MacDonald 1

Emily MacDonald

Joyce Barnes

ENG 1202 Online

17 November 2019

The Privilege of Gun Ownership

Mass shootings in America have started to seem like such a common occurrence, and

with that comes debates over gun control. It is important to realize that within this debate the

racism and sexism surrounding ownership, violence, and control of guns must be acknowledged.

There seems to be a stereotypical idea in America of white men clinging to their guns when gun

support is brought up. It is clear that this isn’t just a Second Amendment issue, but it is a

minority and discrimination issue as well. I believe it is necessary to place stricter restrictions on

guns because the validity of the Second Amendment is misunderstood, gun restrictions have

historically been used only against African Americans owning guns, and guns do not do as much

to protection as people may believe. Is it possible that certain voices are being left out of the

argument altogether?

Before discussing how sexism relates to gun control, it is important to acknowledge that

there are very contrasting views on how women view gun ownership. Some view it is as

something empowering, while others find it to be something more likely to be used against them.

In the article, The Socialization of Conflict and Its Limits: Gender and Gun Politics in America,

Kristin Goss writes about the efforts of both gun rights and gun opposition advocates to get

women behind their movements. The article provides data that shows that the amount of women

supporting gun rights over the last thirty years has not increased enough to show that these pro-
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gun groups have succeeded in their efforts to gain support from women. It also shows that “gun

regulation groups have mobilized their female sympathizers but not enough to offset the political

engagement of pro-gun men” (Goss, 2017). This reveals that there has not been a strong trend of

women increasingly favoring neither gun control nor gun rights over time. With this being said,

the article concludes that despite the marketing campaign efforts to influence women’s attitudes

toward favoring gun ownership, “women are still significantly more likely than men to favor gun

regulation” (Goss, 2017). In fact, a study done to discover the preferences on gun control of state

legislators of different genders reveals that “women state legislators of both parties were more

likely to indicate support for banning guns altogether, requiring licenses or background checks,

and maintaining and strengthening the enforcement of existing firearms laws” (Stucky et al.,

2008).

However, women who do not fall into what seems to be the majority of women favoring

gun control also have valid reasons as to why they support women owning guns. An article

written by Elizabeth Nolan Brown titled, Feminism Needs Firearms, Say ‘Armed and Fabulous’

Women of CPAC, speaks about five women who spoke at a Conservative Political Action

Conference and shared their reasoning for supporting gun ownership. Kristi McMains stated that

she had an experience where she was attacked by a stranger, and her gun ended up saving her.

She explained that women can experience violence at any time and that women are unfairly

shamed for being victims of violence. She supports women owning guns because she wants to be

in control of her safety. According to the article, the women also shared that women should not

be shamed by liberal feminists for choosing to support gun rights. “Okafor, who twice cast

ballots for Barak Obama before voting Trump in the last election, told the crowd at CPAC that

‘real female empowerment’ must include firearms and the protection of Second Amendment
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rights” (Brown, 2017). These women believe that they are not enemies to feminists for taking a

pro-gun stance; they believe that educating and empowering women through this stance actually

resembles the goals of feminism, according to the article. These women argue that women

should not have to rely on law enforcement to protect them, and they urge other women to stop

relying on the government to protect them and use guns as a tool to take matters into their own

hands (Brown, 2017).

The National Rifle Association is one of the groups that is attempting to get women to

support gun rights and ownership. However, there is a bit of controversy over the way that the

NRA perceives women. The NRA Explore website’s page on Women’s Interests shows the

effort to persuade women toward owning guns, and it uses the word “empowered” when

describing pro-gun women. One program the page shows is the NRA’s Refuse to Be A Victim

program. The name of this program raises some red flags because it seems to undermine what it

means to be a victim and implies that being a victim is something that you can choose. The NRA

has been criticized over some of the ways it portrays women. For example, an article by Mark

Follman titled, Here’s How the NRA Degrades and Objectifies Women, described the sexist

magazine article the NRA wrote about the founder of Mom’s Demand Action. In the magazine

article that Follman referenced, gun rights lobbyist Dave Kopel accused Watts of not being

domestic enough as a stay-at-home mom. She is attacked for having a successful career, saying

that this makes her a fraud. In the magazine article, there is a picture of her in a 1950s paper doll

apron. Since the NRA has a huge influence in gun regulation legislation, it is quite revealing that

certain attitudes toward women are being displayed by this organization.

The book, “Guns Don’t Kill People, People Kill People”: And Other Myths About Guns

and Gun Control, by Dennis Henigan discusses why many of the arguments that are pro-gun
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ownership are false, such as the argument that gun are necessary in the home for protection.

Henigan states that this will most likely not take place. He states that it is more likely that you

would either not use your gun, or fire and miss; in most situations, the person does not end up

shooting the person breaking into their house. He goes on to say that a gun in the house is more

likely to be used to shoot someone else who lives in the house. So who is truly at risk of being

harmed by a gun? An important way to look at this subject is to look at a cause of someone in the

home being a victim of gun violence: domestic violence. According to dosomething.org, “85%

of domestic violence victims are women” and “domestic violence is the leading cause of injury

to women – more than car accidents, muggings, and rapes combined”. The website also states

that “in 60% to 80% of intimate partner homicides, no matter which partner was killed, the man

physically abused the woman before the murder”. These statements reveal that domestic violence

against women is a major contribution to situations where someone can be killed in the home.

Statistics like these should be considered more when gun regulation legislation proposal is shut

down because people argue that guns are needed to keep them safe.

Women aren’t the only people that aren’t being considered as deeply as they should be

when discussing the idea of tightening up gun regulations; there is also a lot of racism behind the

history of gun control. Gunfight: The Battle over the Right to Bear Arms in America, by Adam

Winkler, talks about the long history of racism and gun control. He mentions that the founders of

America, who wrote the Second Amendment, did not allow slaves or free African-Americans to

own firearms. Meanwhile, the white colonists were allowed to use firearms to start a revolt.

“America’s most notorious racists, the Ku Klux Klan, which was formed after the Civil War,

made their first objective the confiscation of all guns from newly freed blacks, who gained
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access to guns in service to the Union Army. In the twentieth century, gun control laws were

often enacted after blacks with guns came to be perceived as a threat to whites” (Winkler, 2011).

The article, The NRA Supported Gun Control When the Black Panthers Had the

Weapons, by Thad Morgan from History.com was written in 2018 and describes the actions of

the NRA and law enforcement toward the Black Panther Party carrying weapons. The article

points out that today, the NRA takes a strong stance that everyone should have the right to bear

arms, but they were opposed to the Black Panthers exercising that right. The NRA “fought

alongside the government for stricter gun regulations in the 1960s. This was part of an effort to

keep guns out of the hands of African-Americans as racial tensions in the nation grew. The NRA

felt especially threatened by the Black Panthers, whose well-photographed carrying of weapons

in public spaces was entirely legal in the state of California, where they were based” (Morgan,

2018). This information is very revealing to the fact that African-Americans have historically

been disarmed. Has the support for gun ownership grown now that African-Americans have

already been limited from owning them?

A New York Times articles written by Christine Hauser in 2018 reports on a conversation

between a police officer and two African-American children. The police were called on “two

young male blacks” who had a gun. The officer approached the children with a weapon drawn

and then discovered that they only had a BB Gun. After this discovery, the officer lectures the

children and tells them that he could have killed them. This situation has received varying

responses, with some praising the officer for teaching them a lesson, and others saying that these

children were targeted because of their race. One person said, “Why is your department trying to

pat themselves on the back for NOT shooting some Black kids who had a BB Gun?” (Hauser,

2018) and pointed out that open carry is legal in Ohio. The topic of police discrimination towards
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African-Americans is also a very controversial one. This article makes someone wonder whether

if the boys were white, would someone have had the police called on them at all. Additionally,

would white children have received the same lecture from the officer?

Gun control is not a topic that is new or unique to today’s society; for as long as there

have been guns, there has been gun control. There has always been instances of one powerful

mass of people taking weapons away from another. In a journal article titled, Gun Control and

Racism by Stefan B. Tahmassebi, the evidence of racism and gun control is displayed.

Tahmassebi talks about how minorities have always been disarmed. “Discrimination and

oppression of blacks, other racial and ethnic minorities, immigrants, and other ‘unwanted

elements’, including union organizers and agrarian reformers” has caused gun control

enforcement toward minorities as a way to oppress them. Disarmament precedes America.

Looking back to the 17th century, the penal laws against the Irish Catholics provide a historical

example of how one group uses gun control against another group as a means of exerting their

power. The Irish penal laws created under William III disarmed Irish Catholics (Eddlem, 2014).

These laws were described by English Parliamentarian Edmund Burke as “a machine of wise and

elaborate contrivance, as well fitted for the oppression, impoverishment and degradation of a

people, and the debasement in the of human nature itself, as ever proceeded from the perverted

ingenuity of man” ( Eddlem, 2014). This statement tells us that gun control has historically been

used to oppress certain people, and was a way to threaten their livelihood.

This pattern of gun ownership from certain groups being restricted continues as one takes

a look at slavery in America. Since white people and slaveowners were fearful of slaves

revolting, it was an obvious choice to make it illegal for slaves to own guns. However, the 1830

case, North Carolina v. Mann, showed a more gruesome relationship between gun ownership
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and slavery. In this case, “the Supreme Court of North Carolina defended the right of a master

who had shot his slaves named Lydia while she was trying to run away” (Eddlem, 2014). “The

case established that slavery was less about labor than about dehumanizing power” (Eddlem,

2014). Unfortunately, these rules did not end after slavery was abolished. “Across the former

Confederate states, reconstituted legislatures in 1865 passed laws designed to reduce the status of

African-Americans back to slaves without the name” (Eddlem, 2014). This demonstrates the fact

that gun control laws have historically served racist purposes.

The media definitely plays a role in the way we perceive reality. For instance, when

watching the news people constantly are hearing about crimes occurring. This causes there to be

a lot more fear in regards the world around us. In fact, many people don’t realize that “crime and

violent crime has been steadily declining since its peak in the 1970s” (Primm et al., 2009). One

can infer that the amount of fear people have about the amount of crime surrounding them,

whether this fear is rational or not, causes them to desire protection. It is very necessary to be

aware of the fact that the beliefs people have about crime also shape their perceptions of race,

according to the article, Race, Fear, and Firearms: The Demographics and Guilt Assuagement in

the Creation of a Political Partition, by Eric Primm et al. The media over represents African

Americans “as perpetrators of violent crime” (Primm et al., 2009). Therefore, white Americans

especially think of criminals as being African American in their imaginations, and more

specifically they think of young, male African Americans, according to Primm. Primm explains

that this means people have a fear of crime that is based on race, and also explains why many

previous gun control laws have been placed with the intentions of making it more difficult for

African Americans to own guns.

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The article, Racial Resentment and Whites’ Gun Policy Preferences in Contemporary

America, by Alexandra Filindra and Noah J. Kaplan also explores the reasons supporting gun

rights is a white movement. The authors argue that the word “rights” in this instance is used in a

way that defends white privilege. They state that white movements distinguished two types of

rights: “race-neutral rights assigned to a specific category of citizens and ‘special rights’

associated with racial and ethnic groups” (Filindra and Kaplan, 2016). The authors use the

example of white movements using the term “homeowner rights” when they want to defend

residential segregation, and Filindra and Kaplan explain that these “rights” defend white

privilege because they ignore the fact that white people already have the upper-hand in that

argument. However, they use the word “rights” to imply that it is as if we are suddenly all equal

in the given situation. According to the authors, attitudes suddenly shifted in America from

supporting gun control based towards African Americans, to supporting gun rights for the law

abiding citizens. This reveals that white people started supporting gun ownership after disarming

African Americans. These gun rights are an example of race-neutral rights because it appears to

be fair on the surface but it ignores the fact white people already had the upper-hand. Gun rights

for the law abiding citizen is also discrimination because the opposite of a law abiding citizen is

a criminal, and it is known that white people imagine criminals as being African American,

according to Filindra and Kaplan. In this wave of gun right advocacy, guns became symbols of

freedom and good morals; therefore, when minorities started to fight for gun control, they were

easily labeled as “enemies of freedom” (Filindra and Kaplan, 2016). The authors state that the

Civil Rights Movement reshaped the racial associations with gun; before white people were

supporters of gun control targeted toward African Americans, but during the civil rights era,

white people shifted towards advocating for gun rights. “Indeed, we strongly suspect that such a
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change in gun policy attitudes among whites was possible because guns have been a marker of

white privilege throughout American history” (Filindra and Kaplan, 2016). This reveals the

amount of white privilege that exists surrounding gun rights.

This image, provided by a Pew Research article

(pewsocialtrends.org), is a good visualization of some of the

points made in this essay. According to the image and article,

“White men are especially likely to be gun owners: About half

(48%) say they own a gun, compared with about a quarter of white

women and nonwhite men (24% each) and 16% of nonwhite

women” (Parker et. al, 2017). You can also see in the image that

more women experience having a gun in their home that isn’t

theirs than men, which is interesting when considering domestic

violence statistics. This image also displays the fact that more

white people own guns than African-Americans and Hispanics. It

is interesting to see what the history of gun control in America has

Figure 1: Percent of adults saying they
led to today as far as who owns the most guns. own a gun, provided by Pew Research
Center

Another point that needs to be made in order to show why it

is important to be open to stricter gun regulations is about the Second Amendment itself and it’s

interpretation. The book, “Guns Don’t Kill People, People Kill People”: And Other Myths About

Guns and Gun Control, by Dennis Henigan brings to light some of the confusion behind the

wording used in the Second Amendment. He states that the NRA, like many people, have

remembered a more edited down version of what the amendment actually says. Most people

think that the Second Amendment is the right to bear arms. In fact, the building of the NRA
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headquarters says, “The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed”. What

the NRA has done in this instance is conveniently left out the first half of the amendment. The

entire Second Amendment is, “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free

State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed”. When reading this

right in its entirety, it is harder to understand exactly what it means. Henigan states that the 1939

case United States v. Miller ruled that owning a weapon had to comply with the first half of the

amendment, meaning that it would have to be for the purpose of militia activity. Over time, as

Henigan points out, some cases have had rulings that suggest that the militia use is not necessary,

and guns can be possessed for self-defense purposes. It is important to realize that this right that

certain people and groups are defending has a complicated language that has had many different

interpretations; this is something to remember as groups like the NRA refuse to allow any small

regulations on gun ownership.

After thinking about the historical implications of who was able to own guns, in addition

to the way certain groups of people experience violence and discrimination to this day, does gun

ownership truly feel like it reflects freedom today? It is easy to say now, as the political issue

over restricting gun rights continues to become a more and more heated debate, that

discrimination is in the past, but that doesn’t seem to be true when, for example, we look at how

recently the NRA disarmed the black panthers. We can see that females tend to support gun

control more than men, but do we consider that this might be a result of the fact that they face

more domestic violence? Lobbyist groups such as the NRA today have been working hard to

avoid any legal restrictions on gun ownership. It is incredibly important that as we take one

stance or another, we make sure we know all the facts. This argument is a very privileged one to
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have when considering how many minority groups have been disarmed throughout American

history. Is gun ownership a truly American right, or is it a right for white, male Americans?
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Works Cited

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CPAC.” Reason.com, Reason, 24 Feb. 2017, reason.com/2017/02/24/feminism-needs-

firearms-say-cpac-women/.

Eddlem, Thomas R. “The Racist Origin of America’s Gun Control Laws.” New American

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in Contemporary America.” Political Behavior, vol. 38, no. 2, June 2016, pp. 255–275.

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2019, www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/09/nra-women-sexism-guns/.

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America*.” Social Science Quarterly, no. 2, 2017, p. 455. EBSCOhost,

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