The Business of Fear and Murder

All the depressing bullshit about gun violence and accidental shootings was running through my head last night, as I was falling asleep to an old “Law & Order” episode about easily-modified guns. I’m sure others have written about this more and better, but a new facet of fucked-uppedness of the gun situation in this country clicked with me last night.

Specifically, that gun manufacturers benefit directly from increasing fear and murder.

It’s no secret that there are tons of guns in this country, hundreds of millions of them, which works out to roughly one gun per person in the country, not counting government-owned weapons, and it’s unclear if it includes illegally-owned ones.

There are varying stories about how guns fall into the hands of criminals, and the prevalence of gun shows and Internet firearm merchants suggests that it’s probably not that difficult for most people who want guns to obtain them through legal or semi-legal means. But even if every gun on the streets was stolen from a home, a gun shop, or Wal-Mart, it wouldn’t matter: the manufacturers get paid either way.

Unless gun retailers work very differently from other retailers, the manufacturers/distributors get paid when shop owners order product to put on the shelves. Whatever happens to the gun after that–if it’s legally purchased, if it’s a straw purchase, if it’s stolen from the shop, if it’s stolen from the distribution truck on the way to the shop, if it’s acquired in some way then given, sold secondhand, or stolen–is irrelevant from the manufacturer’s perspective, because they’ve already been paid. Weapons stolen from the shop or the purchasers would presumably be covered by insurance, and then those people would presumably use that insurance money to buy more guns, which would be even better for the gun manufacturers/distributors.

We’ve seen surges in gun sales any time the gun lobby can convince enough people that someone’s gonna come take their guns away. Fear of new gun regulations increases gun sales. I talked last year about the memes and myths surrounding the gun conversation, so many of which hinge on fear–fear of home invasion, fear of muggings, fear of tyrannical government, fear of black youths–which form the justifications for owning guns “for protection.” I’ll be curious to see if there’s any upswing in gun ownership by people of color, as racist trigger-happy vigilantes and racist trigger-happy cops have reentered the news cycle in a big way.

A shame the fear of an accidental shooting never seems to drive people’s gun ownership decisions.

So the more fear there is–of violence, of government, of criminals–the more guns sell, the more gun manufacturers profit. Even in a climate of steadily declining violent crime; there’s no reason the fear needs to be realistic or justified. And the more criminals obtain guns, the more gun manufacturers profit. And the more criminals use those guns, the more fear they create, and the more fearful people buy guns, and the more gun manufacturers profit.

Gun manufacturers–and ultimately, the whole gun retail sector, though the manufacturers most of all–directly benefit from increasing gun crime. It’s time to stop pretending that the gun lobby is about advocacy or protection. They are selling both the disease and the placebo they call a cure. They profit no matter who buys, no matter who dies. We need, as a society, to stop letting the gun lobby bully us out of having a serious discussion about gun control. We need, as a society, to stop pretending that any gun control measures would be some risky, untested experiment when countless other nations have paved the way for us to follow. We need, as a society, to realize that “guns don’t kill people” and the other bumper sticker phrases that pass for gun lobby arguments amount to empty deflections designed to distract from actual problems. We need, as a society, to finally realize that the only people who benefit from more guns on the streets are the people who manufacture and sell them. We, as a society, need to realize that those benefits are paid for with innocent blood.