Citation

Phillips CD. Am. J. Public Health 2018; 108(7): 868-870.

Affiliation

The author is with the Department of Health Policy and Management, School of Public Health, Texas A&M University Health Science Center, College Station.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2018, American Public Health Association)

DOI

10.2105/AJPH.2018.304462

PMID

29874484

Abstract

Ten thousand square feet of Capitol lawn were recently drenched in grief; 7000 pairs of empty shoes, each pair representing a child killed by a firearm in the approximately six years since the massacre at Sandy Hook, filled that space. The recent massacre in Parkland, Florida, and the reactions to it, such as that heart-wrenching display on the Capitol lawn, yet again brings the politics of firearm safety to the fore. Throughout this editorial, I use the term “firearm safety,” as in “highway safety,” avoiding the term “gun control,” which is as inappropriate a term as “car control.”

The struggle for firearm safety, like much work on injury prevention, involves a version of asymmetrical political warfare. The dominant belligerent is a large industry represented by multiple organizations with considerable financial resources and some measure of popular support, a portion of which is both quite radical and uncompromising. This powerful industry, whose products often place the population’s health at risk, faces a less powerful and fragmented resistance movement composed of groups of social activists with limited funds and varying levels of public support. Most problematic, much of the populace remains uninvolved politically in such struggles.

The resistance, in this instance, includes organizations seeking enactment of meaningful firearm safety legislation, such as the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and Everytown for Gun Safety. These organizations continually work for greater firearm safety with their limited funds and relatively small staffs. Unfortunately, only in the wake of mass murders do these organizations garner wide public attention. ...

Language: en