See if you can detect the connection

[roscoe]

From a NY Times article on trying to get minorities (who have much higher drowning rates) to learn to swim:

If parents do not know how to swim, they can see less value in their children's learning. Parents often react to the drowning numbers by urging their children to stay away from the water, thereby passing on the fear.

 

[Zundfolge]

That explains why the US Olympic Synchronized Swimming team is mostly white.


So you think this theory applies to gun ownership as well? I'm sure Kenn Blanchard would agree with that.

 

['Card]

Makes perfect sense to me.

Simply not knowing or understanding something can make people feel inadequate or inferior.
Feeling inadequate or inferior forces people to justify their lack of knowledge, usually by saying they don't really want to know or understand something anyway.
From saying "I don't want to know that anyway", it's a short jump to saying "I don't see why anyone would want to know that."

In this context, we're obviously talking about people who come from that viewpoint ending up with an anti-gun position, but it definitely isn't limited to that. Liberal, conservative, or otherwise, it's a blind spot (and a defensive position) that can affect people's opinions on lots of different subjects in many walks of life.

 

[hso]

Are we using the starter's pistol as the relevant gun info here or are you implying the logical similar relationship to firearms ownership and safety?

 

['Card]

What he's saying is that if your parents knew how to swim, the odds are good that you'll know how to swim. If your parents didn't know how to swim, then not only did they not teach you, but they probably minimized (or even derided) the value of swimming in your upbringing. Same deal with firearms, which is why you have a non-firearm owning population that gets increasingly hostile towards (and afraid of) firearms with each subsequent generation.

 

[roscoe]

We have a winner! The way we will turn around attitutes towards firearm ownership is with the youth. Even though it would be a political hot potato, I think we need to be looking toward groups that have traditionally not had firearms. Send those inner-city kids out to a ranch where they can learn about wildlife, hunting, tracking, etc., or teach young people responsible firearm use other ways.

Would people squeal, yes, but if we reduce the racial inner-city polarization on the issue, we would do more than just play to the gun-owning base, which is what the NRA does.

I like the NRA but they need to do more than just preach to the choir.