{"id":72394,"date":"2021-09-22T03:42:03","date_gmt":"2021-09-22T08:42:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=72394"},"modified":"2021-09-22T03:42:03","modified_gmt":"2021-09-22T08:42:03","slug":"72394","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=72394","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

Pew: \u2018Key Facts About Americans and Guns\u2019 Revealing<\/a><\/p>\n

A recent analysis of polling data by the\u00a0Pew Research Center<\/a>\u00a0shows personal protection \u201ctops the list of reasons why gun owners say they own a firearm.\u201d<\/p>\n

This would certainly square with what a 20-something Seattle resident\u2014a transplant from Florida about five years ago\u2014told John Carlson, the morning drive time talk host at KVI-AM in an interesting interview about why he felt the need to arm himself and take some firearms training, and get a concealed pistol license. The young man\u2019s name is Wyatt, and he is one of nearly 98,000 residents of Washington\u2019s King County, which encompasses Seattle, to have an active CPL, according to the most recent data from the state Department of Licensing.<\/p>\n

Wyatt told Carlson he\u2019s been a witness or intended victim of crime over the past couple of years, and said he\u2019s\u2019 had to draw his legally-carried sidearm more than once on knife-armed thugs.<\/p>\n

So it is no wonder why he\u2019s part of what may be a growing number of Americans now packing hardware. The Pew story referred to a survey conducted in June which revealed \u201cMen are more likely than women to say they own a gun (39% vs. 22%). And 41% of adults living in rural areas report owning a firearm, compared with about 29% of those living in the suburbs and two-in-ten living in cities.\u201d<\/p>\n

But in Seattle, where there have been at\u00a0least 32 homicides<\/a>\u00a0so far this year, and other cities experiencing increasing crime rates in the 19th<\/sup>\u00a0month of COVID-19, that could change.<\/p>\n

Another revelation in the Pew report is that 48 percent of Americans \u201csee gun violence as a very big problem.\u201d By why single out guns for demonization? In Wyatt\u2019s case, he was almost a victim of \u201cknife violence,\u201d except that nobody in the media ever calls it that. For some reason, guns get not-so-special treatment when used in a violent crime.<\/p>\n

Pew based its conclusion on research from April which showed 48 percent of survey respondents think gun-related crime is a problem.<\/p>\n

The same April survey revealed 53 percent of Americans \u201cfavor stricter gun laws,\u201d but that\u2019s a decline since 2019, when it was 60 percent. Could this have anything to do with the fact that the past 19 months have seen an estimated 8 million people purchase guns for the first time? Going through the process\u2014depending upon the jurisdiction\u2014can be an eye-opener for people who previously thought guns were too easily obtained. The\u00a0Washington Examiner<\/a>\u00a0recently reported that the pandemic and rising murder numbers could change gun politics for a long time to come.<\/p>\n

According to Pew, \u201cRepublicans are currently more likely to say gun laws should be less strict (27%) than stricter (20%)\u2026Today, a large majority of Democrats and Democratic leaners (81%) say gun laws should be stricter, though this share has declined slightly since 2019 (down from 86%).\u201d<\/p>\n

Pew has also found Americans are split when asked if restricting gun ownership would result in fewer mass shootings, with 49 percent contending there would be a reduction, and 42 percent saying it would make no difference. Nine percent think there would be more mass shootings if it was harder for people to legally buy a gun.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pew: \u2018Key Facts About Americans and Guns\u2019 Revealing A recent analysis of polling data by the\u00a0Pew Research Center\u00a0shows personal protection \u201ctops the list of reasons why gun owners say they own a firearm.\u201d This would certainly square with what a 20-something Seattle resident\u2014a transplant from Florida about five years ago\u2014told John Carlson, the morning drive … Continue reading “”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-72394","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rkba","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72394","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=72394"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72394\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72395,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72394\/revisions\/72395"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=72394"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=72394"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=72394"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}