Debunking the NRA's 9 Favorite Gun Myths

As four more innocent people are massacred in the 385th mass shooting of 2024, we are beyond the point of needing critical federal gun safety legislation

I want this article to serve as a reference point for people looking to quickly debunk propaganda from the NRA and gun lobby. We live in an America in which gun violence since 1968 has killed more Americans than all Americans killed in all wars in American history — combined. It does not have to be this way.

Yet this week four more innocent people are dead in a Georgia high school, including two children, because a 14-year-old got easy access to a firearm and committed the 385th mass shooting of 2024. That's 1 mass shooting every 16 hours. The facts are that no good reasons exist to block gun safety laws, and those who continue to obstruct reform are complicit in the mass gun violence we suffer in America.

Let’s Address This.

(L/R) Richard Aspinwall, Christina Irimie, Mason Schermerhorn, Christian Angulo. Victims in the Apalachee High School shooting on September 4. 

Myth 1: This isn’t the right time to talk about it

In fact, the right time was much earlier — like after Uvalde, Parkland, Buffalo, or Aurora, Las Vegas, Orlando, or Sandy Hook, or Oak Creek, or El Paso, or Sutherland Springs, or Tree of Life, or Columbine — hopefully you get the point.

Americans are suffering a mass shooting every 16 hours. So if you think it’s too soon to talk about gun safety legislation after this particular mass shooting, then go ahead and assume we’re talking about the one that happened more than 16 hours ago, that you were also silent on. Either way, stop standing in the way of gun safety legislation while innocent Americans are killed by preventible gun violence.

Myth 2: Gun laws don’t work because criminals don’t obey laws

Every single study ever done proves gun laws effectively reduce gun violence, homicides, and suicides. For example, a Harvard University School of Public Health study found that:

States with more key firearm laws had fewer firearm homicides and fewer firearm suicides, after controlling for poverty, unemployment, education, race and non-firearm violence-related deaths.

Another study by Third Way, a think tank that studies gun violence, found that red states that have lax gun laws have a 40% higher murder rate than do blue states that have stronger gun safety laws. They report:

Murder rates in the 25 states Trump carried in 2020 are 40% higher overall than in the states Biden won. (The report used 2020 data because 2021 data is not yet fully available.) The five states with the highest per capita murder rate — Mississippi, Louisiana, Kentucky, Alabama and Missouri — all lean Republican and voted for Trump.

Likewise, per the CDC, 16 of the top 17 states with the highest gun death rate are GOP states who refuse to enact gun safety laws (and instead repeal the weak laws already on the books), and 11 of the top 12 states with the lowest gun death rate are Democrat states who pass comprehensive gun safety legislation. Gun laws work.

Myth 3: People who obtain firearms legally do not commit mass shootings

Let this simple graphic debunk this myth once and for all. A system that allows such would be terrorists to acquire weapons of mass murder so easily is a broken and unjust system. Those who refuse to act to reform this system are knowingly complicit.

Myth 4: It’s not a gun crisis, it’s a mental health crisis

Yes, one in five Americans suffers or periodically suffers from some sort of mental illness. No, there’s no evidence that mental illness is the driving cause of gun violence. In fact, people who suffer with a mental illness are more likely to be victims of said violence, than to perpetuate it. A comprehensive study by the National Institute of Health that included more than 10,000 people who struggled with mental illness concluded:

Media accounts of mass shootings by disturbed individuals galvanize public attention and reinforce popular belief that mental illness often results in violence. Epidemiologic studies show that the large majority of people with serious mental illnesses are never violent.

Another report by the mental health advocacy organization, Mental Health America, reports:

Mental illness is not a predictor of violence towards others, but it is a predictor of suicide. To say otherwise is misleading and wrongfully points a finger at tens of millions of people who have experienced or are living with mental health conditions. Depression is the leading cause of disability globally and many people live with mental illness around the world. The vast majority of people with mental illness are not violent: 95-97 percent of homicidal gun violence is not carried out by individuals with a mental illness. 

Likewise, The Lancet public health journal reports:

People with mental illness are much more often the victims of violence rather than the perpetrators.

Adding to the absurdity of gun cultists blaming mental health, and not the lack of gun safety regulations, for gun violence, is that Republican administrations and politicians continue to cut mental health funding. Texas Governor Abbot cut $211 million from mental health funding Texas right before the Uvalde massacre. Georgia Governor Kemp cut millions from mental health funding in 2023 and in 2024, right before the Apalachee High School massacre. Trump worked to cut mental health funding on a federal level despite the epidemic of mass shootings during his presidency. Republicans falsely blame the lack of mental healthcare as the cause of mass shootings, then cut mental healthcare funding—because the cruelty is the point.

Myth 5: Women need guns for self-defense

FBI data proves that far from protecting women from assault or murder, guns exponentially increase mortal danger to women. The FBI data shows:

Women were over 100 times more likely to be murdered by a man with a gun than to use it to kill a man in self-defense. Ninety-three percent of the female victims were murdered by a man they knew, and 64 percent were wives or “intimate acquaintances” of the man that killed them.

Violence committed by men against women is epidemic in America, as men kill more than 1600 women annually in gender based violence—and the most common weapon used to commit that murder is a firearm. More than 93% of the time a woman is murdered by a man, she is murdered by a man she knew and at some point trusted. Therefore, when a firearm is present, a woman is 100X more likely to be killed by that firearm—hence why red flag laws are so critical to ensure violent men don’t get easy access to firearms. Republicans continue to block red flag laws, which is just one more reason why guns do not in fact enable self-defense for women.

Myth 6: UK banned guns and they still have knife violence, so stop blaming guns

Knife homicides in the UK amount to 235 deaths annually, i.e. 1 in 286K people. Meanwhile, knife homicides in the USA amount to 1476 deaths annually, i.e. 1 in 224K people. So, not only does the USA have 103X the gun death rate of the UK—the USA also has a higher knife death rate than the UK.

The UK also proves gun laws work. The UK banned handguns in 1997 after the 1996 Dunblane massacre, in which a man targeted a school, killing 16 children and their teacher. Since then, the UK has suffered only 7 mass shootings in the last 30 years, resulting in 24 tragic deaths and 41 injuries. Meanwhile, the United States has suffered 7 mass shootings in the last 3 days, and roughly 109 Americans die by gun violence every single day.

Myth 7: Restricting guns invites tyranny

This is a made up claim and does not have a shred of truth to it. Every developed nation on Earth that has successfully regulated guns ranks higher than the United States on the peace index, higher on the happiness index, lower in violent crime rates, lower in murder rates, and all are thriving democracies.

This includes Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Japan, Australia, and many, many more. If more guns made us safer, the United States would lead the world in safety—sadly we rank 129th in safety. In fact, each of the top 10 countries globally in safety have comprehensive gun safety regulations, and all are strong democracies.

Myth 8: Guns don’t kill people, people kill people. Do you want to ban cars next?

If we agree it is people who kill people, why wouldn’t you want stricter laws to prevent violent people from getting their hands on a gun? We simply want legislation that makes it difficult for people who want to use guns to kill people, from having easy access to guns. Why is that even controversial? Indeed, the irony of this “people kill people” argument is that every law abiding gun owner should have zero problem proving that they are a law abiding gun owner, who do not want firearms for some sinister goal of killing people. More than 93% of Americans support universal background checks and 56% of Americans want overall stricter gun laws.

Moreover, we already do ban cars for people who are reckless drivers, or unable to prove they can be safe drivers. In fact, treating guns like cars is a great idea. To purchase a firearm you first take a written test, then an eye test, then a hearing test, then a practical examination, get licensed, get registered, get insurance, and then periodically get retested to ensure you’re still capable of handling a firearm safely.

None of this is hypothetical. This, or something similar, is what every developed nation on Earth does to ensure only competent, trained, and non-violent people have access to firearms—and why they all have a fraction of the gun violence as the United States.

Myth 9: What about Chicago?

The final gasp of air for NRA propagandists is to point to Chicago. In reality, this not just an ignorant argument, it is related to the “what about Black on Black crime” racist trope. As someone on Facebook retorted to me a short while ago, “When will Rashid say anything about black on black gun violence? Probably never.” Well, now seems like a great time to rebuke this classic white supremacist talking point espoused by ignorant people who frequent racist websites. Here are three facts to consider.

FACT 1: Intra-racial violence is the most common form of violence in America because America is still deeply segregated due to the legacy of slavery, Jim Crow, and redlining. This segregation has never been remedied in any meaningful way. This is also why 83% of white people are killed by other white people. When will such critics say anything about this so-called "white on white" violence? Probably never.

FACT 2: Chicago isn’t even in the top 25 cities for gun violence in America—it’s way down as number 27. Moreover, roughly 60% of illegal guns in Chicago come from out of state—meaning the issue isn’t that Chicago’s gun laws aren’t working, it’s that other states refuse to enact gun laws. Turns out, these things called roads exist and people illegally traffic guns from states with weak gun safety laws (Indiana and Wisconsin) to states with strong gun safety laws (Illinois). America’s persistent gun violence problem reaffirms why we need Federal gun safety legislation to protect all of us from the scourge of gun violence.

FACT 3: The above notwithstanding, the work Black civil rights leaders are doing to curb gun violence is truly heroic and courageous. Reach out to your local NAACP, Moms Demand, or local Black church as a great starting point to see the extensive work being done. If you’re not aware of that work being done, it’s a reflection on you, not on Black people.

Conclusion

The National Institute of Health reports that gun violence has become so devastating in the United States that guns are now the leading cause of preventable death for American children—even surpassing automobile accidents. Author Lois McMaster Bujold writes, "The dead cannot cry out for justice. It is a duty of the living to do so for them." Students Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo, and teachers Christina Irimie and Richard Aspinwall can no longer cry out for justice -- but we must.

We know gun laws work. We know they increase public safety. And we know that far from harming our democracy, they strengthen our republic. Stop tolerating the NRA propaganda from corrupt politicians bought by the NRA lobby.

I hope you found this article useful. Please do subscribe to support my advocacy, and comment below any common NRA myths I missed, and I’ll be sure to address them in a future piece.

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