RESPONSIBLE GUN OWNERSHIP IS A LIE

How to convince Americans that firearms won’t make them safer

- DAVID FRUM

When the coronavirus pandemic struck last year, people throughout the developed world raced to buy toilet paper, bottled water, yeast for baking bread, and other basic necessities. Americans also stocked up on guns. They bought more than 23 million rearms in 2020, up 65 percent from 2019. First-time gun purchases were notably high. The surge has not abated in 2021. In January, Americans bought 4.3 million guns, a monthly record.

Last year was also a high-water mark for gun violence—more people were shot dead than at any time since the 1990s—though 2021 is shaping up to be even worse. There was one bright spot in 2020. When Americans self-isolated, mass shooters were denied their usual targets. But as America began to return to normal, so did the mass shootings: 45 in the single month between March 16 and April 15.

The shock and horror of mass shootings focus our attention. But most of the casualties are inflicted one by one by one. Americans use their guns to open fire on one another at backyard barbecues, to stalk and intimidate ex-spouses and lovers, to rob and assault, and to kill themselves. Half of the almost 48,000 suicides committed in 2019 were carried out by gun. All of this slaughter is enabled by the most permissive gun laws in the developed world.

You know this. You’ve heard it before. Maybe you have even gotten sick of hearing it. Yet the problem continues to get worse. The Biden administration is developing strategies to try to decrease gun violence—to crack down on rogue gun dealers, to “keep guns out of the wrong hands.” That’s a worthy project, of course, but it, too, may sound wanly familiar. Over the past decade, many states have relaxed their gun laws, making these weapons even easier to get.