Rolling Stone and The Trace Have Psychoanalyzed America’s ‘Tribal’ Gun Culture and Find it Guilty of Being Comprised of Too Many Violent White Men

DESPITE MAKING UP ONLY 30 percent of America’s population, the core of the country’s gun market is composed of white men, or rather a subset of white men, since only a portion of them own and continually purchase firearms. Without these buyers, civilian sales would collapse, which the gun industry knows. Still, the industry is defensive about the role it plays in arming this demographic. The image of such individuals wielding their firearms can bring to mind racial terrorism, violent political radicalism, and mass shootings. Men like Ian Rogers remind the public that in order for an extremist to attack, someone must supply weapons.

More than a decade ago, the National Rifle Association began an attempt at rebranding itself, obscuring this connection. It hired its first prominent Black spokesperson, a young, athletic YouTube influencer and gun enthusiast named Colion Noir. As he began his new role, the organization dispatched a crew to interview him on a gun range. The raw footage, never before made public, shows him dressed in a black baseball cap and long-sleeve shirt. After Noir introduces himself, he says that he’s “passionate about concealed carry,” and rejects the assumption that firearms are for people “living in a rural setting.” The producer points out, “You’re able to bring a perspective that the NRA has not really embraced before,” adding, “talk about that to the camera.” Noir responds, “So, there’s a lot of talk and a lot of mention about my race, obviously. And I can understand that to a degree … considering that there really hasn’t been a Black face of the NRA, so to speak.” He goes on: “I really am appreciative of the opportunity to utilize the NRA’s platform, and I’m also very thankful that they were able to reach out to me and see the need for that and embrace it.”

Noir is no longer with the NRA. He told me, of his time there, that the “organization understood what its perception was to most people; they’re not dumb.” He had creative control over his content, and feels his experience at the NRA was generally positive, but, he acknowledges, “They were absolutely using me. I knew they were using me, and I was fine with it because I inherently believed in what they were doing.”

The National Shooting Sports Foundation, the nonprofit that serves as the gun industry’s trade group, has similarly attempted to alter the public’s perception. Working on a parallel track to the NRA, which loudly represents the interests of gun owners, the NSSF is staid by comparison and focuses on ensuring the future of the firearms business. The organization, which declined to comment for this story, quietly lobbies on behalf of dues-paying gun manufacturers and retailers, and every year hosts the SHOT Show in Las Vegas, the industry’s biggest trade event. During the pandemic, amid a record-breaking boost in gun sales, Lawrence Keane, one of the NSSF’s top executives, wrote in a post on the organization’s website that a paradigm shift was underway. “Throw out the stereotypes on American gun ownership,” he said. “They’re just wrong. Against the backdrop of historically high firearm sales, one major theme is shattering misconceptions that America’s gun owners are ‘old white men.’” Keane went on, “Today’s gun buyer looks more like the rest of America.”

The claim was largely driven by the NSSF’s retailer surveys, drawn from hundreds of gun retailers, and was amplified across the national press, which ran headlines like “Why More Black People Are Looking for Safety in Gun Ownership” and “Black Americans Have Been Buying More Guns During the Pandemic.” Unlike NSSF members, the public does not have ready access to the organization’s gun-market research, which provides a view into the industry’s best intelligence. The Trace and Rolling Stone obtained multiple NSSF research documents, including its most recent retailer surveys. In 2018, according to the surveys, 60 percent of gun buyers were white men. In 2020, as other demographics purchased more, that number did indeed drop — to 52 percent. But by 2022 that change had proved to be an aberration, as the number of white male customers once again approached 60 percent. Meanwhile, it was also the case that white men comprised 66 percent of retail staff, demonstrating that American gun culture is largely tribal.

The NSSF’s research also showed that first-time buyers do not account for the bulk of industry profits, comprising less than 23 percent of sales in 2022, a figure consistent with the years before the pandemic surge. That means once the gun industry brings a customer in, it must keep him, a task that requires not only the selling of guns but also the culture and politics of gun ownership. What makes white men in particular susceptible to this messaging is a matter of academic study. The sociologist Jennifer Carlson, a professor at Arizona State University, introduced the concept of the “citizen protector,” a man who experiences a sense of dislocation in today’s America. He may be struggling economically, or feel he’s not succeeding as a provider or a contributing member of the broader society. Deprived of a traditional masculine role, these men reimagine themselves as soldiers on the front lines, an honorable identity that bestows power. 

Many white male gun owners do not neatly conform to this archetype, including enigmatic individuals like Thomas Matthew Crooks, who attempted to assassinate Donald Trump last year, and Luigi Mangione, who is accused of killing the CEO of UnitedHealthcare. Still, according to Angela Stroud, a sociologist and author of Good Guys With Guns, white men have more than any other group been “thoroughly inculcated with a culture of entitlement.” And yet, she says, “it is also true that white men have not kept up in this economy, even though they’ve been taught throughout history that they’re going to have access to prosperity and power. So what you have is a sense of aggrieved entitlement, and that, in combination with guns, is extremely dangerous.” At the same time, Stroud adds, “The gun industry will do anything to sell you this product. The more fear the better. And in a culture that is becoming void of meaning for many people — the loss of work, community, religion — you can see how someone is not content to be a passive believer; they want to be a doer.” 

— Mike Spies in White, Legally Armed, and Primed for Political Violence