Last night, I practiced one of the most difficult exercises for an anthropology student, but also one of the most important for a storyteller, as well as a human open to dialogue:
The Young Americans for Freedom at the University of Washington (YAF) invited a representative of the National Rifle Association (NRA) to give a speech demystifying some of the gun control ideas circulating nowadays in the United States, inviting students to “Arm yourself with the facts!”
I attended it armed with nothing more than my values and my laptop bursting with alarming articles on how the United States has more gun deaths compared to other high-income countries.
I want to be honest with you: As a far-left liberal European who grew up in a country where it is unthinkable that someone would openly carry a firearm (except for hunters), I was pretty nervous when I entered Gowen Hall.
But what was tensing the muscles around my spine was the fact that I was already hurt by YAF’s invitation for the NRA to come on campus roughly two weeks after Florida’s mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, where 17 people were killed. I initially found it insensitive and insulting for the families and friends of victims of that mass shooting, particularly because there was no mention of the shooting during the meeting. Nor was there mention of other recent mass shootings:
Twenty-six people were killed at First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, on Nov. 5, 2017. Fifty-eight were killed at the Harvest Music Festival in Las Vegas on Oct. 1, 2017. Forty-nine were killed at Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Fla. on June 12, 2016. And 27, mostly children, were killed at Sandy Hook, Conn., on Dec. 14, 2012.
These are some of the deadliest mass shootings in American history, but there have been many others. So yes, I did have a biased attitude, especially coming from a country where these kind of open-fire attacks only happen once every twenty years and are considered terrorist attacks. To put this into perspective, in the United States, there are 10.2 firearm deaths per 100,000 people, while in Spain there’s only 0.6.
But what I found in that class was different than what I expected. Everyone welcomed me, someone with a radically different stand in the debate and is really scared of weapons, and were happy to explain in the best way they could why it is important to respect the Second Amendment.
We both worked on building an important intercultural bridge and opened a road for dialogue. Most importantly, we both did what every single university pamphlet tries to tell you when they explain what college will do to help you: It wants you to challenge your pre-established ideas, make you think critically, and face your strongest opposers. It’s all just to find that we as humans are not as ideologically polarized as we might think, and that the only way to experience progress in a society is to not exclude anyone from debate, even if only to just learn to understand their side without agreeing with it.
A YAF member, who preferred not to be named in this article, confessed he feels he is not being heard neither on campus, in Olympia — when YAF members are not well-received by some state senators — nor in other locations, such as when he and his peers were harassed with flattened tires and property trespassing from individuals with radically different perspectives.
“We feel more than left out in many occasions,” he commented.
The NRA has a lobbying branch, the Institute for Legislative Action (ILA), that comes to university campuses around the country and affiliates with student groups. Ben Carpenter, the ILA representative who came to the UW, agreed with the audience that well-spread claims such as more guns equals more crime, prohibiting private firearm transactions reduces crimes, and that banning “assault weapons” as well as “large” magazines would reduce crime, are actually myths: According to the NRA, the nation’s murder rate has decreased 52 percent, “nearly the lowest point of U.S. history,” while in recent decades Americans have acquired 120 million more firearms, and the number of right-to-carry states has risen to 41.
But the numbers I had in my head were far different: According to a study by the American Journal of Medicine, Americans are 10 times more likely to be hurt or killed by guns than any other developed country. This is the country with the highest rate of firearms per capita in the world. The study concludes with a thought that contradicts what the NRA and my fellow UW students feel, which I don’t understand: firearms kill instead of protect. That reason is why I obviously don’t want to be on a campus where there are students with guns in their hips.
Evan Wallesen, a student here at the UW and a board member of YAF, tried to explain his point of view. He argued that “criminals are going to be criminals, they do not abide by the law by definition.” Therefore, if they know that by coming to campus they will find a place filled with individuals who are not carrying, they’re more drawn to these places.
“It may take four minutes for the cops to show up if someone is pointing at you,” Wallesen said. “By the time they get here, it might be too late, unless you can defend yourself.”
Still, even though I understand, I can’t help but feel that the following question is the core of the problem:
Doesn’t less accessibility to guns for everyone means less guns to be used in murders and accidents? Why walk down the supermarket aisle with your hands stuck to your hip in constant fear, feeling paranoid that a random shooter might assault you? And wouldn’t there be no shooter in the first place if purchasing a weapon was too complicated?
Protecting yourself from guns with more guns still doesn’t make too much sense to me, but I want to learn more about other perspectives. And even though I had a civil conversation with YAF and NRA members last night, it still didn’t change the fact that I don’t see guns as protective, and I am terrified to think that they could be openly carried on campus.
Reach writer Clàudia Esplugas Masvidal at opinion@dailyuw.com. Twitter: @ClaudiaEsplugas
