TOW #29: Our Obsession With Guns

In Michael Moore’s documentary Bowling for Columbine he has many claims that collectively make up for his overall argument regarding the gun issues in our modernized American society. With that said, one of his most focused on claims is the fact that Americans are obsessed with guns. At first, such a statement comes off nearly as a hyperbole when seeing the documentary, however after seeing Moore’s argument, it soon begins to make sense that this obsession could very well be the reasoning behind our gun problems we face today.

Moore interviews people from his own state of Michigan who are nearly obsessed with guns to the point where they stress it is a necessity in their life. The militiamen he interviews stress that guns are a right of being an American, therefore if an American does not own a gun, they are simply not capitalizing on one of the many opportunities there are for being an American citizen. Additionally, Moore compiles many different commercials we have all seen on TV, primarily commercials with an intended audience of children, which advertise child guns that are almost identical to those that an adult would have. Thus, Moore even goes out on a limb and says that this obsession is not even with adults, it begins with children therefore by the time they are adults the obsession has already developed and can lead to the issues we have today with firearms.

Furthermore, Michael Moore depicts America’s obsession with guns with more evidence as he travels to locations such as a barbershop where you can get your haircut, but also purchase a gun while you’re at it. He also goes into the house of a man who has a gun hidden right under his pillow, and the man’s simple yet convincing response to having the weapon under his pillow was for protection. Moore adds to this claim that Americans are obsessed with guns by tying it to another claim of his that Americans are obsessed with guns due to the fact that Americans live in fear. Hence, having a gun is what makes Americans feel safe, and with so many guns in circulation, this is when the catastrophes we hear on the news begin to make sense as these guns end up in the wrong hands.

After watching this documentary, the progression of Moore’s argument seemed to come alive in my mind, as it seemed to come together like a puzzle. The main claim, that Americans are obsessed with guns, begins to make sense when you look at the illustrations of fear in which our people live in portrayed from the media and other sources. This claim is further emphasized when Moore compares the safer Canadian society without guns to that of Detroit and other major cities in which there is atrocities everyday related to gun violence.