A new survey from the Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention at the University of Michigan has discovered what most of us already knew to be the case: the number one reason why tens of millions of Americans exercise their Second Amendment rights is personal safety. 

The survey quizzed about 2,500 gun owners about their motivation to keep and bear arms, and the vast majority of respondents said self-defense was the most important factor in their decision. 

Nearly 80% said they were motivated to get a firearm for personal protection, a proportion that appears to have risen over the past 25 years. No single study has tracked the reasons for gun ownership over time, making comparisons inexact, but similar studies have found that about 26% of Americans reported owning a gun for protection in 1999. Various studies suggest that between 60% and 70% of gun owners said protection was their main motivation for having a firearm from 2017 through 2021.

It’s a trend that has roots in the social upheaval of the 1960s, said Dr. David Yamane, a professor of sociology at Wake Forest University who studies gun culture in the United States and who was not involved in the survey. 

“It was a time of profound social unrest and social uncertainty, lots of political movements, cultural change, foreign threats, people listening to crazy music, you know, ‘sex, drugs and rock n’ roll,’ political assassination, riots or protest movements in some cities,” said Yamane, who owns a gun and who financially supports organizations that promote gun ownership.

It's odd that CNN included that information about Yamane, because I've never seen them highlight the lack of gun ownership or the financial support given to or received by any academics who are in favor of more gun control. CNN's Brenda Goodman, who authored this piece, failed to mention whether any of the folks who put together this survey own guns or have benefitted from the largesse of gun control groups, even though the institute that was responsible for this survey has previously received support from anti-gun groups like the Joyce Foundation. 

 If CNN believes Yamane's gun ownership and financial support for 2A organizations is important enough to share with readers, then shouldn't it also highlight the institution's ties to groups that fund gun control efforts as well? 

The new survey, which was led by researchers at the Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, set out to see whether the motivations and ownership of guns varied depending on whether a state had a “stand your ground” law.

Of the 2,477 gun-owning adults who responded to the survey, 79% reported protection as the most important reason for owning a firearm, and 52% reported carrying a firearm outside their home within the past year for reasons excluding work, hunting or target shooting. 

The study did not find that people were more likely to carry a gun for protection in states with “stand your ground” laws, but gun owners in those states were more likely to carry outside the home. Yamane pointed out that only about 5% of people who said they carried a gun for protection reported carrying it outside their home.

“A lot of those people are hunting, they are going to the range, whatever,” he said.

I don't think this survey tells us much that we didn't already know. Gun ownership is normal. Most gun owners have firearms to protect themselves and loved ones from harm. David Yamane is a gun-owning sociologist. And CNN, despite the contributions of The Reload's Stephen Gutowski, has a bone to pick with the tens of millions of Americans who are exercising their right to armed self-defense.