared-85885">learn fear and experience terror through exposure</a> to the trauma and fear of others. Even seeing a frightened face in black and white on a computer will make our <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fnbeh.2015.00154">amygdala</a>, the fear area of our brain, light up in brain imaging studies. </p>
<p>People in the vicinity of a mass shooting may see exposed, disfigured, burned or dead bodies. They may also see injured people in agony, hear extremely loud noises and experience chaos and terror in the post-shooting environment. They must also face the unknown, or a sense of lack of control over the situation. The fear of the unknown plays an important role in making people feel insecure, terrified and traumatized. </p>
<p>A group whose chronic exposure to such trauma is usually overlooked is the first responders. While victims and potential victims try to run away from an active shooter, <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-aching-blue-trauma-stress-and-invisible-wounds-of-those-in-law-enforcement-146539">the police</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-aching-red-firefighters-often-silently-suffer-from-trauma-and-job-related-stress-164994">firefighters</a> and paramedics rush into the danger zone. </p>
<p>Many of these first responders might have their own children in that school or nearby. They frequently face uncertainty; threats to themselves, their colleagues and others; and terrible bloody post-shooting scenes. This exposure happens to them too frequently. PTSD has been reported in up to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2015.06.015">20% of first responders</a> to mass violence. </p>
<h2>Widespread panic and pain</h2>
<p>People who were not directly exposed to a disaster but who were <a href="https://doi.org/10.3402/ejpt.v3i0.19709">exposed to the news</a> also experience distress, anxiety or even PTSD. This happened <a href="https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.288.5.581">after 9/11</a>. Fear, the coming unknown – is there another strike? are other co-conspirators involved? – and reduced faith in perceived safety may all play a role in this. </p>
<p>Repeated media exposure to the circumstances surrounding a tragic event, including images of the aftermath of a shooting, can be highly stressful to survivors, those who lost loved ones and to first responders. In my clinic, I hear from affected people that repeatedly seeing the event on the news, as well as having others ask them about their experiences, can bring painful memories to the surface. Some first responders I’ve worked with try to hide their occupation from others to prevent being asked about such events.</p>
<p>Every time there is a mass shooting in a new place, people learn that kind of place is now on the not-very-safe list. People worry not only about themselves but also about the safety of their children and other loved ones.</p>
<h2>Is there any good to come of such tragedy?</h2>
<p>We can channel the collective agony and frustration to encourage meaningful changes, such as making gun laws safer, opening constructive discussions, informing the public about the risks and calling on lawmakers to take real action. In times of hardship, humans often can raise the sense of community, support one another and fight for their rights, including the right to be safe at schools, concerts, restaurants and movie theaters.</p>
<p>One beautiful outcome of the tragic shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue in October 2018 was the solidarity of the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2018/10/28/respond-evil-with-good-muslim-community-raises-money-victims-synagogue-shooting/">Muslim community with the Jewish</a>. This is especially productive in the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-politics-of-fear-how-it-manipulates-us-to-tribalism-113815">current political environment</a>, with fear and division being so common.</p>
<p>Sadness, anxiety, anger and frustration can be channeled into actions such as becoming involved in activism and volunteering to help the victims. It is also important not to spend too much time watching television coverage; turn it off when it stresses you too much.</p>
<p>Finally, studies have shown that exposure to media coverage for several hours daily following a collective trauma <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1316265110">can lead to high stress</a>. So check the news a couple of times a day to be informed, but don’t continue seeking out coverage <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-protect-your-family-from-horrific-news-images-and-still-stay-informed-181818">and exposure to graphic images and news</a>. The news cycle tends to report the same stories without much additional information.</p>
<p>_Editor’s Note: This is an updated version of an article originally published on <a href="https://theconversation.com/mass-shootings-leave-emotional-and-mental-scars-on-survivors-first-responders-and-millions-of-others-157935">March 26, 2021</a>. It was updated with the news of an 11th death on Jan. 23, 2023.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198366/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Arash Javanbakht does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Even people who are only indirectly exposed to these repeat tragedies, such as first responders and those affected by media coverage, can experience profound and long-lasting grief.Arash Javanbakht, Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Wayne State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1982182023-01-19T21:22:32Z2023-01-19T21:22:32ZWhat is involuntary manslaughter? A law professor explains the charge facing Alec Baldwin for ‘Rust’ shooting death<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505468/original/file-20230119-26-w9y9jg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=48%2C169%2C5345%2C3315&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Alec Baldwin accidentally shot and killed a cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins, in late 2021 while filming a movie in New Mexico.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/PropFirearmMovieSet/373f9ec3a3014e6c985d1d165d7bca12/photo?Query=alec%20baldwin%20rust&mediaType=photo&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=63&currentItemNo=25">AP Photo/Jae C. Hong</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A prosecutor in New Mexico <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/19/arts/rust-shooting-charges-alec-baldwin.html">intends to charge Alec Baldwin</a> with two counts of involuntary manslaughter it was announced on Jan. 19, 2023, over the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/21/us/alec-baldwin-shooting-rust-movie.html">deadly shooting</a> on the set of the film “Rust” in 2021. The shooting occurred while Baldwin was rehearsing a scene with a gun that had been loaded with live ammunition instead of blanks. The prosecutor also intends to charge Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, the <a href="https://www.careersinfilm.com/armorer/">armorer</a> responsible for <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/after-rust-shooting-industry-veterans-say-buck-stops-armorers-movie-n1282743">overseeing the safety of firearms</a> on the set, with two counts of involuntary manslaughter as well. </p>
<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=X8tNfOsAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">professor of law</a>, my job is to understand the nuance of the U.S. legal system. Involuntary manslaughter occurs when a person unintentionally, but still unlawfully, kills another person. And a prosecutor will need to show the unlawful nature of either Baldwin’s or Gutierrez-Reed’s actions to get a conviction in this case.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505472/original/file-20230119-16395-n9cbqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A number of handgun cartridges with the tops pinched closed and no bullet." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505472/original/file-20230119-16395-n9cbqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505472/original/file-20230119-16395-n9cbqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505472/original/file-20230119-16395-n9cbqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505472/original/file-20230119-16395-n9cbqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505472/original/file-20230119-16395-n9cbqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=490&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505472/original/file-20230119-16395-n9cbqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=490&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/505472/original/file-20230119-16395-n9cbqf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=490&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Baldwin thought the gun was loaded with blanks, ammunition that contains powder but not a bullet.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Buffalo_Blanks_Mounted_Shooting_Blanks.jpg">KenAmorosano/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<h2>A reckless or negligent accident</h2>
<p>To convict someone of involuntary manslaughter, a prosecutor has to prove that the defendant <a href="https://www.findlaw.com/criminal/criminal-charges/involuntary-manslaughter-overview.html">acted either recklessly or with criminal negligence</a>.</p>
<p>To prove someone acted recklessly, a prosecutor has to show that the defendant was aware of the risk they were creating with their actions – like a drunk driver crashing into a car and <a href="https://www.ksdk.com/article/news/crime/driver-convicted-involuntary-manslaughter-killed-baby-2-parents-jefferson-co/63-e9d29793-5187-446e-9067-96e8f29e0806">killing a baby and her parents</a>. In contrast, the charge of criminal negligence is filed when a defendant is not aware of the risk, but a reasonable person in the position of the defendant would have been aware of the risk. For example, if someone rents out an apartment without smoke detectors and there is a fire that kills the occupants, the owner of the apartment could be charged with involuntary manslaughter.</p>
<p>The question for a potential jury is whether Baldwin was guilty of either reckless or criminally negligent actions that resulted in the death of <a href="https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/halyna-hutchins-in-her-own-words/ar-AA16wWuh">Halyna Hutchins</a>, the cinematographer on the “Rust” set. </p>
<p>The prosecutor is alleging that <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/19/arts/rust-shooting-charges-alec-baldwin.html?">Baldwin had a duty</a> to ensure that the gun and the ammunition he used were properly checked and that without doing that check himself, Baldwin should never have pointed the gun at anyone. Although that is what the prosecutor is claiming, a complicating factor is that there was another person, an on-set safety person responsible for the weapons and ammunition. </p>
<p>To convict Baldwin of manslaughter – assuming the case goes to trial – the prosecutor will have to convince a jury of two things. First, that Baldwin could not reasonably rely on Gutierrez-Reed to do her job and ensure that the gun did not have any live ammunition in it. And second, that Baldwin acted recklessly, or at least with criminal negligence, by not checking the gun and the ammunition himself before pointing the gun at the person he killed.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198218/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter A. Joy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>To convict Alec Baldwin of manslaughter for the on-set deadly shooting of Halyna Hutchins in 2021, prosecution will need to show that the actor was either reckless or criminally negligent.Peter A. Joy, Henry Hitchcock Professor of Law, School of Law, Washington University in St. LouisLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1975972023-01-12T13:20:36Z2023-01-12T13:20:36ZHow does a child become a shooter? Research suggests easy access to guns and exposure to screen violence increase the risk<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/504081/original/file-20230111-18-oyusqn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C8%2C2747%2C1826&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The shooting of an elementary school teacher by one of her students is a shocking example of gun violence.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/police-tape-hangs-from-a-sign-post-outside-richneck-news-photo/1246066075?phrase=virginia%20teacher&adppopup=true">Jay Paul/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the aftermath of a shocking incident in which a <a href="https://theconversation.com/first-grader-who-shot-teacher-in-virginia-is-among-the-youngest-school-shooters-in-us-history-197392">first grader shot and seriously injured a teacher</a> at a school in Newport News, Virginia, the city’s mayor <a href="https://twitter.com/Phil_Jones_757/status/1611843035905785856">asked the question</a>: “How did this happen?” </p>
<p>Some <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/6-year-old-unlikely-charged-teachers-shooting-parents-experts-say-rcna65176">details</a> are now known: The child took the gun from his home, and the firearm was <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/01/09/virginia-teacher-6-year-old-student-authorities-gun-shooting/11020209002/">legally purchased by his mother</a>.</p>
<p>Many other aspects of the incident have yet to be established – not least, the likely many factors that resulted in the boy shooting his teacher. But as <a href="https://www.asc.upenn.edu/people/faculty/dan-romer-phd">experts in media use</a> <a href="https://comm.osu.edu/people/bushman.20">and its connections to violence</a>, we have reported some disturbing findings about how children are influenced by gun violence depicted in media like television, movies and video games. What makes this more troubling is the fact that <a href="https://theconversation.com/most-school-shooters-get-their-guns-from-home-and-during-the-pandemic-the-number-of-firearms-in-households-with-teenagers-went-up-172951">millions of children in the U.S. have easy access</a> to firearms in their homes, increasing the risk of gun deaths, <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-easy-access-to-guns-at-home-contributes-to-americas-youth-suicide-problem-187744">including suicides</a>. </p>
<h2>The effect of media violence on children</h2>
<p>Research has shown that the depiction of gun violence is increasing in both <a href="https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2013-1600">movies</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0247780">on TV</a>. Our research found that acts of gun violence in PG-13 movies has nearly tripled in the 30 years since the rating was introduced in 1984. And PG-13 movies are not exclusively watched by teens and above. A <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/1018017/pg-13-movie-viewing-age-us/">survey of adults in 2019</a> found that 12% said they were allowed to watch PG-13 movies between the ages of 6 and 9, with 6% saying they watched such films aged even younger.</p>
<p>Although <a href="https://homeword.com/2019/01/22/movie-violence-doesnt-make-kids-violent-study-finds/#.Y78jYOzML9E">some skeptics say</a> violent media do not lead children to become more aggressive, a large survey conducted in 2015 found that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/ppm0000046">most pediatricians and media scholars agree</a> that there is a link. </p>
<p>Violent media can also lead children to engage in more dangerous behavior if they find a real gun. In studies one of us conducted, exposure to both <a href="https://doi.org//10.1001/jamapediatrics.2017.2229">movies</a> and <a href="https://doi.org//10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2019.4319">video games</a> with guns was found to encourage children ages 8-12 years old to pick up a real gun that had been hidden in a drawer and pull the trigger, including while pointing the gun at themselves or their friend. This behavior was observed by a hidden camera.</p>
<p>This is what can happen if parents do not store a gun in a secure location in the home.</p>
<p>The child in the Virginia shooting was younger than 8 years old, but there is no reason to believe the effects we found would differ in a younger child. In fact, the effects might be stronger in younger children because those younger than about 8 can have <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Fake-Fact-and-Fantasy-Childrens-Interpretations-of-Television-Reality/Davies/p/book/9780805820478">more difficulty distinguishing reality from fantasy</a>.</p>
<p>Violence in the media can desensitize or numb children to violence. In <a href="https://doi.org//10.1177/0886260515584337">one study</a>, researchers found that “children exposed to multiple sources of violence may become desensitized, increasing the possibility of them imitating the aggressive behaviors they watch and considering such behavior as normal.”</p>
<p>Movies containing gun violence that are rated PG-13 portray the use of guns <a href="https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2017-3491">in ways that are unrealistic</a>. The effects of gun use in such films are often sanitized so that one rarely sees much blood or serious harm, unlike what is typically shown in movies that are rated R. This could give a child the sense that using a gun to harm someone is not as dangerous as it actually could be.</p>
<p>What concerns us about these findings is that they come at a time of increased media consumption by younger children. A <a href="https://www.commonsensemedia.org/research/the-common-sense-census-media-use-by-tweens-and-teens-2021">2021 report</a> by Common Sense Media found that <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/16/health/covid-kids-tech-use.html">media use by children has risen faster</a> in the two years since the pandemic than the four years before. <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/fullarticle/2798256">Research has found</a> that children ranging in age from 5 to 11 years old spent an average of more than three hours a day on screens and consuming media during the pandemic. </p>
<h2>Guns in the home</h2>
<p>Children are naturally curious, and adults often <a href="https://theconversation.com/most-school-shooters-get-their-guns-from-home-and-during-the-pandemic-the-number-of-firearms-in-households-with-teenagers-went-up-172951">underestimate their ability to find guns</a> hidden in the home. As one <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2021/12/09/health/gun-safety-tips-for-home-parents-children-wellness/index.html">firearms expert noted</a>, “Their brains are developing. That same curiosity that can inspire them to pick up a book and want to learn how to read can inspire them to go looking for a parent’s gun.” </p>
<p>And the U.S. has <a href="https://www.smallarmssurvey.org/database/global-firearms-holdings">far more</a> civilian-owned guns per capita than any country in the world, with 120.5 guns per 100 residents – the next highest country is Yemen, with 52.8 guns per 100 residents.</p>
<p>The U.S. is also an outlier when it comes to gun-related violence, with rates about <a href="https://www.healthdata.org/acting-data/gun-violence-united-states-outlier">23 times higher</a> than in other developed countries. </p>
<p>Figures from the nonprofit organization Everytown for Gun Safety show that every year <a href="https://everytownresearch.org/report/notanaccident/">more than 300 people are either wounded or killed</a> in unintentional shootings by children. Data on the number of people shot by children intentionally is not, to our knowledge, available.</p>
<p>It is vital for gun owners to lock away firearms, unloaded, with ammunition stored separately – especially if there are children in the home. The <a href="https://www.aap.org/en/advocacy/state-advocacy/safe-storage-of-firearms/">American Academy of Pediatrics</a> recommends that all guns be secured to decrease “the risk of both unintentional gun injuries and intentional shootings.” Roughly a third of U.S. homes with children have guns, but <a href="https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2018/survey-more-than-half-of-u-s-gun-owners-do-not-safely-store-their-guns">less than half</a> of gun owners secure their guns. As of 2022, an estimated <a href="https://www.healthychildren.org/English/safety-prevention/at-home/Pages/Handguns-in-the-Home.aspx">4.6 million children in the U.S.</a> live in a home with unlocked, loaded guns.</p>
<p>What drove the child at an elementary school in Virginia to shoot his teacher is something that is not publicly known. But what the research clearly shows is that exposure to gun violence in media and easy access to firearms around the home all serve to increase the risks of any child picking up a gun.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/197597/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dan Romer receives funding from the National Institutes of Health and from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brad Bushman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Watching gun violence on screen can desensitize children to the harm caused by firearms.Brad Bushman, Professor of Communication and Rinehart Chair of Mass Communication, The Ohio State UniversityDan Romer, Research Director, Annenberg Public Policy Center, University of PennsylvaniaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1946142023-01-10T13:29:29Z2023-01-10T13:29:29ZGod and guns often go together in US history – this course examines why<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502489/original/file-20221221-20-q1wuth.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C2%2C1986%2C1502&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Views on guns are intertwined with views on God for many Americans.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/pistol-on-open-bible-royalty-free-image/157197798?phrase=gun%20god&adppopup=true">RichLegg/E+ via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Text saying: Uncommon Courses, from The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/uncommon-courses-130908">Uncommon Courses</a> is an occasional series from The Conversation U.S. highlighting unconventional approaches to teaching.</em> </p>
<h2>Title of course:</h2>
<p>“God and Guns: the History of Faith and Firearms in America”</p>
<h2>What prompted the idea for the course?</h2>
<p>As <a href="http://jslaughter01.faculty.wesleyan.edu">a religion professor</a>, I’ve come to know many students from other countries who identify as Christian. I realized they were puzzled at some of the things Americans often bundled into their faith – things these international Christians didn’t consider relevant to their own religious identity.</p>
<p>One issue in particular sparked a question from a South Asian Christian student: Why did American evangelicals seem to have such an affinity for firearms? For example, Pew Research indicates <a href="https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2017/november/god-gun-control-white-evangelicals-texas-church-shooting.html">41% of white evangelicals</a> own a firearm, compared with 30% of people in the U.S. overall. This unsettled the student, since they shared much of the same theology, and they wanted to know more about this connection.</p>
<p>I was embarrassed to admit that I didn’t have a satisfactory answer. Since I was trained as <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/122/article/766198">a historian of the 18th and early 19th centuries</a>, I suspected it wasn’t explained by the last 10 or 20 years. I knew we needed to go back and start with the Colonial era and work our way forward. This course is my humble attempt to answer these students’ questions.</p>
<h2>What does the course explore?</h2>
<p>We spend the first two weeks reading what the Bible says about violence. There are no firearms in the ancient text, of course – but there are plenty of other weapons.</p>
<p>For example, <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Judges+5&version=KJV">hymns of celebration</a> after <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Judges+4&version=KJV">defeating enemies</a>, such as when Jael hammers a peg through the head of the military commander Sisera in the Book of Judges, appear to celebrate violence.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+5&version=KJV">the Sermon on the Mount</a>, however, Jesus teaches his followers to turn the other cheek. What do American Christians think about these types of passages, and to what degree do they inform their approach to firearms? </p>
<p>The surprises in the text are endless, especially since very few of my students have ever read the Bible.</p>
<p>Our readings help contextualize key themes in American history as we move through the course: from the Colonial era, <a href="https://wwnorton.co.uk/books/9780393334906-our-savage-neighbors-5712a22d-99af-4f98-ab18-ca2a75a2180e">when firearms, religion and violence were intertwined aspects of settlers’ lives</a>, to the Cold War, when we discover how evangelicals embraced a <a href="https://wwnorton.com/books/9781631495731">masculine, warriorlike idea of Jesus</a>.</p>
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<img alt="A black and white old-fashioned portrait of a standing man with a long white beard in black clothing." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502500/original/file-20221222-22-kmbu5s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502500/original/file-20221222-22-kmbu5s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=846&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502500/original/file-20221222-22-kmbu5s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=846&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502500/original/file-20221222-22-kmbu5s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=846&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502500/original/file-20221222-22-kmbu5s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1063&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502500/original/file-20221222-22-kmbu5s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1063&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502500/original/file-20221222-22-kmbu5s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1063&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Portrait of John Brown (1800-1859).</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/portrait-of-john-brown-militant-abolitionist-that-seized-news-photo/615230680?phrase=%22john%20brown%22&adppopup=true">Corbis Historical via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>Together, we explore digital and archival sources that show a wide range of attitudes toward weapons. For example, the abolitionist <a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442236707/John-Brown-Speaks-Letters-and-Statements-from-Charlestown">John Brown’s prison letters</a> provide a fascinating window into how faith and firearms can be central to someone’s cause. Brown was a Christian who believed so strongly in abolishing slavery that he was convinced God had appointed him as his agent of violent judgment. The letters were written just prior to Brown’s execution in 1859, after his failed attempt to spark a slave uprising in Harper’s Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia).</p>
<h2>Why is this course relevant now?</h2>
<p>Americans live in a country where politicians’ platforms often focus on God and guns.</p>
<p>Some are overtly weaving it into their election pitch, such as U.S. Senate candidate <a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/news/mandel-campaigning-pro-god-guns-050100949.html">Josh Mandel</a> of Ohio, who called himself “pro-God, guns and Trump,” while other Republicans such as Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert and Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/christmas-card-guns-lauren-boebert-thomas-massie-start-new-culture-ncna1285709">included guns in Christmas messages</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A crowd holds signs, including one that says, 'God...guns...and guts...lets keep them all.'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502503/original/file-20221222-24-d330ay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/502503/original/file-20221222-24-d330ay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502503/original/file-20221222-24-d330ay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502503/original/file-20221222-24-d330ay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502503/original/file-20221222-24-d330ay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=518&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502503/original/file-20221222-24-d330ay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=518&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/502503/original/file-20221222-24-d330ay.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=518&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A crowd outside the Arizona State Capitol in Phoenix in 2013, during a Guns Across America rally.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/GodAndGuns/9c3ba87661c54684aaea8a29da4171d0/photo?Query=guns%20god&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=116&currentItemNo=4">AP Photo/Matt York</a></span>
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<h2>What’s a critical lesson from the course?</h2>
<p>American Christians, including evangelicals, are a diverse lot. The “peace church” tradition – the Mennonites, Amish and Quakers, among others – may not often grab headlines, but complicate the narrative about guns and God in U.S. culture. </p>
<p>Many other types of Christianity <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-06-01/the-role-of-religion-in-the-gun-control-debate/101114470">do not embrace firearms</a>, either. For example, Pew Research found that only 52% of Black Protestants have fired a gun, compared with <a href="https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2017/july/praise-lord-pass-ammunition-who-loves-god-guns-pew.html">a 72% average among all Americans</a>.</p>
<p>Yet from the time of the Puritans onward, many Christians <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691181592/as-a-city-on-a-hill">have viewed America as a divinely inspired nation</a> – an idea that often served to sanction violence, whether in a war for Indigenous lands, defending slavery or leading a revolt.</p>
<h2>What will the course prepare students to do?</h2>
<p>Hopefully this course will equip students to coherently answer the question of why American religious culture is so intertwined with gun culture – especially if the subject comes up at Thanksgiving dinner. </p>
<p>More seriously, the better that people in America understand how their predecessors viewed firearms, the more robust and productive debates will be over their place <a href="https://gunsandsocietycenter.com/">in American society today</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/194614/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joseph P. Slaughter does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Support for strong gun ownership rights is often associated with conservative Christian views, but religion and self-defense have a much longer history in the United States.Joseph P. Slaughter, Assistant Professor of the Practice in Religion and History and Associate Director of the Center for the Study of Guns and Society, Wesleyan UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.