Dialogues on Gun Control (Philosophical Dialogues on Contemporary Problems)

142 Pages·2023·2.652 MB·English

by  David DeGrazia

Dialogues on Gun Control
What happens when two intelligent American college students with
different attitudes about guns launch into a careful exploration of the
ethics of gun policy? What might a European exchange student add to
the mix? All three characters in this book are fictional, the creation of
author David DeGrazia’s imagination. But their vigorous, respectful
conversations over six meetings—well-informed by the latest empirical
data and the best available philosophical arguments—shed needed light
on the reality of guns in the U.S. today.
These dialogues introduce students, professional academics, and
others to the American experience with gun violence and gun pol-
icy, articulating ethical arguments supporting and opposing substantial
gun control and specific possibilities for reform. They also demonstrate
how those who initially disagree about the place of guns in American
society can communicate constructively and agree on many ideas.
Dialogue 1 distinguishes legal rights to private gun ownership from
the ethics of gun policy and illustrates how the U.S. is an outlier with
respect to gun violence, gun ownership, and gun politics. Dialogue 2
explores the overall social consequences of high rates of gun ownership
and minimal regulation and enforcement. Then, turning to moral rights,
Dialogue 3 probes the subtle relationships among a right to self-defense,
its possible foundation(s), and alleged gun rights. Dialogue 4 turns to
appeals to various liberties as possible bases for gun rights. Next, Dialogue 5
examines the possibility that various other moral rights—such as a right
to a reasonably safe environment—can illuminate gun policy ethics.
Finally, Dialogue 6 concludes with a fairly detailed exploration of the
shape of morally defensible gun policy in the United States.
David DeGrazia is Elton Professor of Philosophy at George Washington
University. Among his ten books are Taking Animals Seriously (1996),
Human Identity and Bioethics (2005), Debating Gun Control (with Lester
Hunt, 2016), and A Theory of Bioethics (with Joseph Millum, 2021).
Philosophical Dialogues on Contemporary Problems
Philosophical Dialogues on Contemporary Problems uses a well-known
form—at least as old as Socrates and his interlocutors—to deepen
understanding of a range of today’s widely deliberated issues. Each vol-
ume includes an open dialogue between two or more fictional char-
acters as they discuss and debate the empirical data and philosophical
ideas underlying a problem in contemporary society. Students and other
readers gain valuable, multiple perspectives on the problem at hand.
Each volume includes a foreword by a well-known philosopher.
Dialogues on the Ethical Vegetarianism
Michael Huemer
Dialogues on the Ethics of Abortion
Bertha Alvarez Manninen
Dialogues on Climate Justice
Stephen M. Gardiner and Arthur R. Obst
Dialogues on Gun Control
David DeGrazia
Dialogues on Free Will
Laura Ekstrom
Dialogues on Immigration and the Open Society
Chandran Kukathas
For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/
Philosophical-Dialogues-on-Contemporary-Problems/book-series/
PDCP
Dialogues on Gun Control
David DeGrazia
Designed cover image: © artas / Getty Images
First published 2023
by Routledge
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and by Routledge
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Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa
business
© 2023 David DeGrazia
The right of David DeGrazia to be identified as author of this
work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of
the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted
or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
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including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from
the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks
or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
ISBN: 978-0-367-61532-1 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-367-61530-7 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-10540-4 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003105404
Typeset in Bembo
by KnowledgeWorks Global Ltd.
For my family

Contents
Preface viii
Acknowledgments xii
Foreword xiii
Dialogue 1: I s American Gun Policy a Moral
Issue Meriting Serious Attention? 1
Dialogue 2: Does a Focus on Social Consequences
Support Substantial Gun Control? 16
Dialogue 3: Does a Right to Self-Defense Support
Gun Rights? 33
Dialogue 4: Do Appeals to Liberty Support Gun Rights? 61
Dialogue 5: Do Other Moral Rights Strengthen
the Case for Substantial Gun Control? 85
Dialogue 6: What Would Morally Justified Gun Policy
Look Like? 97
Index 125
Preface
My Vantage Point
Growing up, I did not think very much about guns. Only three times
did I use a firearm, specifically a rifle, each time in connection with
the Boy Scouts during my teen years: twice in summer camp at a
shooting range, with exemplary adult supervision, and once on a
camping trip, when several of us (somewhat irresponsibly) shot beer
cans at a distance. In the years of my childhood, adolescence, and
early adulthood I mainly thought about guns when I read or heard
about homicides, suicides, or the occasional gun accident. I was lucky
enough to grow up in a safe suburban neighborhood—and not as a
member of a marginalized minority group. I was never threatened
with a gun, never felt the need to have one, and rarely even saw one
except in a police officer’s holster or on television or in movies. Guns
were not a big part of my life.
So why did I become an author on the topic of gun policy ethics?
There were two reasons. First, I became deeply demoralized reading
newspaper articles about mass shootings, firearm tragedies involving
children, and other fatal misuses of guns. Even though I did not know
much about firearms, gun violence, or relevant policies, to me so many
senseless killings constituted an urgent social problem. Second, I had
been trained in philosophy with specializations in ethical theory and
applied ethics. Listening to politicians and laypeople argue about gun
rights and gun control, I was not very impressed by the quality of dis-
course, which was often characterized by inattention to salient facts,
careless reasoning, and rhetorical fireworks. Maybe someone with
extensive training in ethics and an analytical bent of mind could help
clarify some of these issues. When I searched the literature on the ethics
of gun policy, I found that only a few philosophers and ethicists had
contributed. Perhaps I had something to offer.
Preface ix
Delving into gun policy ethics represented a big commitment because
it meant educating myself about several complex topics: the legislative
status quo concerning guns; empirical evidence regarding the relation-
ships among gun ownership, gun violence, and existing regulations;
proposals for reform; as well as the more philosophical arguments on
all sides of this debate. Finding time for this research also meant setting
aside work in other areas in which I had long been engaged. But a grant
from George Washington University for summer research in 2012 cat-
apulted my foray into gun policy ethics; and, within a few years, I had
published a couple of journal articles, a book review, two newspaper Op
Eds, and a coauthored book (Debating Gun Control [Oxford University
Press, 2016], with Lester Hunt). After 2016, however, I wasn’t actively
working in this area—until Andy Beck of Routledge Press invited me
to write the present volume. At first, I was unsure I had anything to add
to what I had written in the earlier book and shorter writings. But, on
reflection, I realized that I had not yet addressed several specific topics
and important arguments. This book would afford me an opportunity
to explore issues more thoroughly.
Moreover, as I write this Preface in spring 2022 I am convinced that
helping to illuminate the American experience with gun violence and
the ethics of gun policy has never been more urgent. Less than two weeks
ago an 18-year-old used a military-style assault rifle, which he was
able to purchase legally, to slaughter first his grandmother and later
19 children and two teachers in an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas.
This was just one of more than 20 acts of gun violence at American
K-12 campuses so far this year. Only ten days before the massacre in
Texas, another teenager, apparently a White supremacist, gunned down
ten Black people at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York. Stepping back
from these recent tragedies, I am struck by the fact that in the last few
years the number of gun deaths in the United States—both involving
children and for the overall population—has surpassed the number of
automobile deaths. The U.S. has a massive problem with gun violence,
a problem that does not seem inevitable when one considers the leg-
islative approaches and relative successes of other developed countries.
I hope that this book will contribute to and encourage clear, well-
informed, and ethically rigorous thinking about how to address this
country’s problem of gun violence.
The invitation to write a book in the format of a series of dialogues
was attractive. I have long felt that dialogues can be a great way to
engage and educate readers. As a college student, I loved Plato’s dia-
logues, which got me going in philosophy and pushed me to think
about the foundations of ethics. In graduate school, I had the pleasure