Gun culture in the United States

Behaviors and attitudes about firearms in the United States

See also: Global gun cultures and Culture of the United States § Gun culture

Percent of households with guns in 2016. RAND Corporation.[1][2]

Gun culture in the United States refers to the behaviors, attitudes, and beliefs surrounding the ownership and use of firearms by private citizens. Gun ownership is deeply rooted in the country’s history and is legally protected by the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution. Firearms in the U.S. are commonly used for self-defense, hunting, and recreational activities.

Gun politics in the United States are highly polarized. Advocates of gun rights, typically aligned with conservative or libertarian views, emphasize the importance of the Second Amendment and oppose gun control. In contrast, those who support stricter gun control, often with liberal perspectives, advocate for more regulations to reduce gun violence. The gun culture in the United States is unique among developed nations due to the massive volume of firearms owned by civilians, the popularity of firearms for self-defense, hunting, and sporting activities, and a generally permissive regulatory environment.[3]

## History

[edit]

Firearms became readily identifiable symbols of westward expansion.

### American militia culture

[edit]

American attitudes on gun ownership date back to the American Revolutionary War, and also arise from traditions of hunting, militias, and frontier living.[4]

Justifying the unique attitude toward gun ownership in the United States, James Madison wrote in Federalist No. 46, in 1788:

> Those who are best acquainted with the last successful resistance of this country against the British arms, will be most inclined to deny the possibility of it. Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of. Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms. And it is not certain, that with this aid alone they would not be able to shake off their yokes. But were the people to possess the additional advantages of local governments chosen by themselves, who could collect the national will and direct the national force, and of officers appointed out of the militia, by these governments, and attached both to them and to the militia, it may be affirmed with the greatest assurance, that the throne of every tyranny in Europe would be speedily overturned in spite of the legions which surround it.[5]

Calamity Jane, pioneer frontierswoman and scout, at age 43. Photo by H.R. Locke.

The American hunting and sporting passion comes from a time when the United States was an agrarian, subsistence nation where hunting was a profession for some, an auxiliary source of food for some settlers, and also a deterrence to animal predators. A connection between shooting skills and survival among rural American men was in many cases a necessity and a rite of passage for manhood. Hunting endures as a central sentimental component of a gun culture to control animal populations across the country, regardless of modern trends away from subsistence hunting and rural living.[4]

The militia spirit derives from an early American dependence on arms to protect themselves from foreign armies and hostile Native Americans. Survival depended upon everyone being capable of using a weapon. Before the American Revolution there was neither budget nor manpower nor government desire to maintain a full-time army. Therefore, the armed citizen-soldier carried the responsibility. Service in militia, including providing one's own ammunition and weapons, was mandatory for all men. Yet, as early as the 1790s, the mandatory universal militia duty gave way to voluntary militia units and a reliance on a regular army. Throughout the 19th century, the institution of the civilian militia began to decline.[4]

Closely related to the militia tradition was the frontier tradition with the need for a means of self-protection closely associated with the nineteenth-century westward expansion and the American frontier. In popular literature, frontier adventure was most famously told by James Fenimore Cooper, who is credited by Petri Liukkonen with creating the archetype of an 18th-century frontiersman through such novels as The Last of the Mohicans (1826) and The Deerslayer (1840).[6]

Scotch-Irish Americans arguably best epitomized this frontier spirit. Emigrating from areas of Ireland and Scotland which had historically been economically poor and violent, these immigrants brought with them an intense pride, individualism and love of guns which would shape future decedent's views and help form the origin of American gun culture. Settling in Appalachia, the Scots-Irish would lead the push westward and eventually populate a band stretching from Appalachia to Texas and Oklahoma, and particularly after the Dust Bowl into Southern California.[7]

### African American gun culture

[edit]

Black Panther Party armed demonstration at the California State Capitol on May 2, 1967.

A distinct and growing sub-culture of American gun culture has been developed and promoted by African Americans since at least the end of the American Civil War. From Frederick Douglass, DuBois, Ida B. Wells and Marcus Garvey, the American Civil Rights movement, and the Pan-African movement, an array of African American gun cultures and philosophies of violence and self-defense have proliferated in American life.[8]

## Ownership levels

[edit]

The U.S. gun homicide rate is ~18 times the average in other developed countries.[9] The U.S. gun ownership rate is more than one per person.[9]

Gun-related death rates are positively correlated with household gun ownership rates.[10]

For both men and women, gun suicide death rates are positively correlated with household gun ownership rates.[11]

Annual gun production in the U.S. has increased substantially in the 21st century, after having remained fairly level over preceding decades.[12] By 2023, a majority of U.S. states allowed adults to carry concealed guns in public.[12]

U.S. gun sales have risen in the 21st century, peaking during the COVID-19 pandemic.[13][better source needed] "NICS" is the FBI's National Instant Background Check System.

Almost every major gunmaker produces its own version of the AR-15, with ~16 million Americans owning at least one.[14]

"Americans made up 4 percent of the world's population but owned about 46 percent of the entire global stock of 857 million civilian firearms."[15][attribution needed] U.S. civilians own 393 million guns. American civilians own more guns "than those held by civilians in the other top 25 countries combined."[16][attribution needed]

In 2018 it was estimated that U.S. civilians own 393 million firearms,[17] and that 40% to 42% of the households in the country have at least one gun. However, record gun sales followed in the following years.[18][19][20] The U.S. has by far the highest estimated number of guns per capita in the world, at 120.5 guns for every 100 people.[21]

As per 2023 survey, 32% of Americans own at least one firearm. From 1994 to 2023, 28% gun ownership increased in America. In which women ownership increased by 13.6%, and Hispanics ownership increased by 33.3%. [22]

Although historically there have been significant differences in respect to gun ownership between different races and sexes, that gap may be closing. For example, women and ethnic minorities saw the sharpest rise of private gun ownership in the United States in 2020 and the ongoing ownership trends do not indicate any sign of abatement.[23][24][25] Also, in 2020 and 2021 a sharp increase in gun ownership was seen due to the riots and pandemic during that time.[26][27] Nearly half of the gun buyers appeared to be first-time owners.[27] Over 2 million firearms were purchased during the pandemic alone.

According to Gallup, in 2020, 32% of U.S. adults said they personally own a gun, while a larger percentage, 44%, report living in a gun household.[28]

## Popular culture

[edit]

A handbill for Buffalo Bill's Wild West and Congress of Rough Riders of the World Visitors at a gun show, U.S.

In the late 19th century, cowboy and "Wild West" imagery entered the collective imagination. The first American female superstar, Annie Oakley, was a sharpshooter who toured the country starting in 1885, performing in Buffalo Bill's Wild West show. The cowboy archetype of the individualist hero was established largely by Owen Wister in stories and novels, most notably The Virginian (1902), following close on the heels of Theodore Roosevelt's The Winning of the West (1889–1895), a history of the early frontier.[29][30][31] Cowboys were also popularized in turn of the 20th century cinema, notably through such early classics as The Great Train Robbery (1903) and A California Hold Up (1906)—the most commercially successful film of the pre-nickelodeon era.[32]

Gangster films started in 1910, but became popular only with the advent of sound in film in the 1930s. The genre was boosted by the events of the prohibition era, such as bootlegging and the St. Valentine's Day Massacre of 1929, the existence of real-life gangsters such as Al Capone and the rise of contemporary organized crime and escalation of urban violence. These movies flaunted the archetypal exploits of "swaggering, cruel, wily, tough, and law-defying bootleggers and urban gangsters".[33]

Since World War II, Hollywood produced many morale-boosting movies, patriotic rallying cries that affirmed a sense of national purpose. The image of the lone cowboy was replaced in these combat films by stories emphasizing group efforts and the value of individual sacrifices for a larger cause, often featuring a group of men from diverse ethnic backgrounds who were thrown together, tested on the battlefield, and molded into a dedicated fighting unit.[34]

Guns frequently accompanied famous heroes and villains in late 20th-century American films, from the outlaws of Bonnie and Clyde (1967) and The Godfather (1972), to fictional law and order avengers such as Dirty Harry (1971) and RoboCop (1987). In the 1970s, fictional madmen ostensibly produced by the Vietnam War were central to films such as Taxi Driver (1976) and Apocalypse Now (1979), while the 1978 films Coming Home and The Deer Hunter told stories of fictional veterans who were victims of the war and in need of rehabilitation.[35] Many action films continue to celebrate the gun toting hero in fictional settings. The negative role of the gun in fictionalized modern urban violence has been explored in films such as Boyz n the Hood (1991) and Menace 2 Society (1993). Bowling for Columbine was a 2002 documentary by Michael Moore exploring gun culture in the United States.

## Political and cultural theories

[edit]

U.S. opinion on gun control issues is deeply divided along political lines, as shown in this 2021 survey.[36] Gun-related suicides and homicides in the United States[37]

Gun culture and its effects have been at the center of major debates in the US's public sphere for decades.[38] In his 1970 article "America as a Gun Culture,"[39] historian Richard Hofstadter used the phrase "gun culture" to characterize America as having a long-held affection for guns, embracing and celebrating the association of guns and an overall heritage relating to guns. He also noted that the US "is the only industrial nation in which the possession of rifles, shotguns, and handguns is lawfully prevalent among large numbers of its population". In 1995, political scientist Robert Spitzer said that the modern American gun culture is founded on three factors: the proliferation of firearms since the earliest days of the nation, the connection between personal ownership of weapons and the country's revolutionary and frontier history, and the cultural mythology regarding the gun in the frontier and in modern life.[40] In 2008, the US Supreme Court affirmed that the right of individuals to possess firearms is guaranteed by the Second Amendment.[41]

## Terms applied to opponents

[edit]

Terms used by gun rights and gun control advocates to refer to opponents are part of the larger topic of gun politics.

The term gun nut refers to firearms enthusiasts who are deeply involved with the gun culture. It is regarded as a pejorative stereotype cast upon gun owners by gun control advocates as a means of implying that they are fanatical, exhibit abnormal behavior, or are a threat to the safety of others.[42][43][44] Some gun owners embrace the term affectionately.[45]

The term hoplophobia refers to an "irrational aversion to firearms",[46] and US Marine Jeff Cooper claimed to have invented the term in the 1960s.[47]

## Foreign perspective

[edit]

The US attitude to guns generally perplexes those in other developed countries, many of whom do not understand the unusual permissiveness of American gun laws, and believe that the American public should push for harsher gun control measures due to mass shootings.[48][49][better source needed] Critics contrast the US reaction to terrorism given how few deaths it causes, with their high death rates from non-terror related gun crime.[50][51][better source needed]

## See also

[edit]

* Global gun cultures
* Gun control
* Gun ownership
* Gun politics
* Gun show loophole
* Gun violence in the United States
* Index of gun politics articles
* Second Amendment sanctuary

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Schell, Terry L.; Peterson, Samuel; Vegetabile, Brian G.; Scherling, Adam; Smart, Rosanna; Morral, Andrew R. (April 22, 2020). "State-Level Estimates of Household Firearm Ownership". RAND Corporation. Archived from the original on May 5, 2023. Click on "Download the Database", extract the xlsx file, and choose the data tab at the bottom. Select state data for particular year from the HFR column. There is 2016 data for all states. Sort the year column.
2. ^ "Gun Ownership in America". RAND Corporation. See 1980-2016 timeline graph: "This figure displays three-year rolling averages for household gun ownership rates in each state and the nation overall." Hover over state lines for year and percent. There is also a form to select state lines to show. Add one at a time.
3. ^ Fisher, Max (December 15, 2012). "What makes America's gun culture totally unique in the world, in four charts". Washington Post. Washington D.C. Retrieved January 25, 2014.
4. ^ a b c Spitzer, Robert J. (1995). The Politics of Gun Control. Chatham House. ISBN 9781566430227.
5. ^ "Federalist No. 46". The Avalon Project. Yale Law School. Retrieved 10 September 2019.
6. ^ Liukkonen, Petri. "James Fenimore Cooper". Books and Writers (kirjasto.sci.fi). Finland: Kuusankoski Public Library. Archived from the original on 23 August 2014.
7. ^ Fukuyama, Francis (2015) [2014]. Political Order and Political Decay: From the Industrial Revolution to the Globalization of Democracy (1st Paperback ed.). New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. pp. 141–142\. ISBN 9780374535629.
8. ^ Johnson, Nicholas (2014). Negroes and the Gun: The Black Tradition of Arms. Amherst, New York: Globe Pequot / Prometheus. p. 170\. ISBN 978-1-61614-839-3.
9. ^ a b Fox, Kara; Shveda, Krystina; Croker, Natalie; Chacon, Marco (November 26, 2021). "How US gun culture stacks up with the world". CNN. Archived from the original on November 26, 2021. "CNN's attribution: Developed countries are defined based on the UN classification, which includes 36 countries. Source: Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (Global Burden of Disease 2019), Small Arms Survey (Civilian Firearm Holdings 2017)"
10. ^ ● Mortality data from "Firearm Mortality by State". cdc.gov. Center for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics. 2022. Archived from the original on June 3, 2023. "The number of deaths per 100,000 total population. Source: wonder.cdc.gov"
● Household firearm ownership data from Schell, Terry L.; Peterson, Samuel; Vegetabile, Brian G.; Scherling, Adam; Smart, Rosanna; Morral, Andrew R. (April 22, 2020). "State-Level Estimates of Household Firearm Ownership". rand.org. RAND Corporation. Archived from the original on May 5, 2023. (Click on "Download the Database", extract the xlsx file, and choose the tab at the bottom of the xlsx file to see the long data listing, select data for particular year.)
11. ^ Siegel, Michael; Rothman, Emily F. (10 June 2016). "Firearm Ownership and Suicide Rates Among US Men and Women, 1981–2013". American Journal of Public Health. 106 (7): 1316–1322\. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2016.303182. PMC 4984734. PMID 27196643. Table 1.
12. ^ a b Mascia, Jennifer; Brownlee, Chip (April 9, 2024). "The Armed Era". The Trace. Archived from the original on April 14, 2024.
13. ^ ● Gun sale data from Brownlee, Chip (December 31, 2023). "Gun Violence by the Numbers in 2023". The Trace. Archived from the original on January 28, 2024.
● NICS firearm check data downloaded via link at "NICS Firearm Background Checks: Month/Year" (PDF). FBI.gov. Federal Bureau of Investigation. January 2024. Archived (PDF) from the original on January 29, 2024.
14. ^ Frankel, Todd C.; Boburg, Shawn; Dawsey, Josh; Parker, Ashley; Horton, Alex (27 March 2023). "The gun that divides a nation". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 27 March 2023. Frankel et al. credit: "Source: National Shooting Sports Foundation and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives." Frankel et al. quote: "The shift began after the 2004 expiration of a federal assault weapons ban that had blocked the sales of many semiautomatic rifles. A handful of manufacturers saw a chance to ride a post-9/11 surge in military glorification while also stoking a desire among new gun owners to personalize their weapons with tactical accessories."
15. ^ Christopher Ingraham (June 19, 2018). "There are more guns than people in the United States, according to a new study of global firearm ownership". The Washington Post.
16. ^ Edith M. Lederer (June 18, 2018). "Americans Own 46% of the World's 1 Billion Guns, Says U.N. Report". Time. Archived from the original on June 22, 2018. Retrieved January 17, 2019.
17. ^ smallarmssurvey.org Estimating Global CivilianHELD Firearms Numbers. Aaron Karp. June 2018
18. ^ Schaeffer, Kathleen. "Key facts about Americans and guns". Pew Research Center. Pew Research. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
19. ^ Desilver, Drew (June 4, 2013). "A Minority of Americans Own Guns, But Just How Many Is Unclear". Pew Research Center. Retrieved October 25, 2015.
20. ^ "Guns: Gallup Historical Trends", Gallup. Retrieved October 25, 2015.
21. ^ Briefing Paper. Estimating Global Civilian-Held Firearms Numbers. June 2018 by Aaron Karp. Of Small Arms Survey. See box 4 on page 8 for a detailed explanation of "Computation methods for civilian firearms holdings". See country table in annex PDF: Civilian Firearms Holdings, 2017. See publications home.
22. ^ "How Many Gun Owners Are In America? 2023 - 2024 Statistics".
23. ^ "Largest rise in gun ownership? African-American women". March 28, 2022. Retrieved March 28, 2022.
24. ^ "About Us". Retrieved March 28, 2022.
25. ^ "Boom: 5M new gun owners, with 58% black and 40% women". August 31, 2020. Retrieved March 28, 2022.
26. ^ "Gun and ammunition sales soar as defund-the-police movement grows". CNN. 24 June 2020.
27. ^ a b Chris Arnold (16 July 2020). "Pandemic And Protests Spark Record Gun Sales". NPR.
28. ^ Saad, L. (Nov. 13, 2020). What percentage of Americans own guns? What Percentage of Americans Own Guns? Gallup.
29. ^ "American Literature: Prose, MSN Encarta". Archived from the original on 2009-10-28.
30. ^ "New Perspectives on the West: Theodore Roosevelt, PBS, 2001". Pbs.org. 1919-01-06. Archived from the original on March 9, 2001. Retrieved 2010-11-21.
31. ^ Liukkonen, Petri. "Owen Wister". Books and Writers (kirjasto.sci.fi). Finland: Kuusankoski Public Library. Archived from the original on 24 December 2013.
32. ^ ""Western Films", Tim Dirks, Filmsite, 1996-2007". Filmsite.org. Retrieved 2010-11-21.
33. ^ ""Crime and Gangster Films", Tim Dirks, Filmsite, 1996-2007". Filmsite.org. Retrieved 2010-11-21.
34. ^ Digital History, Steven Mintz. "Hollywood as History: Wartime Hollywood, Digital History". Digitalhistory.uh.edu. Archived from the original on 2010-11-29. Retrieved 2010-11-21.
35. ^ Digital History, Steven Mintz. "Hollywood as History: The "New" Hollywood, Digital History". Digitalhistory.uh.edu. Archived from the original on 2010-11-29. Retrieved 2010-11-21.
36. ^ "Amid a Series of Mass Shootings in the U.S., Gun Policy Remains Deeply Divisive". PewResearch.org. April 20, 2021. Archived from the original on May 30, 2022.
37. ^ ● Data through 2016: "Guns / Firearm-related deaths". NSC.org copy of U.S. Government (CDC) data. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. December 2017. Archived from the original on August 29, 2018. Retrieved August 29, 2018. (archive of actual data).
● 2017 data: Howard, Jacqueline (December 13, 2018). "Gun deaths in US reach highest level in nearly 40 years, CDC data reveal". CNN. Archived from the original on December 13, 2018. (2017 CDC data)
● 2018 data: "New CDC Data Show 39,740 People Died by Gun Violence in 2018". efsgv.org. January 31, 2020. Archived from the original on February 16, 2020. (2018 CDC data)
● 2019-2024 data: "Past Summary Ledgers". Gun Violence Archive. January 2025. Archived from the original on 12 January 2025.
38. ^ Cramer, Clayton E. (2009-08-24). Armed America: The Remarkable Story of How and Why Guns Became as American as Apple Pie. Thomas Nelson Inc. ISBN 9781418551872.
39. ^ Hofstadter, Richard (October 1970). "America as a Gun Culture". American Heritage Magazine. 21 (6). American Heritage Publishing. Retrieved January 25, 2014.
40. ^ Spitzer, Robert J. (1995). The Politics of Gun Control. Chatham House Publishers. ISBN 9781566430227.
41. ^ "US District of Columbia et al v Heller" (PDF). US Supreme Court. June 26, 2008.
42. ^ "Shoot-out Confirms Foreign View of America as 'Gun Nut' Country" by T.R. Reid, The Buffalo News, July 26, 1998
43. ^ "Small steps on gun control" Los Angeles Times, June 17, 2007
44. ^ "'Terror in Capitol' No Surprise to World" By T.R. Reid, Washington Post, July 26, 1998
45. ^ The Gun Nut blog at Field & Stream
46. ^ Cooper, Jeff (1990). To Ride, Shoot Straight, and Speak the Truth Archived 2013-10-02 at the Wayback Machine. Boulder, Colorado: Paladin Press. pp. 16–19.
47. ^ Baum, Dan (2013). Gun Guys: A Road Trip. Knopf Doubleday. p. 308\. ISBN 9780307962218.
48. ^ "The world is 'mystified' by America's enduring racism and 'bizarre' gun laws". Business Insider. Retrieved 2016-02-23.
49. ^ "The Rest of the First World Is Astounded by America's Enduring Gun Culture". The Wire. Retrieved 2016-02-23.
50. ^ Friedman, Uri (5 December 2015). "Australian Gun Reformer: 'It's Time to Call Out the U.S.A.'". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2016-02-23.
51. ^ "American gun use is out of control. Shouldn't the world intervene?". The Guardian. 2013-09-21. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2016-02-23.

## External links

[edit]

* "Gun Culture". TIME. March 18, 2009. Archived from the original on April 2, 2009.
* Pilkington, Ed (10 January 2011). "US gun crime: death for sale". The Guardian. London.
* DeBrabander, Firmin (2015). Do Guns Make Us Free?: Democracy and the Armed Society. Yale University Press. ASIN B07CGH7R79.

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