I read this Wapo agitprop warning of how more and more dangerous guns are accumulating in the hands of fewer and fewer hate-filled racist sexist homophobic slack-jawed toothless cracker domestic terrorists clinging bitterly to their ancient weapons and hokie religions. Tried to work up a post, failed to care sufficiently to accomplish the task, thrashed about aimlessly, and found that Peter Grant had done a far superior job days before I even read the thing. So go read that instead.
Thumbed down through the comments, and someone there summed the matter up beautifully – rather sadly, given the holiday…
Ever go to a thrift store and see those old gun cases with a glass front, room for 7 or 8 rifles, a few drawers? The ones no one uses anymore? The guns now are locked away in a safe somewhere. That is the simile for US firearms owners- we have been vilified by the left, and the leftist owned press, for at least 50 years- Why would we expose ourselves to more potential attacks?
Genuine Americans with genuine values are not extinct in the land, despite the reports and the best efforts of those who take upon themselves the responsibility of writing lies on such matters. No longer welcome, they keep to themselves. But they live.
I can quickly see two very good explanations for the reduction in gun ownership over recent years as shown in that graph, and they are not mutually exclusive:
1) The increasing divide in this country between the “haves” and the “have not’s”. Simply put, as our middle class disappears we gain a higher proportion of working poor. To someone struggling to simply put a roof over their family’s head and to feed them, a gun may look like an unobtainable luxury.
2) With changing attitudes, more gun owners probably routinely deny that they own guns.
Also, if you were to extend that graph back to fronter times, I wouldn’t be surprised to see it start from nearly 100% gun ownership. In the macro, the graph merely demonstrates our move further and further away from the days when a family routinely “shot supper”.
Your Pic reminds me of a quote by John Wayne said in the Shootist:
“I won’t be wronged. I won’t be insulted. I won’t be laid a-hand on. I don’t do these things to other people, and I require the same from them.”
I think this has been one of the problems with the media. The leftest media is big on not being wronged, not being insulted and not having a hand laid upon them but for all others, like gun owners, everyone is fair game. I wonder how much they would howl if similar restrictions were placed upon their reporting as is placed on gun owners. If the second amendment in the American Constitution is out dated, wouldn’t it stand to reason that the first amendment could also use an over haul?
Give them a shiny badge that says; “official journalist” and they’ll be fine with any government restrictions.