The rumors and conspiracy theories in the wake of Hurricane Helene were weaponized and dangerous: government aid was a green light for confiscation of property; money immediately running dry; the storm itself had been developed by the government to benefit Kamala Harris’ campaign. Meterologists were threatened with death. In North Carolina, FEMA workers stopped knocking on doors for fear that militiamen were after them. In Tennessee, one A volunteer from the church group stood between them federal aides and angry locals with open weapons. And at least one arrest, of a man armed with a rifle and a handgun, took place in North Carolina.
The paranoia in hurricane country, with its undercurrent of violence, is just the latest sign of a new wrinkle in American gun ownership, something scientists have come to describe as gun culture 3.0. The 1.0 version is often based on firearm ownership, based on hunting animated by a mythologized western frontier. Gun culture 2.0 focuses on self-defense, motivated by overwhelming concerns about violent crimes that emerged in the 1960s. For years, American gun owners have been telling pollsters that the #1 reason they own guns is to protect themselves in dangerous situations.
But that broad motivation masks a shift in what many — but not all — gun owners now feel they need protection against. Taken from the militia movement, which ipoints to government tyranny as a major reason for gun ownershipGun culture 3.0 is all about perceived political threats unleashed by those who no longer invest in normal guardrails – whether rogue government agents or rogue private individuals.
Of course, gun culture 3.0 raises the question of what will happen after November 5. Regardless of what the American electorate does on Election Day, it is difficult to imagine a scenario that does not allow for violence.
In fact, it has already started.
In Arizona, where I live, the Office of the Democratic Party Tempe was shot at three times in the past two months — and closed this month as staff were exhausted by the threat of bullets fired. In Pima Countythe Democratic office has reset its public hours in light of incoming violent threats. Election workers fearing for their lives is now so common that the change barely made news.
Meanwhile, two assassination attempts on former President Trump feel almost unremarkable. Even the first attempt that almost caused an accident could not be registered – one poll The following days showed that about 30% of Biden supporters (he was still in the race) downplayed the severity of the situation, suggesting the attempt may have been staged. A similar share of Republicans feel the same way about mass shootings.
Political violence and threats appear to be a feature, not a bug, of American politics.
Although gun owners are modestly more likely to believe that political violence is justified than their non-gun-owning counterparts, they are They are not more likely to be willing to participate in such violence. Nevertheless, there is some evidence that certain subgroups of gun owners might be. According to to a recent studyPolitical violence can be justified, according to 42% of assault-style gun owners, as do 56% of gun owners who carry them all or most of the time.
Such a stance betrays a right-wing distrust of government and a heavy-handed embrace of the Second Amendment. And yet the same survey reported that 44% of a different but potentially overlapping subgroup – new gun owners – also agreed that political violence could be justified. New gun owners are disproportionately women and people of color, and they tend to lean liberal compared to existing gun owners. They too are part of an emerging gun culture 3.0.
In fact one study A study published this summer in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that new gun owners are far more likely to be motivated by political concerns about protective violence than by other issues: They want protection at rallies and demonstrations, and they are especially concerned concerns about violence from people who do not share their political beliefs. Black gun owners—longstanding or new—were particularly concerned about police brutality.
This data suggests that Americans across the spectrum are turning to firearms as a last resort to—as “bad feminist” and new gun owner Roxane Gay recently put it—“ways to not feel out of control.” And our divisive and distrustful politics are driving them there.
Some people think that political violence resolves itself, and it does his ‘own worst enemy’, because the adversity it causes renews people’s commitment to civility and a fundamental, despite our differences, unity. But waiting for political violence to bring Americans back from the brink cannot be the only way to reverse the division and fear behind gun culture 3.0.
When armed adversaries approached first responders in Tennessee in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, the woman who stepped between them listened. “People just need to be heard,” she told a reporter. “I said, ‘I hear you.’ But she also pointed out what they could see for themselves: storm victims are being helped, not exploited.
We can depolarize everyday lifecalling out divisive behavior and calling out disinformation for what it is, even among our political allies, and working – as hard as it may be – to approach those on the “other side” with curiosity. Maybe even pity.
Neither gun ownership nor gun restrictions can address the underlying fear and polarization fueling gun culture 3.0. We must do something about our withered ability to live together.
Jennifer Carlson is the founding director of the Center for the Study of Guns in Society at Arizona State University and a 2022 MacArthur Fellow.