> Well, among the key facts necessary to understand that is that the "safety features" are not pure cost-free benefit, and the NRA believes the costs outweigh the benefits. They have some decent arguments for the existence of the costs; reasonable people could disagree about the relative degree of each.
Sure. Advanced safety features in cars probably cost a lot to develop, too, and I'm sure there's a lot of people who think seatbelts are lame and cars would be cooler without them. But car companies actively work to promote safety while the NRA seems to actively undermine it.
> It is also worth remembering that even as the number of guns have increased, the death rate has, as the article pointed out, gone down
That's actually the direct opposite of what the article says. The very first paragraph states: "Deaths by guns, though—the great majority suicides, accidents or domestic violence—have been trending slightly upwards."
> When you find yourself completely unable to understand how anyone could possibly believe something, that's usually a sign that you've been exposed to only the propaganda of one side. Note that I said understand, not agree with or believe. I understand many points of view I do not agree with. Some of them I even had to go chase down, in accordance with the principle I just gave, because I could tell I'd just been fed one side of the propaganda.
I agree. That was the premise of my question. Unfortunately, I haven't seen too much clarification yet :(