3% of USA Population own 1/2 the guns & they're insecure about everything

[kpete]

3 percent of America’s population own half the guns in the country. A study says the group as less educated white men who are concerned about their ability to protect their families, insecure about their place in the workforce, and afraid of Black people

Link to tweet

?s=20&t=qvRV7Peq3JfNcJlgKVZNhQ
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/why-are-white-men-stockpiling-guns/

[Hermit-The-Prog]

1. How many are enough?

https://petapixel.com/2022/05/24/ameriguns-photo-series-reveals-the-unique-culture-of-guns-in-the-usa/





https://www.gabrielegalimberti.com/the-ameriguns/

[leftieNanner]

4. Looks like Dad spent their

College fund on killing machines.

[Rebl2]

26. Yep

[enid602]

9. Wives

I’d feel sorry for their wives if they ever decide to leave.

[SomedayKindaLove]

11. I know a guy

Who bought a bunch of guns right before Obama became president because...you guessed it...Obama was going to take away all his guns.

I told him I'd never heard anything dumber. This was before the Trump years of course.

[keithbvadu2]

44. The only Prez in many, many years to confiscate legally owned guns was Dubya after Katrina.

The only Prez in many, many years to confiscate legally owned guns was Dubya after Katrina.

[DENVERPOPS]

36. Sounds to me like

A deep seated insecurity about their masculinity.....also a poor self image about their below average IQ.........

Intelligent people resolve their differences with words, stupid people resort to violence.....FACT

[vercetti2021]

40. Photos scream small dick energy

Like big time

[Botany]

2. Scared, dumb ass white people, who worried about "the blacks" after Obama became POTUS

And the NRA, the gun industry, the right wing hate talk media, and Russia went right for that niche.

worth reading.

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/why-are-white-men-stockpiling-guns/

[EarnestPutz]

6. Jeez, "Scientific American". Pretty good reference, but not on many RWNJ reading lists.

[Journeyman]

10. Thanks for the link, Botany. A very important article. I look forward to reading it all . . .

[elleng]

3. 'Insecure about everything' sounds about right,

and a 'recipe' for disaster, imo.

[ThoughtCriminal]

5. The fantasy world of the gun "collector"

They think it's not enough to carry one gun everywhere they go - it might not be the right gun for some situation that they spend A LOT of time thinking about. They have lots of fantasies about being the hero in a shooting situation - which itself has lead to the death of numerous innocent victims.

[DENVERPOPS]

38. Last weekend

I was walking in olde town Arvada, near Denver. A passerby stopped and told me that I was standing in the exact spot the good guy was standing, after shooting the bad guy, and the good guy was killed at that exact spot by a cop who didn't know he was the good guy. Tragic, but understandable how that could happen......

[Bootlace]

7. Firearms have been

Around for a long time. Semiautomatic firearms have been around for over 100 years. They aren't any more deadly today, they aren't cheaper today, they aren't easier to get today. I remember when I was a boy, hardware stores and auto parts stores sold guns and ammo.
This mass shooting scourge is new, relatively speaking, just in the past couple of decades has this really been an issue. It isn't the guns that have changed.

[Model35mech]

13. Mass shootings don't actually create the greatest expected no's of deaths

In July 2022 the number of dead in mass shootings was 235, the projected number for the year was roughly twice that.

BUT the number of OTHER gun homicides was projected to be 20,000.

Why do you think Americans focus on the smaller problem?

[Bootlace]

23. I wish I had that answer

But honestly I don't know. Maybe it is because it is so senseless. I mean mobsters, gang bangers, bank robbers getting in a shootout has its reasons, they are wrong but reasons none the less. maybe turf wars, fighting over a street corner, or a neighborhood, you killed one of us so we are going to kill one of you, not wanting to go to jail, what ever.
This mass shooting problem is something all together different. Murdering random people for no reason is something I just can't get my mind around.

[yankee87]

32. Missed the big one

Most shootings occur between friends, family members and acquaintances. Don’t fall for the NRA talking points about gangs, which is code word for minorities.

[Bootlace]

39. I'm not going to disagree.

My dinner was starting to burn so I couldn't ponder my reply much longer.

[Skittles]

62. oh come on

surely you must know why America has so many gun humping COWARDS

[AnrothElf]

19. They also last many years... decades.. a century...

It's not just the guns, it's the shere QUANTITY of the guns, their ubiquity, and the pathetic fucking hobbyists who think they're "fun"

[Bootlace]

48. I hate to be the one

To break the bad news to you but democrats own and collect guns, democrats hunt wild game, democrats partake in shooting sports competition. Democrats have been doing all of this as long as there has been democrats. Been that way for my family since the 1800's

[Skittles]

61. so what's the problem, are you really going to say a mental health issue?

as if America is the only country in the world with mental health issues?

I hate to be the one but I live in Texas and you so sound SOOOOOOO familiar

[plimsoll]

33. The way they're marketed has changed.

I remember seeing guns in lots of hardware stores growing up, you could order them through Kotter &Co (True Value supplier). They where directed at a hunting use mostly. This seems to be marketed at what I'd call the "Tactical Ted" demographic, late 20 to 40 year old white guys who didn't join the military but want to prove how tough they are. But the scared of everything comment seems to be the correct analysis.

[Torchlight]

8. It's a profitable strategy for the gun industry to take.

Heck, hate radio has been pushing fear long enough to make it standard rather than optional among many of my less-educated neighbors. I'm just surprised their fear-for-profit tactic hasn't been made more overt than it already is. Triggering fear (no pun intended) to this demographic brings the industry more revenue.

[Timeflyer]

12. They live in so much fear, when they and their guns are the real threats.

[Captain Zero]

16. This. Exactly.

[former9thward]

14. A totally made up statistic.

No credible authority tracks who owns guns. None.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

17. I take it you don't think the Pew Research Center is credible.

Okay.

[NickB79]

18. I don't think most gun owners would answer pollsters in the first place

And those that do answer, I doubt would respond honestly.

Doesn't matter who asks the question.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

21. I'm curious, in which direction do you think they are lying?

[AndyS]

25. And yet every gunner out there hangs on every word John Lott

published to prove that 2 million times a year people use guns in self defense. A number that came from a phone survey. An anonymous survey over the phone by total strangers.

Can ya' rationalize this?

[keithbvadu2]

37. An imaginary survey that he lied about having the data.

[former9thward]

24. You tell me how they would know.

Okay.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

20. I am currently reading Dying of Whiteness

by Jonathan M. Metzl. Subtitle is "How the politics of racial resentment is killing America's heartland." The first part is about guns, and specifically suicide by gun, which I believe is far and away the greatest number of gun deaths. What's especially tragic is that most people who aim a gun at themself die. He goes to some suicide survivor (meaning family and friends) support groups, and speaks individually to people. It's like they truly don't get the connection between a gun in the house and the suicide.

The second part of the book looks at Tennessee not expanding health care after the Affordable Care act, and Kansas cutting money to schools and social services. I expect I will learn a lot before I am done.

[AnrothElf]

22. "Fuck your hobby"

Is the only argument I need.

Cowards, every last "law-abiding" gun nut.

[Rebl2]

27. I am insecure

about a lot of things and don’t own one gun and don’t plan to.

[Skittles]

65. you're not a coward

[ancianita]

28. 3 percent of the population of 336,030,517 is 10,080, 916 people with guns. Scary.

Especially if they have assault weapons and see everyone not like them as a lethal enemy.

[Artcatt]

29. Sounds like an army to me.

[ancianita]

30. Several armies. Since the US active duty military numbers 1.4 million.

[fescuerescue]

43. That's actually better I think than..

336,030,517 each having 1 gun.

If the real threat is down to 10 million people. We can track them and monitor them much easier than 336 million.

After all these 10 million people don't have 916 arms and hands.

[NickB79]

51. That still leaves 200 million guns for the other 97%

Because we have 400 million guns in the US.

[ancianita]

52. What the 3% own can be passed out to the rest of Americans without guns. Come ON.

Are you serious?

American civilians own nearly 100 times as many firearms as the U.S. military and nearly
400 times as many as law enforcement.

[fescuerescue]

67. If I a gun nut walked up to you and handed you a free one

Would you accept?

[ancianita]

69. Not sure what I'd do. Depends on the situation around me.

I've owned three. But haven't since college days.

Why do you ask? Also, would you?

[inthewind21]

70. Why wouldn't you accept

it? It's one less gun in the hands of a "gun nut" Sounds like a win to me.

[ancianita]

74. I didn't say I wouldn't. I just said it would depend on the situation.

That might be one reason to accept it, but probably not my only reason.

Also consider that for every 100 persons there exist 120.5 guns. That's a stat from a few years ago, and so we can reasonably expect that the ratio is higher now.

You didn't answer my questions back to you, either.

[ancianita]

31. The Armed Insecure by the numbers, and these numbers are a couple of years old.

So they're probably much higher now.

The US has 46% of all firearms in the world, and it's 4% of the world's population. That makes
-- 3 times as many guns as the armed forces of the Russian Federation (30.3 million),
China (27.5 million),
North Korea (8.4 million),
Ukraine (6.6 million),
United States (4.5 million),
India (3.9 million),
Vietnam (3.8 million),
Iran (3.3 million),
South Korea (2.7 million),
Pakistan (2.3 million),
and all the other countries (39.7 million) combined.

-- American civilians own more guns "than those held by civilians in the other top 25 countries combined."


-- American civilians own nearly 100 times as many firearms as the U.S. military and nearly
-- 400 times as many as law enforcement."


-- Americans bought more than 2 million guns in May 2018, alone.[8] That is more than twice as many guns, as possessed by every law enforcement agency in the United States put together.[8]
-- In April and May 2018, U.S. civilians bought 4.7 million guns, which is more than all the firearms stockpiled by the United States military.

-- In 2017, Americans bought 25.2 million guns, which is 2.5 million more guns than possessed by every law enforcement agency in the world put together.
-- Between 2012 and 2017, U.S. civilians bought 135 million guns, 2 million more guns than the combined stockpile of all the world's armed forces.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_ownership

[yankee87]

34. Personal anecdote

Was second shift manager of a steel mill and had the same truck drivers pretty much every night. Well became friendly with one, nice guy. One night talking and he brings up about since overtime cut, trouble making mortgage. He then also tells me about how he has about 500 guns and ammunition for each one. Again, not threatening, just shooting the shit.
Of course, he didn’t figure out how the tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in guns affected his finances. He was in his mid fifties, wife and already raised his kids.
I remember thinking, that would be a great house to rob and steal his guns. I mean, at some point the house is empty.
Lost the second shift a little after that. Hopefully he turned out okay.

[Bootlace]

35. How was this study conducted?

Was it some random phone survey? Are they just robodialing people to ask if they own guns?

Ring ring, hello? Q- Yes, how many guns in your home?
A- f'n none.

Ring ring, hello? Q-yes, how much gold and silver in your home? A- f'n none.

Ring ring, hello? Q- yes, how much cash and jewelry in your home? A- f'n none.

[oldsoftie]

47. Yeah, I'm not buying it either. 9M people own 200 million guns?

[Bootlace]

50. It doesn't

Make a whole lot of sense does it.

[grantcart]

58. Yeah the math is suspect but the principle needs exposure

There are a small number of people who have huge stockpile of guns.

Wish they had more reliable numbers.

[inthewind21]

72. Why is the

math suspect? Do the math. You might be surprised.

[grantcart]

75. Obviously you haven't bothered to do the math

It is highly suspect because

1) The source asserts the number but the link to the Harvard study doesn't work and googling it yields nothing

2) The numbers aren't consistent with known statistical sources

3) Its not logical

The known statistics for gun ownership in the US are that there are 400 million guns and 100 million gun owners (33% of the population owns a gun and 45% of the population live in a household with a gun)

If 3% of the population owns half of the guns that means that the author is asserting that 91 million own 200 million guns and 9 million own 200 million of course that 9 million wouldn't have exactly the same number of guns so a likely extrapolation would be that the top 1% or 3 million would own 100 million guns.

4) If you google "3% of Americans own guns" the only article I could find is a Guardian article that asserts that three percent of Americans own 133 million guns which is only 1/3rd of the guns in the US and would average about 15 guns per highest concentration of gun owners which seems about right, although I am sure that there are 100,000 people with questionable sanity that own an average 50 guns each.

5) Glaring error in calculating the number of people who own guns. The Guardian number (and I saw a similar number in a Forbes article but couldn't find it again). The Guardian article states that "only 21 to 31% of American adults say they personally own a gun". Literature on gun statistical analysis has noted that response to surveys have become increasingly suspect as paranoia among gun owners has increased and that the number of gun owners has remained stable but what has decreased is the number of people who are comfortable telling a stranger if they own a gun has significantly decreased.

6) Statistical analysis that is based not on respondent answers but on actual gun purchase statistics consistently estimate that 33% of Americans own a gun and about 45% of American households own a gun.


Obviously if you dramatically underestimate the number of Americans who own a gun by relying on respondents to a survey when gun owners are notoriously paranoid about people asking questions about their guns rather than looking at more reliable statistical analysis the concentration of guns per household is going to be distorted and higher than the reality. That is why the claim which isn't supported with clear statistical data is suspect when compared to data that is based on actual ATF statistics.


Guardian article noted above


https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/nov/15/the-gun-numbers-just-3-of-american-adults-own-a-collective-133m-firearms


Example of one of many articles showing that gun ownership in the US is as high as 45% of households as opposed to the 21% in the Guardian article

https://www.statista.com/statistics/249740/percentage-of-households-in-the-united-states-owning-a-firearm/

[inthewind21]

71. Why not

That's 22.22 guns each. When there are people who own 100 or more, 22.2 isn't that hard to buy at all.

[oldsoftie]

73. I know they exist, but MILLIONS of them?

And most people have guns that aren't registered anyway, so the data used to come to this conclusion seems weak. They'd never know how many I have because they came from my father & grandfather.

[calimary]

41. So ALL THE REST OF US are ruled by 3% of the population?

A small fraction of irrationally paranoid chickenshits determined to rule the rest of us through fear - because THEY have arsenals? They’re all of THREE PERCENT? They’re THREATENING us, their fellow citizens??? That’d constitute 97% of the rest of us, their fellow citizens???

And we have to let them?

We have to allow this????

We somehow have to be okay with this?

FUCK that!!!

[Skittles]

63. they are backed by the NRA and an ENTIRE POLITICAL PARTY

gun humping cowards have a lot of people on their side

[Kaleva]

78. They rule you only if you allow it.

The odds of me, and maybe you, of being a victim of a crime involving a gun are very small

[keithbvadu2]

42. Buying more guns

NRA dues and solicitations
comment from a blog (DU I think)

I had a coworker who was a big time gun owner who kept a gun in every room in the house just in case someone broke in (lots of problems with that idea, may be worth a blog article someday, but that’s what he did). He even went so far as to start buying more guns for each room after a school shooting, like home invasion and mass shooting are correlated somehow. He had let his NRA membership lapse and refused to renew it because he got tired of nonstop requests for donations. To him all the membership did was give the NRA to badger him for more money with phone calls, and direct mailings. If the
organization is as strapped for cash as it appears, those solicitations may have gone way over the top and people are simply tired of being badgered for money and are choosing to let their membership to lapse.

[Bootlace]

53. I let mine lapse too.

The nra was a good organization at one time, and still are to a certain extent. If you are looking for a firearm safety class, an NRA certified instructor is definitely the gold standard. Their youth firearm training is second to none. All of my kids went through their training and I don't know how they did it, but I have never had to remind them, not even once, about safety. But they spend all of the money you send them in membership dues to scare and lobby you for more money. When it went political, I bailed out. It's a shame because they had a good thing for a while

[GP6971]

54. Wrong.

I agree that the NRA was good organization going way back. But not now to ANY extent. Strictly political and nothing else...and on the wrong side.

[Bootlace]

55. Wrong

Their safety training is still the best there is.

[GP6971]

56. I haven't found any NRA traing courses

out here that are not political. Mostly run by by RWNJs, And I've looked all around.

[Bootlace]

57. For some reason

That doesn't surprise me.

[Skittles]

64. your responses do not surprise me

over and *OUT*

[Kaleva]

77. They do have on line distance courses.

Ignore the politics and focus on the actual training.

[Kaleva]

76. The training is good

The NRA course I took a few years ago emphasized avoidance and retreat when possible and a gun is only to be used as a last resort.

[calimary]

66. My husband grew up in Scouts, and told me the NRA used to sponsor gun safety sessions.

Last edited Tue Jan 24, 2023, 05:52 AM - Edit history (1)

He said they were serious, credible, very cautious, and very good. He still takes it seriously.

[oldsoftie]

45. Black women are the fastest growing gun buying group.

And the link in the article to the study doesnt work.

[Samrob]

46. Insecure about their place in the job market yet they hate education and educators.

Insecure about their place in the job market yet their jobs are not being taken from them by blacks but the influx of white Europeans, Russians, and all those jobs being outsourced to India and Taiwan ...you know all those folks you have a hard time understanding when you call any business for customer service.

They fear blacks yet most of them are being killed by other whites or other ethnic groups that are not black.

WTF? Did the election of Obama actually make them lose their fucking minds? How much actual harm was done to white people while Obama was President ... except the harm done to their minds by the likes of Limbaugh and FOX? Beer and good and people are crazy!

[oldsoftie]

49. Wheres this "influx of white europeans & Russians"? Whites make up less than 20% of immigrants.

[Skittles]

59. gun-humping COWARDS

they are absolutely PATHETIC

[Iggo]

60. And they're still scared.

[uponit7771]

68. Some scary shit right here