White Americans are much more likely to support gun rights than their non-white counterparts, but not because they want arms for self-protection

Does fear of criminal victimization contribute to white Americans’ enthusiastic support for ‘gun rights’? While those in favor of less arms control link gun rights to fear of crime and self-protection, Alexandra Filindra takes a look at the notion that Americans support gun ownership on the grounds of personal protection. Finding that the gun owning population is much whiter than the American population as a whole, the authors prove that fear of crime, real or imagined, does not explain why Americans have been more supportive of gun rights in the past years.