After each mass shooting, the aftermath is the same; tearful vigils, incensed television pundits, and bereft survivors dominate the news cycle. This contemporary sensationalism in the media charges the American debate over gun ownership with strong emotions and distracts from fact. Hence arises the gun debate’s incorrigible characteristics of misinformation, misperception, and polarization, such that, for instance, Americans’ emotions are so entrenched in their opinions that they cannot reach “consensus as a society” as to what exactly assault rifles are, much less what the law thereabout should be (Source A). But the emotional atmosphere of the American gun debate extends far beyond assault rifles alone; it creates statistically significant discrepancies between factual truth and popular American sentiment on all gun control issues.
According to the Pew Research
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In fact, every spike in the percentage of Americans who desire stricter gun control corresponds to a major mass shooting. The late 2012 spike lines up almost exactly with the Aurora, Colorado movie theater shooting and the Sandy Hook shooting, both of which occured in late 2012. The late 2015 spike coincides with the December 2015 mass shooting in San Bernardino (Source D). There seems to be a clear trend in which a surge of pro-gun regulation sentiments emerge for a short time immediately following a gun-related tragedy. This is because these terrors instill fear in people by showing how destructive and evil guns can be. People react to this fear, ignoring such facts as those reported by the Pew Research Center, hence the motivation to push for new regulation (Source C). It is not statistics or evidence that drives these great surges of gun control regulations. Rather, it is hyper-emotional fear, running athwart the logic of statistics and evidence, that primarily motivates discussion of gun