Reading Time: < 1 minute Ponder this. There’s a rule of inference in propositional logic called modus tollens. It says, when a ‘then’ assertion is untrue in an If-Then argument, the ‘if’ assertion is untrue too. Here’s the infallible logic of the thing: “If A, then B. Not B. Then not A.” Let us use this for school shootings and […]
guns
Posted inViolence
Why are AR-15-style rifles so wildly popular in America?
Reading Time: 6 minutes Why does the United States all-too-casually allow virtually anyone to buy an AR-15-style rifle, a fearsomely lethal weapon millions of American civilians have already joyfully acquired? I ask myself that question every time one of these awful weapons is used to kill many, many innocent people in a matter of minutes or even seconds—including the […]
Posted inViolence
Skipping America: US gun culture has the rest of the world keeping its distance
Reading Time: 6 minutes In late May of this year, while reeling from the news of the mass shootings in a Buffalo, NY grocery store and Uvalde, TX elementary school, I found myself thinking about which progressive country with sensible gun regulations I could emigrate to. A place where my husband and I could send our son to school […]
Posted inLaw
For many evangelical Christians, God and guns are inextricably linked
Reading Time: 3 minutes When the mass shooting occurred in Uvalde, Texas last month, you may have seen one particular image online. It was a (since-deleted) tweet from Daniel Defense, the company that made the gun used to kill 19 children and two adults, not just showing a children playing with a weapon, but also invoking a biblical verse […]
Posted inNews
Supreme Court ruling against NY gun restrictions puts all gun control measures at risk
Reading Time: 3 minutes In a June 23 ruling, New York gun restrictions that prevented most forms of concealed carry outside of the home were deemed unconstitutional by a conservative Supreme Court. Top Democrats were quick to announce their feelings about the court’s decision. “I call on all Americans across the country to make their voices heard on gun […]
Posted inNews
Would raising the minimum age of combat soldiers curb US gun violence?
Reading Time: 7 minutes On a TV news show the other day, I listened to a Republican congressman opine that it was nonsensical and unfair to consider raising the legal age to buy firearms to over 18. In his opinion, 18-year-olds in this country can already legally vote and can also choose to put their life on the line […]
Posted inResearch
Gun ownership by religious affiliation
Reading Time: < 1 minute 25% of nonbelievers and 23% of religiously unaffiliated own a gun in 2021. This is higher than other non-Christians. Approximately 30% of non-Catholic Christians own a gun.
Posted inFrom the Vault
Between massacres: a uniquely American horror show in seven acts
Reading Time: 7 minutes A shooter enters a building in an American city and takes innocent lives. The name of the shooter is insignificant, while their race and gender are both significant and mostly predictable. The city is Buffalo, or Uvalde, or East Lansing, or Monterey Park, or a hundred others. In each case, the shooting serves as the prelude to a seven-act piece of socio-political theatre. Some of the acts are honest and well-meaning; others are cynical and grotesque. But the net result of the cycle is always the same: nothing of substance changes.
Posted inRacial justice
Mental illness doesn’t cause mass shootings. Hate armed for war does
Reading Time: 6 minutes First Amendment-loving conservatives have long blamed isolated mental-health issues in very angry individuals but never the availability of guns as the proximate cause of America’s decades-long epidemic of horrific mass shootings in America. Or they claim mass shootings are hardly a problem at all and that, by the way, overall gun violence is supposedly down […]
Posted inSatire
Señorita pistols and the amendment after the First
Reading Time: 3 minutes This piece does not intend to minimize the horror of gun violence in the U.S. Indeed, the purpose here is to lampoon the ineffectiveness of our gun policies and the notion that more guns is what we need. Consider this A Modest Proposal. The text of an upcoming speech by Senator Burlo Winchester—an advocate of […]