To be 100% clear - I know very little about this in general, and don’t pretend to suddenly have an informed opinion. The purpose of this is more to clarify the opinions I know I already do have, for the practice of clarifying my own thoughts. However, I know that I realistically will not be trying to lobby or take any action, political or otherwise, on this basis. For that reason, this is more an exercise (albeit about a serious topic) than anything else. These are a reflection of my own personal beliefs and convictions (not necessarily something I expect everyone to agree with).
- Avoid the political. Gun control is, for historical then cultural reasons, a very political and controversial topic in the US. I do not have a view on where this should go. Therefore, the policies I advocate for would be the policies that are the least political and the most practical.
- Mass shootings is a subset of gun-related violence, and should be treated as such. The four biggest problems with guns in the US are gang violence and murder, suicide, terror attacks, and mass shootings.
- gang violence and murder are the issue of law enforcement (which was largely hampered by public sentiment change in the last two years). Here, I stand strong that the police force is not perfect, but is overwhelmingly a net positive for the country and should be treated as such.
- suicide is the issue of mental health and (separately) broken spiritual foundations, that manifest in a lack of communal support. Guns are a tangential part of the story, but not a causal one. There may be a link between gun presence and thoughts on mortality, but I would guess it is a weak one. Suicide prevention efforts here matter more than gun control.
- terror attacks carried out by actors following a centralized organization (say, a fundamentalist Islamic terror group) are under the purview of national defense agencies, who seem to be doing a pretty good job. The FBI stops dozens of these every year, and any that succeed are due to an intelligence failure on behalf of existing national agencies.
- mass shootings are effectively terror attacks by believers in an ideology or movement, that are carried out by independent, decentralized actors. In the US, these have manifested as school or religious shootings. In these cases, the actor is easy to profile (young male, with a history of disturbed behavior, deep resentment, and unhealthy communal infrastructure as seen through unemployment, bullying, or lack of family support).
- What we know about mass shootings:
- Most of the data available is not relevant to this point, biased both on the left and the right. For example, data on mass shootings in America also includes gang violence, which is a function of weak law enforcement and, often, a black market for guns. The only piece of data that is relevant for this conversation, is the number of non-gang-affiliated mass shootings carried out with legally purchased firearms. Every other graph is a distraction.
- At the root of this violence is some ideology. This ranges from specific racially-informed stances to malice against the meaning of existence itself. A full embracing of meaninglessness does not necessarily lead to senseless violence, but it is often associated with it (causal but not strictly causal). The shootings are the manifestation of a sick society that allows for such ideologies to flourish and does not take care of its victims fast enough. Here, we should encourage messages and stories that promote meaning, through the Jordan Petersons of this world (who has probably spoken more powerfully to troubled young males than anyone else), or the much older and more powerful religious narratives he talks about. I think few would argue that a more religious America would definitely not increase the number of school shootings. Unfortunately, I don’t believe there is anything the government can do here, because this is the domain of community and citizens.
- However, the damage done by these individuals is proportional to the access and power of the available weapons. Guns provide a low-friction, high damage option. Should guns be removed, there would surely still be acts of violence, either through car attacks, stabbings, or improvised explosives. However, the hope is that those mediums would still have less victims and, by friction, hopefully less perpetrators. This is where most of the political discourse focuses its energy.
- Where the political is biased. Politically, I think the right makes a mistake in trying to blanket protect against any form of government intervention when it comes to guns. In this case, I think specific intervention can solve specific problems, for the good of the nation. I think the left makes a mistake in conflating specific tragedies (school shootings) with broader gun violence, and makes broad-stroke proposals (overarching gun control) for specific problems (school shootings).
- Is there a reasonable middle ground? This means I look for policies that sound reasonable to the right (who are the most defensive on this topic) but still tackle the problem of mass shootings (often publicized more by the left). This is because I believe that there is an intersection, or common ground, that people from all sides of the political spectrum would be willing to agree to in order to reduce the amount of preventable tragedy seen in the US today.
- I believe that strict profiling and reasonable limits for gun ownership specifically for high-risk individuals would reduce the number of attacks carried out with high victim counts. So how do you identify these individuals, and then how do you prevent them from getting guns, while hopefully minimizing friction for typical, non-psychopathic gun-owning Americans? This question, specifically, is the one that deserves the most thought, especially on a national level. I haven’t given this a lot of thought myself, but some measures that seem reasonable to me include:
- Brief applications and background checks with the sole purpose of filtering out the individuals with the highest risk of carrying out mass shootings. There are probably a few core features that can be filtered for through brief applications and background checks. These don’t have to be extensive, but can include: is the applicant male and single? Have they been steadily employed for >6 months? Do they have strong references from a respected member of their community? Do they have a history of threatening physical violence?
- As for how to prevent them from getting guns: for those who fit this profile, there are several approaches: training (probably useless), a purchasing freeze (say 12 months before re-applying, a clear checklist of what to do in order to be qualified), a freeze on certain types of caliber and round size (say also 12 months, etc), a blanket requirement (for every applicant) to go through X number of community service hours before a first purchase, temporarily storing the firearm in a licensed location (a shooting range, etc.) for a given period (e.g. 12 months).
The specific problem that is being faced (rogue, lone shooters) should be addressed specifically (not conflated with the other issues). The best solution is merely the one that tackles this the most efficiently. To be clear, I think that issue #1 is the province of law enforcement, issue #2 is the province of mental health and community support, and issue #3 is the province of national agencies, and issue #4 is the one requiring novel intervention.
Again, the goal is to craft policies that are as specific as possible, with the only goal of reducing mass shootings. Policies that fit this tight constraint will be the most helpful and also the most likely to pass bipartisan critique.