For one segment of American society, guns symbolize honor, human mastery over nature, and individual self-sufficiency. By opposing gun control, individuals affirm the value of these meanings and the vision of the good society that they construct. For another segment of American society, however, guns connote something else: the perpetuation of illicit social hierarchies, the elevation of force over reason, and the expression of collective indifference to the well-being of strangers. These individuals instinctively support gun control as a means of repudiating these significations and of promoting an alternative vision of the good society that features equality, social solidarity, and civilized nonagression.

-- Donald Braman, Dan M. Kahan. OVERCOMING THE FEAR OF GUNS, THE FEAR OF GUN CONTROL, AND THE FEAR OF CULTURAL POLITICS: CONSTRUCTING A BETTER GUN DEBATE, EMORY LAW JOURNAL, Volume 55, 2006, Number 4.