Reply #30

Household firearms ownership rates in the US have declined steadily for about 35 years. Hunting and sports shooting (with long guns) have become much less popular and significantly fewer people are involved in them, thus in buying guns for them. High crime rates 35 years ago coincided with the industry's need for new products/markets. Voilà: handguns for the masses. Fifty years ago, handguns were much rarer among the general public.

But it isn't just corporations. It's the broader right wing.

Occuping society's public spaces is very important to the right wing. Vulnerable groups and individuals have to be kept in that state, and especially must not get uppity and start making demands.

The whole free-speech thing starting a few years ago was one front in the war. Horowitz and that ilk. Retaking campuses from the liberals; battling the PC army and making them safe for bigoted speech of all varieties. Free speech as a weapon against the enemy.

Guns serve the same purpose. In fact, the guns on campus crusade mimics its "free speech" on campus predecessor. Funded by the right wing, used by the right wing as an organizing tool, carried out by intimidation tactics. Ditto for "concealed carry" (let alone "open carry"). Let them all know that the right wing is there, everywhere, and armed to the teeth. The guns are heavily symbolic of the power they wield over anybody they don't like.

The NRA, of course, is a fully integrated wing of the right wing. It's the symbolic infantry.