A recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reveals that across all political and social groups in the United States, there is a strong preference against living near AR-15 rifle owners and neighbors who store guns outside of locked safes. This surprising consensus suggests that when it comes to immediate living environments, Americans’ views on gun control may be less divided than the polarized national debate suggests.
The research was conducted against a backdrop of increasing gun violence and polarization on gun policy in the United States. The United States has over 350 million civilian firearms and gun-related incidents, including accidents and mass shootings, have become a leading cause of death in the country. Despite political divides, the new study aimed to explore whether there’s common ground among Americans in their immediate living environments, focusing on neighborhood preferences related to gun ownership and storage.
The primary problem with implementing those policies that people want are in the details. Everyone wants [thing], but have widely differing views on what that means. Or they have concerns, some of which are valid, that get in the way of implementing the change.
Most people want universal background checks and for people who are likely to be violent to not have guns. But many also don’t want registration to be tracked because when it has been teacked it has been made publically available. Others don’t want to have to pay for the background check to loan their gun to a friend for hunting.
That is of course before differences in who should be paying for the checks and how to track a check was made without that list being made public.
It is like saying everyone likes fruit, but we have to establish a list of acceptable fruit that will never cover the differences in what kinds of fruit people like. Have fun passing that law.
That would be the task of a democratic process, to figure out those details, if only there was one.
If only we had a functioning democracy!
The filibuster is the tool used most often to avoid even having those discussions in congress. The House won’t spend time on legislation that will just be filibustered in the Senate.