Gun Ownership And Racist Attitudes Are Linked, Study Finds
Source: Huffington Post
Are you a white gun owner? You're more likely to be a racist than if you weren't packing heat.
That's what researchers found in a study published by the journal Plos One, which linked racial prejudice to firearm ownership in America.
A research team led by Dr. Kerry O’Brien, a professor of behavioral studies at Australia's Monash University, examined attitudes about gun control and race using data from the American National Election Study, a survey conducted before and after presidential elections.
The researchers found that "for each 1 point increase in symbolic racism there was a 50% increase in the odds of having a gun at home," as well as "a 28% increase in support for permits to carry concealed handguns."
Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/05/gun-ownership-racism_n_4220727.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
he's gonna need something to fall back on financially.
I noticed this but never put 2+2 together. Now a lot of this makes more sense. I know folks like this and they are carful as to how they express racist attitudes. IE.. "when they can't buy anything with their snap cards and they(reads black folks) have looted all the stores. they will flood out of the city and into the country side, to rob, steal, and plunder. that's why I keep guns." this is a direct quote from someone I know. Wow, thank you for posting this.
Now, setting up a study to find something is normal. Thus a good study could be had by first proposing that if you tend to be pro gun you tend to be more racist, but the author of the study has to take precautions that the prejudices they bring into the study does not affect the study. The best way is to acknowledge such prejudiced when the study is considered.
I bring this up for the report clearly shows greater violence and racism and connection between the two as you deal with people as you go South. To a degree that is true, but it also shows that the study did have some pre study prejudice before the study was even started.
On top of this prejudice creeps in the nature of the question asked for example one of the question in this report:
"For example, in the symbolic racism section, participants were asked, "“How well does the word ‘violent’ describe most blacks?” on a scale of 1 to 5."
That question implies that the terms "Blacks" also mean "violent", the only restriction is how violent are blacks? By the very nature of that question you are asking people to say they are prejudice. It is a very bad question for it implies what you expect the answer to be.
Another question has the same problem:
Participants were also shown statements from the Symbolic Racism Scale, such as "Generations of slavery and discrimination have created conditions that make it difficult for Blacks to work they way out of the lower class?" and asked to what extent they agreed.
If you agree with that statement are you prejudice or just acknowledging facts? i.e Even the most racists would agree Blacks had had a problem prior to the 1960s, but many do not think so today, does that make such a person a racist? It is better the the first question, but not by much.
On top of the problem with the questions, you have the problem of Southern Rural History, Souther Rural History, is both racist AND violent. In the days of Slavery they were interconnected but also independent. The whole south was noted to be violent. In fact prior to the 1960s the Major cities of the US had lower then national average murder rates do to how high was the Southern Rural Murder Rate was. Some of this was racist, some of it was just violent.
Other studies have shown Southern Males tend to be more naturally violent then Northern males. The Experiment required a person to walk down a hallway with various sensors on. They were told that they had to go to another room for the actual study, but in the hallway they were bumped. What the body went through at that point was the experiment. Southern Males shows a grated tendency to go to a fight mood, in place of the Northern Students tendency to go to a laugh it off mood. This follows other studies that showed a greater tendency to acts of violence among Southern Whites. This tendency was noted in the Colonial period.
Now, some of that greater tendency to violence is tied in with what was expected of white southerns during the days of Slavery and Segregation (The Southern Sheriff "patrols", where every white male had to participate in every month, tended to be where white males meet and watched for run away slaves. They were permitted to do act of violence against Slaves (or any other person of "Color"
including killing them. How much this tradition survives in the rural South today is debatable, but it still survives. Note it is acts of violence NOT only against people of Color but each other and other whites.
Thus the Rural South is both Racist and Violent. The real issue is how much are these two things connected today? I can make the argument that they is little or no connection, but both survive among the same people.
Now, that such violence would make the connection of gun ownership and racism in the South is easy to see, for in the South they use to be connected (and may still be connected to a degree). On the other hand, how does this affect the over all study, for it also includes NORTHERN MALES who own guns. The Southern Traditions could make a clear connection, and that connection would make the whole report show a connection between Racism and Gun Ownership in the US as a whole, even if areas outside the South have no such connections. i.e the prejudice of the South makes a report that does NOT separate the Southern and Northern Traditions invalid, for such a report would show a connection do to the clear massive connection in the Southern Tradition, even if elsewhere they is no connection.
Worse, internal immigration would have to be taken into consideration, The Auto Industry, imported People from the South to work in the then new auto factories around Detroit starting in the 1920s. The Older Northern Steel and Coal Industry also recruited from the South starting in the 1920s. Thus huge areas around Pittsburgh and Detroit have a much more Southern Attitude then they did in the 1800s.
Just comments that this report has problems and when we read it accept its problems and do not try to make more of this study then it really shows.
You claim it had "loaded questions." Did you actually research the study? I'm guessing not since you don't believe in studies so your "conclusion" is based on a knee-jerk reaction which is certainly more scientific than a study. 
We have a gungeon on DU where I'm sure you'd be welcomed. Not a whole lot of people in there believe in science either. But they just lerve lerve lerve their penis extenders, er, guns.
