Racism Against the AAPI Community and Gun Ownership

As a gunologist, not to mention an Asian-American gun owner, a recent episode of the Red, Blue & Brady podcast on racism against the AAPI community and gun ownership caught my attention.

The episode focused on a recently published study by a group of public health scholars who fielded a national survey of 916 Asian Americans asking about their experiences of racial discrimination and their firearm-related behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic.

There is a lot of anecdata floating around about how anti-Asian discrimination increased during the pandemic (think of people taking the “China virus” and “kung flu” language to the next outgroup level), and that this led to unprecedented gun buying among Asian Americans.

Of course, without historical data, we can’t really speak to “precedent,” but these scholars find that 6.0% of respondents said they purchased a gun during COVID and another 11.2% said they intended to purchase a gun. Of the 6% of COVID gun buyers, 54.6% were first-time gun buyers.

Light Over Heat #24: My Thoughts on the Murder of Ahmaud Arbery

This week’s episode features audio of comments I made for the Liberal Gun Owners Lens Podcast series on the murder of Ahmaud Arbery.

I try to recognize both the importance of understanding race/racism in American history, and hence gun culture historically, and also the importance of recognizing that this is not essential to American gun culture today.

I hope this subtlety comes through in this episode.

New “Light Over Heat” videos are released on YouTube every Wednesday, so please surf over to my YouTube channel and SUBSCRIBE to follow, RING THE BELL to receive notifications, and SHARE so others can learn about this work.

Light Over Heat #22: Further Thoughts Post-Buffalo Thanks to Intellectual Diversity

In my last video (Light Over Heat #21), I commented on guns and race, racism, and white supremacy in the wake of the Buffalo mass murder. The comments I received, even the critical ones, were generally very respectful and constructive. Given the name and mission of my YouTube channel — “Light Over Heat” — I appreciate this very much.

The comments also got me thinking about the value of diversity (political, cultural, social, intellectual) in exposing us to people and ideas different from our own. From these differences can come greater understanding.

Getting into gun culture has exposed me to more intellectual diversity than if I had just stayed in my bright blue sociology bubble. In this week’s video, I talk about some of the ways I have come to see the issues raised by the Buffalo mass murder differently.

Light Over Heat #21: Talking Guns and Race Post-Buffalo

This week I was supposed to post a video commemorating the 20th consecutive weekly episode of “Light Over Heat”. But the dark side of life intervened in the form of a white supremacist mass murder in Buffalo, New York.

So I quickly recorded some thoughts on guns and race. This is a first word not a last word on the topic, but I felt compelled to put my thoughts out there as I have seen so many perspectives that I think miss the reality of guns in America (typically those on the left) AND the reality of racism in America (typically those on the right).

So, here I try to find the via media and bring some light over heat to an important and controversial issue.

New “Light Over Heat” videos are released on YouTube every Wednesday, so please surf over to my YouTube channel and SUBSCRIBE to follow, RING THE BELL to receive notifications, and SHARE so others can learn about this work.