Richard Ford on America’s gun problem
He wants saner gun laws — but used to carry a pistol. The novelist on his complex relationship with guns
“It’s better that I didn’t have a gun that night and that I didn’t shoot the kid—though I unquestionably would have”
Many of my fellow Americans hold in their minds complicatedly divergent views about guns — about guns’ large presence in our culture, about Americans’ right to own and carry guns, about guns’ generative relationship to violent crime, about guns’ responsibility for the deaths of children in mass killings, about accidental occurrences and suicides, and about what it all says about us that we have so many guns but can’t seem to exercise sane control over their use and misuse. This is not to say that many, many good Americans don’t believe guns are abhorrent and wouldn’t abolish them one and all from our land. And it’s not to say that the National Rifle Association isn’t a domestic terrorist organisation that tacitly supports the killing of children more than it supports reasoned gun legislation. And it’s not to say I think that by writing this now anything about guns-in-America will get better, or that our minds and hearts will soon become less confounded by these matters. As an owner of several guns, I, as much as anyone, hold some of these divergent views. Therefore, what I say here is meant only to lay some certain matters bare, not to advocate whether gun-ownership is good or bad. If I end up defending a point of view or seeking to justify myself, I hope I’ll be responsible enough to own up...
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