If there’s one thing that can polarize a room full of people, it’s gun ownership. Currently voting habits show that white, middle America is in more favor of an armed population, while people who live in cities generally don’t want more guns in civilian hands, according to a Pew Research Center study.
Maj Toure, a 29-year-old black artist and activist from Philadelphia, wants to change this. He started the Black Guns Matter movement, and it’s a stroke of genius.
Black Guns Matter has events in cities all across the country to educate people in urban areas about carry laws and how to deal with law enforcement as a legally carrying citizen. Toure believes legally arming good people in the city will deter crime, empower the black community and reduce the public’s fear of gun ownership. In an interview with the Philadelphia Inquirer, Toure said, “The stigma, especially in an urban environment like Philly, is if you have a gun, you’re either law enforcement or the bad guy.”
He goes on to explain his desire to teach people that they can be a good guy, someone who owns a gun for the purpose of personal protection, if they are well-informed and responsible with their firearm.
In an NPR interview, Toure talks about being a 15-year-old on the streets of Philadelphia and carrying a gun he didn’t know how to use and didn’t respect. Looking back, he realizes how dangerous and potentially fatal it was to carry around a weapon with no training or legal rights to own it.
According to the Brookings Institution, the leading cause of gun deaths nationwide is suicide, but gun deaths in the black community are homicides 82 percent of the time. On top of this, only 19 percent of black households own guns, while 41 percent of white households do so.
Disarming the good people in cities who just want to protect themselves and their families won’t solve any problems. In fact, it will only let people who obtain guns illegally further terrorize their neighborhoods, as the average civilian won’t be able to defend himself. It has to stop.
In 2001, there were 84 guns legally owned in America for every 100 people. Now it’s increased to 88 guns per 100 people, yet we have the lowest rate of gun murders since at least 1981.
It’s time for us to rethink how we deal with gun violence in inner cities. Let’s look at Chicago. Compared to Indiana, Illinois makes it much more difficult for people to legally obtain weapons. For this reason, criminals are incentivized to travel elsewhere, buy a gun and come back to Chicago without registering it. This is illegal, so law-abiding people won’t do it and therefore can’t arm themselves nearly as easily as criminals.
We can’t solve problems with inner city gun violence if we only arm the people who intend to do harm. The Black Guns Matter movement is spreading an important message to black Americans: you have Second Amendment rights too. Fight for them.
dylmoore@umail.iu.edu
