Brian S. Fraser, 39 Rachael Kathleen Parker, 33 Michelle Vo, 32
Keri Galvan, 31 Jennifer Parks, 36 Kurt Allen Von Tillow, 55
Dana Leann Gardner, 52 Carolyn Lee Parsons, 31 William W. Wolfe Jr., 42
Angela C. Gomez, 20 Lisa Marie Patterson, 46
Rocio Guillen, 40 John Joseph Phippen, 56
As a filmmaker looked further into the study, Kleck said that 54 percent of the defensive uses involved someone verbally referring to the gun. Forty-seven percent involved pointing it at a criminal. And less than a quarter (22 percent) of the defensive uses involved actually shooting the gun (as opposed to waving it). Only 14 percent involved actually shooting at a person. In 8 percent of the incidents, the person defending themselves actually wounded or killed the offender.16
The popular statistic that guns are constantly used for defense—every thirteen seconds!—is a fake fact. It’s misconstrued. In contrast, the government reports less than three hundred “justifiable homicides” by private citizens in a year.17 Most of those “justifiable homicides” were in cases of escalating arguments, not from random home burglaries as is often assumed.
Nobody can really know how many lives are saved by guns used for protection. The number will probably vary depending on one’s stance on guns. Even those of us who are not fans of guns must concede that there are a certain number of lives saved each year because someone had a gun. But it comes at the expense of thirty-eight thousand lives taken by someone with a gun.18
Consider the case of the Las Vegas shooter. No “good guy with a gun” could have stopped a man shooting from a hotel window hundreds of yards away with military-style weapons.
In the case of the mass shooting in Tucson where a man murdered six people and almost killed Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, there was an innocent bystander named Joe Zamudio on site with a gun. With the gun still in his pocket, Joe helped another man subdue the shooter and later revealed that he almost fired at the wrong person.19 After a mass shooting we are always left wondering how it might have been different if only there had been a “good guy with a gun” present. Well there was, and he almost shot the wrong person. Meanwhile, a person without a gun subdued the shooter.
The same thing happened in Tennessee when James Shaw Jr., armed only with his courage, bravely stopped a mass shooter in a Waffle House. One study shows that the likelihood of injury when using a gun in self-defense (10.9 percent) is almost identical to the likelihood of injury when the victim takes no action at all (11 percent).20
It seems safe to say that even if guns work in a small percentage of defensive attempts, they don’t work in a whole lot of other attempts. The number of folks who shoot people accidentally crushes any hope for guns saving us, as we can see even in incidents of police killings. And police are professionally trained to use their weapons.
A gun is much more likely to be used in a suicide, a domestic homicide, or an accidental shooting than it is to be used to ward off a criminal.
Myth No. 5: We Don’t Need More Laws; We Need to Enforce the Ones We Have
Many gun advocates will say that we just need to enforce the laws that we already have. Hundreds and hundreds of times this argument has been made, citing that there are twenty thousand gun laws on the books. It actually goes back to a 1965 quote by NRA board member John Dingell, who used the twenty thousand number with no source or records. But then Ronald Reagan picked it up. After he was shot in an attempted assassination, he said, “There are some 20,000 gun laws now in the United States,” but no one knows where that number came from.21 Legal experts Jon Vernick and Lisa Hepburn have done the most thorough work trying to count them, and they came up with about three hundred major state and federal laws and a shrinking number of local gun laws, because state laws trump local laws in forty states.22 Three hundred is a long way from twenty thousand.
So here’s a homework assignment: someone compile a list. It would also be interesting to count how many automobile laws there are on the books, as that number might be closer to twenty thousand.
What’s more, Ronald Reagan called for a prohibition of AK-47s and military-style weapons, and yet there is currently no law keeping them off our streets.23
Myth No. 6: Gun Owners Are the Problem
One of the problems with the political debate around gun control is that people often talk about “gun owners” as one big homogenous group. But they’re not.
As we’ve seen in our quick hike through history, there have been some major rifts in the NRA, and in the gun-owning community in general, over the years. There are many different political persuasions and priorities among gun owners despite the monolithic voice of the NRA that usually dominates the airwaves.
The truth is, most gun owners want to see fewer people die from guns. For many, owning a rifle on the farm or even a pistol for protection does not mean we should have AK-47s on the streets or in our schools.
They may not be the loudest gun owners, but gun owners against gun violence are everywhere.
A recent study by Frank Luntz, who is widely considered to be a reputable, conservative pollster, revealed some stunning things.24 And other studies have corroborated and reinforced his findings.25 He polled hundreds of gun owners, distinguishing between NRA members and those not affiliated with the NRA. The study showed how out of sync the NRA is with its own members, and even more so with gun owners in general. Luntz found that 82 percent of the gun owners who were polled (87 percent of the non-NRA members and 74 percent of the NRA members) support criminal background checks for everyone purchasing a gun (“universal background checks”). About the same number (80 percent total: 80 percent non-NRA gun owners and 79 percent NRA) think gun retailers should perform background checks on employees to check for criminal records. How about that!
Seventy-eight percent of gun owners (81 percent non-NRA gun owners and 75 percent NRA) said that concealed carry permits should not be given to people who have a history of violent crime such as assault or domestic violence.
An overwhelming majority of gun owners (80 percent total: 84 percent non-NRA gun owners and 74 percent NRA) believe a person wanting to own a concealed carry permit should be required to complete gun safety training.
A significant majority (69 percent total: 74 percent non-NRA gun owners and 63 percent NRA) believe a person should be at least twenty-one years old to obtain a concealed carry permit.
Likewise, an overwhelming majority of gun owners believe someone on the terrorist watch list should not be able to get a gun (76 percent total: 80 percent non-NRA gun owners and 71 percent NRA). And gun owners believe stolen guns should have to be reported to police (68 percent total: 71 percent non-NRA gun owners and 64 percent NRA).
And check this one out: 85 percent of gun owners (83 percent non-NRA gun owners and 87 percent NRA) said that support for the Second Amendment goes hand in hand with keeping illegal guns out of the hands of criminals. In other words, these gun owners are no longer buying into the slippery slope argument or uncompromising stance that has been a staple of the NRA. That’s huge. Nearly nine out of ten gun owners in the NRA believe the right to bear arms and public safety don’t have to be enemies. An overwhelming majority believe in at least some commonsense gun reforms. That’s good news!
There were several other interesting takeaways from this groundbreaking study. One is that a lot of us, including gun owners, don’t even realize how crazy things have become. Over half of gun owners mistakenly believe the statement “Everyone who wants to buy a gun has to pass a background check.” Perhaps it should be true, but right now it is not. Another fascinating revelation is that the views of the NRA do not reflect those of its constituency. Sixty-two percent of gun owners said that they feel the NRA is out of touch with them on issues like gun safety and background checks, and only 29 percent said they feel represented by the NRA on issues like these.26
This is a major breakthrough. It is a crack in the wall of the polarized gun debate.
This is a small
start in trying to really understand the debate on guns and figuring out what’s true and what’s false. We also want to encourage you to do your own research and to advocate for as much energy and resources as possible to go toward research on gun violence. The more we understand the problem, the more likely it is that we can actually save lives.
seven
Kids and Guns
If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.
—Matthew 18:6
SOME SAY THAT THE SOLUTION to school shootings is not arming teachers but arming kids. Sacha Baron Cohen, political satirist, posed as an Israeli security expert named Colonel Erran Morad (the “Terrorist Terminator”), championing a program aimed at teaching schoolchildren as young as three (yes, three) to use firearms, including semiautomatics and basic mortars, to defend themselves in a school shooting. He pitched his idea, creatively named “Kinderguardians,” to politicians and gun enthusiasts in the corridors of power. The response was stunning.1
Two congressmen, Dana Rohrabacher (Republican, California) and Joe Wilson (Republican, South Carolina), enthusiastically endorse the program on video. Two former politicians, Trent Lott (former Senate Republican leader) and Joe Walsh (former congressman), participate in a promotional video, in which Walsh explains that the Kinderguardians program “introduces specially selected children, from twelve to four years old, to pistols, rifles, semiautomatics, and a rudimentary knowledge of mortars. In less than a month, a first grader can become a first grenader. . . . Happy shooting, kids.” The politicians hold stuffed animals called “Gunimals” that have weapons inside them, and teach kids to shoot the “Puppy Pistol,” the “Gunny Rabbit,” “Dino-Gun,” and the “Uzicorn.” You can’t make this up. At first you laugh, and then you begin to cry.
One of the gun-rights activists in the video, Philip Van Cleave (president of the Virginia Citizens Defense League) actually champions the idea of arming kids as young as four: “Kids haven’t quite developed what we called ‘conscience,’ where you feel guilty about doing something. . . . If they haven’t developed that yet, they can be very effective soldiers.” Wilson says, “Our forefathers did not put an age limit on the Second Amendment.” And Larry Pratt, director emeritus of Gun Owners of America, scorns our prejudice against toddlers having guns: he laughs that the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a “good toddler” with a gun. The segment says that the solution to our gun problem is not arming teachers, as some would suggest, but arming the kids themselves, even the preschoolers. That’s what we’re up against.
I (Shane) had some friends who moved from California to Philadelphia. As they were settling into life in Philly, their six-year-old noticed some of our gun shops, one of which was the Shooter Shop around the corner from us. He asked innocently, “Why are there so many gun shops in Philadelphia when there aren’t that many deer to hunt?” Out of the mouth of babes, as they say.
Perhaps it’s no surprise that young people are leading the way in the movement against gun violence—from Ferguson to Parkland. The adults have failed them. The politicians have failed them. The young people are rising up.
There is an urgency in their voices because they have seen their friends die. They have hidden in closets as they heard the shots of an AR-15 in their schools. They have had enough.
We need the children to wake up the adults and remind us that kids were not meant to die. And they weren’t meant to kill. But it happens all the time in America.
In just a two-week span before I (Shane) participated in a panel discussion on gun violence, the following happened:
A two-year-old in Milwaukee shot and killed his mother.
A two-year-old in Indiana killed himself with his mom’s gun.
A four-year-old was killed by her dad with a semiautomatic pistol a few blocks from my house.
A two-year-old was shot four times on his front porch, less than one hundred yards from where we live.
All those things happened as I was preparing for a panel discussion on gun violence on PBS. Needless to say, it put a fire in my bones for the panel. The killing of children should break our hearts.
In the aftermath of the May 2018 school shooting in Santa Fe, an interview with a student who survived the attack went viral. The emotional, visibly shaken girl was asked by a reporter if she was surprised something so horrific could happen in her school. Her response was an unforgettable “no.” Shaking her head, she said, “It’s been happening everywhere. I’ve always felt it would eventually happen here too. . . . I wasn’t surprised, I was just scared.”2
We should never get used to children killing or being killed. The fact is that this is a uniquely American problem. Of all the children (ages zero to fourteen) killed by guns in industrialized countries, 87 percent are US children.3 Every year, over 2,300 children and teenagers (ages zero to eighteen) are killed by guns, and another 14,500 are injured. Gun violence is the second-leading cause of death among our youth.4
Nearly two million kids under age eighteen live in homes with firearms that are both loaded and unlocked.5
Sixteen percent of high school students say they’ve carried a weapon (any weapon, not just a gun) to school in the past month, one 2009 study shows. Another study more specific to guns revealed that, over the course of one month, two out of every twenty-five high school kids nationwide (around 8 percent) carried a gun to school.6
A GUN IN THE HOME
(Note) “The absence of guns from children’s homes and communities is the most reliable and effective measure to prevent firearm-related injuries in children and adolescents.”
—American Academy of Pediatrics
It’s helpful to reiterate, like the refrain of a song—it doesn’t have to be this way. This sort of thing isn’t a normal occurrence in other developed countries. There is something wrong when our country has three times more gun dealers than McDonald’s. More gun shops than grocery stores.7
In my neighborhood we have a food desert; it’s hard to get good, nutritious, locally grown food. I’ll never forget hearing a young man explain, “It’s easier to get a gun in our neighborhood than it is to get a salad.” For those of us who are people of faith, we know that our mission in the world is to bring the kingdom of God on earth. Or as we say, we are trying to bring the garden of Eden to North Philadelphia. We want to see God’s kingdom come—on earth. On Potter Street. And God’s dream is not to see 105 people die every day in the United States from guns, three of whom are kids.
Memorial to the Lost
SANDY HOOK ELEMENTARY SCHOOL, NEWTOWN, CONNECTICUT (DECEMBER 14, 2012)
On December 14, 2012, twenty first-grade students and six school staff were murdered when a man shot his way into the school using a Bushmaster AR-15 assault-style semiautomatic rifle with high-capacity magazines. It all happened in ten minutes. The children killed that day were between the ages of six and seven years old. Here are the names of the children, as well as the school staff who died trying to protect them:
Charlotte Bacon, 6 Grace McDonnell, 7
Daniel Barden, 7 Anne Marie Murphy, 52
Rachel Davino, 29 Emilie Parker, 6
Olivia Engel, 6 Jack Pinto, 6
Josephine Gay, 7 Noah Pozner, 6
Ana M. Marquez-Greene, 6 Caroline Previdi, 6
Dawn Hochsprung, 47 Jessica Rekos, 6
Dylan Hockley, 6 Avielle Richman, 6
Madeline F. Hsu, 6 Lauren Rousseau, 30
Catherine V. Hubbard, 6 Mary Sherlach, 56
Chase Kowalski, 7 Victoria Soto, 27
Jesse Lewis, 6 Benjamin Wheeler, 6
James Mattioli, 6 Allison N. Wyatt, 6
The Kids Shall Lead Them
I (Shane) was talking with a kid in my neighborhood, who at the age of ten had already seen his share of violence and guns and bloodshed on our streets. He bounced into my house after school, as he often
did. I could tell he had something he couldn’t wait to tell me. He skipped the small talk. “Shane, I figured out who invented the gun,” he blasted out, leaving the conversation hanging in silent anticipation for a second, like a comedian waiting to deliver the punch line. I asked the obvious question: “Who?” I’m not sure what I expected him to say. Maybe he was doing a research project? I’ll never forget what he said next: “Satan.”
He went on confidently, without missing a beat. “Satan wants us to kill each other. God wants us to love each other. Satan invented the gun to make it easier for us to kill each other.”
I think my ten-year-old friend may be right, even though it doesn’t say that on Wikipedia or in the history books.
In all of our talk about original sin, we sometimes forget about original innocence. I hang out with kids a lot because they have a certain innocence and imagination and defiant hope. It’s no surprise that in 2018 the kids in Parkland, Florida, began to lead our country when it comes to gun violence. They have been teaching the politicians what courage looks like.
The prophet Isaiah, the same one who gave us the vision of beating swords into plows, also said that a child shall lead them (Isa. 11:6). He dreams of a time when “the wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together, . . . the cow will feed with the bear, . . . the infant will play near the cobra’s den, and the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest” (Isa. 11:6–8). It’s a vision of a world of peace, free of harm and fear. He says, “They will neither harm nor destroy” (v. 9). And, my favorite part, “a little child will lead them” (v. 6). The adults of our world have done a lot of damage. They have created wars and bloodshed and death. We have a lot of politicians who act childishly. And a lot of kids who are wise beyond their years.
Beating Guns Page 10