-Special program on today's mass murder in the capital city.
Good evening.
One of history's worst mass murders
occurred here in Austin today.
49 persons were hit by gunfire. There are 16 dead.
-Dead people were lying on the hot sidewalk.
-Is appalled, is stunned.
-Since the University of Texas tower shooting in 1966,
there have been more than 150 mass shootings
in the United States.
In the aftermath of these tragedies,
the conversations about gun violence
often revolve around the same topics.
-We debate gun culture.
We debate what is the meaning of the Second Amendment?
Should we have this law or that law?
-Often, the conversation is framed around mass shootings
and school shootings,
'cause they get the most media attention.
-But these events have more in common
than just similar rhetoric.
All but three of these shootings were committed by men,
and more broadly,
the majority of gun violence is perpetrated by men.
In 2017, the Centers for Disease Control
recorded nearly 40,000 gun deaths.
Most were from suicides and homicides.
Men are over-represented on both sides of this gun violence,
making up more than 80% of both perpetrators and victims.
-Whether it's mass shootings, whether it's violence
amongst men in the inner city,
whether it's rural, you know, crime, is that a cultural thing?
Absolutely it's a cultural thing.
-The connection between guns and American masculinity runs deep,
and it's often right in front of us.
But the U. S.
is now seeing a re-examination of the traits
often associated with masculinity --
control, power, independence, entitlement.
-Boys will be boys. Boys will be boys.
-Will this re-evaluation reach gun culture and gun violence?
-I think we gravitate,
especially in times of tragedy, to simple explanations.
We want an easy fix.
Fix the mental healthcare system.
Fix the gun-show loophole.
One of those solutions has to be redefining
what it means to be a boy and a man.
-Right now it is quarter to 9:00,
and we're running a little bit late.
Just got out of Little League, and now we have to go
to Granite State Indoor Range in Hudson, New Hampshire,
so we can go make a couple YouTube videos.
The comments were astounding on the previous video.
-Josh Cast is the creator of the YouTube channel
FourGuysGuns, which offers firearm product reviews,
demonstrations, and safety tips.
-You know, it just kind of took off.
It was just me and one other guy that were just constantly
making videos, two a week, three a week,
like, just banging them out.
And it just started growing a following.
-Do an Instagram Live real quick.
Gonna wait for some people to populate.
I don't think masculinity has a place as the focal point
of the firearms conversation, but I do think it has a role,
because that's where we're at from a long lineage
of where we get our knowledge from,
where we get our experience from.
There's a long history of masculinity behind that.
Jesus.
The misconceptions of a gun owner that I feel are very,
very prevalent are, like, we're all, you know, molon labe,
"come take it,"
and just anti-everything and super-right-wing,
and I think a lot of it is,
it's a threatening of masculinity,
you know, like I don't have a large penis
if I don't have a firearm.
Can I say that? -Sure.
You can say that.
-I don't want you to say that. -Manhood.
Okay.
Guns play into my identity with kind of like my gender role.
I think inherently, though, and genetically, there's caregivers,
and, you know, there's your fighters, your warriors.
-What is it about guns that gets linked to masculinity?
Or what is it about masculinity that guns address?
That physical object matters.
That is part of how you go through your everyday life
and how you affirm in your everyday life
that you are a particular kind of person.
-At the heart of gun politics is masculinity politics.
So guns are really symbols of protection
and providing for men and their families,
but they're also symbols of independence.
And that's a broader, kind of bigger idea
of what it means to be a man.
-Jennifer Carlson and Scott Melzer have studied
the political and societal reasons for gun ownership.
-Here, buddy. It's all yours.
-And they have both completed in-depth research
on society's expectations of men.
-The ideal forms of masculinity revolve around these ideas
of men being in control and powerful.
-Home ownership, stable wages.
-Independent and tough and strong.
-All of these things were kind of packaged together
as this kind of recipe for how to be a good man.
-Any failure at all can lead to your identity,
your sense of masculinity being undermined.
And certainly, that's where we can see guns enter the picture.
-A gun is a way to still assert your relevance, your importance.
-These ideas can be seen in the gender divide in gun ownership.
In 2017, 39% of American men reported owning a gun,
compared to 22% of American women.
Nearly half of white men are gun owners,
while about a quarter of nonwhite men say they own a gun.
And men as a whole are five times
more likely to own a gun than women,
even when taking other characteristics into account.
-We know that gender is the highest predictor
of whether someone owns a gun.
We know if we look at the data
who's getting concealed-pistol licenses,
who is owning guns, who has pro-gun attitudes,
and men tend to dominate.
-Recording. You're the best.
-So if you are genetically wired to protect the herd,
protect the tribe, to, you know,
hunt, gather, you're gonna see more men owning firearms
than you would women, simply for that fact alone.
-There are men who own firearms because they, you know,
grew up with this image of,
you know, that's part of manliness, right?
Traditionally the protectors, traditionally the fighters,
traditionally in control of things.
-7. 5.
-Rob Pincus teaches defensive-shooting courses
and is an advocate for gun rights.
He's also an outspoken critic of the NRA,
and at the organization's 2019 convention,
he called for more financial transparency
and criticized leadership
for only representing certain types of gun owners.
-These traditional ideas of masculinity
certainly apply to firearms ownership and to gun ownership
because of the protective nature of firearms
and the role that they play,
but I think that just like every other aspect of life,
traditional gender roles are being broken down left
and right, right, whether it's in the workplace or in politics
or even in firearms ownership.
-According to a 2017 Pew Research survey,
men and women are equally likely to cite protection
as a reason for gun ownership.
For men, it's often one of many,
but women are far more likely to say it's the sole reason.
-I wasn't sure if I was even gonna own a firearm.
It was more to learn about how to keep myself safe.
-All right, so, these are my targets.
I like them.
-Laurdina Bellinger is an NRA-certified gun instructor
and chapter president of The Well Armed Woman
in Tacoma, Washington.
-I'm gonna use a loader, 'cause I'm gonna protect my nails.
Ready?
-There are women that come from all walks of life,
and we're just interested in learning basics about firearms.
Others are getting out of domestic-violence situations,
and they want to learn all about personal safety.
Women gun owners --
their identity's not so entrenched in owning that gun,
which is a thing that empowers them,
you know, as some of the men are in the culture.
The green gun is a training gun,
and I like to use this when I teach.
And so they see it as a tool -- a simple tool.
And it really depends, honestly,
what's going on up here, you know?
-Literally? -Yeah.
I tell women, "Different bras force me
to do different things."
So, a lot of guns weren't designed for women's hands,
and so women need to learn the fundamentals to shoot better.
Most firearms are designed for men.
The industry was geared towards men.
-M&P -- advanced by design.
-Gun advertisers sometimes lean on the idea that guns
are manly when marketing their products,
but their messaging has also changed over time.
-The biggest shift I've seen as far as firearms-community
advertising or marketing
has been the shift from the hunting
and the shooting sports and the defensive aspect.
I really think it's been driven by the growth of concealed carry
and the growth of firearms as a defensive tool far more
than they are just a symbol of manliness.
-The truth is they want to ban every gun in America.
-Unfortunately, the NRA has taken a shift
to really, you know,
pandering in a lot of ways to a very small demographic.
-The only way we save our country and our freedom
is to fight this violence of lies
with the clenched fist of truth.
-So, that image of the angry conservative gun owner --
that helps perpetuate the stigma,
the negative stigma of gun ownership
as a scared, fearful, angry, you know, person.
-From my cold, dead hands! -The NRA's messaging --
it revolves around them being both victims and heroes.
And if we lose gun rights, they argue,
then we're going to lose all individual rights and freedoms.
-Our rights, our freedoms that we own as individuals.
-Our individual rights and freedoms
are coded masculine, according to the NRA,
because that's about independence, self-reliance.
You buy a gun and protect your family and yourself.
-This isn't just a rifle.
-Gunmakers are usually protected from legal or civil recourse
when their guns are used in a crime.
-Families can sue gunmaker Remington.
-But in 2019, the Connecticut Supreme Court
paved the way for Sandy Hook
families to sue companies like Remington,
which manufactured the rifle used by shooter Adam Lanza.
Lawyers argued that ads like this
were aimed at courting disturbed young men.
Violence, especially gun violence,
is filtered through society and culture.
And so when we expect boys and men to be dominant,
powerful, in control, in charge, to not give in,
then we're essentially coaching them, training them,
rewarding them for potentially engaging in violence
when they feel like they've lost control.
-All gun owners are certainly not committing violent crimes,
but it is important to look
at the manifestations of gun violence.
Control, and therefore masculinity,
is often at the center.
-Is anybody injured?
Did you say Gabrielle Giffords was hit?
-Okay, is anybody injured? -Yes, yes!
A lot of blood. Please help!
-Mass shootings are the extreme example of gun violence.
-What is the location of your emergency?
-Some of these shooters had violent tendencies,
mental-health issues, criminal records, or racist ideologies.
-In a matter of seconds, a country-music festival
turned tragic.
-Others are more elusive,
and we still don't know why they did it.
-We do live in a culture
in which we often associate masculinity with violence.
-Eric Madfis has studied the phenomenon
of American mass shootings
and the people who carry them out.
They often share a few similar traits
in addition to their gender.
-A vast majority of mass shooters desire fame.
It's a way to be seen as masculine, as tough, as macho.
-People dead, including the gunman,
after he allegedly posted -- -It showed the world
that you have meaning and aren't just weak
and don't have that control.
-The shooter has been described as a white male,
approximately -- -They tend to be white,
heterosexual men.
They tend to be people who have experienced
downward mobility in their life.
They tend to blame other people and then therefore get angry
at other people for what's happening.
-Had an extensive anti-Semitic, anti-Jewish, digital -- -Right,
it's a recourse to perform your masculinity
by committing a sort of massive act of violence.
But it's not necessarily the full extent of the problem.
So if we want to talk about gun violence more generally, right,
there's a lot of other things that we can do.
-Discussions around solutions to gun violence
usually revolve around the same topics -- arming teachers.
-Teacher would have a concealed gun on them.
-What the Second Amendment means.
-Some are even calling for the shredding
of the Constitution.
-Or calls for more legislation. -The time is now.
-But for many, the familiar debates seem no longer adequate.
-The current gun debate is a bunch of people
at polar opposites,
screaming at the top of their lungs
and not listening to what the other is saying.
-Get out of here! -I am pro-gun,
but I don't like this.
And this is the hardest part,
'cause I went through it when it came to Newtown.
I have kids. How do you process that?
-The gun debate is what happens when we can't talk
about feelings of vulnerability, trauma, grief.
It's easier to talk about a physical object
or a policy we don't like than it is
to actually talk about the profound sense of vulnerability
that is actually at the heart of the issue of guns
and gun politics and gun violence in this country.
-We're having very public discussion right now,
a much needed one, about what does it mean to be a man.
These ideals that say men should be stoic,
we should suppress our emotions,
we should be tough and strong at all times,
in control of ourselves --
have we established ideals that are toxic for boys
and men themselves and, also, for those around them?
When we ignore the role of masculinity
when talking about gun violence and mass shootings,
then we're ignoring some of the causes of that gun violence.
If you don't get at the cause, you're not going to be able
to reduce that violence.