Who Do You Trust?
The gun debate is really about whether you trust government or your fellow citizens.
In a recent conversation with a colleague who is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran and gun owner, he made the following observation about the recent gun control debate:
Joey is exactly right — the reason we are not seeing action on gun reform, one way or the other, is because we’re having the wrong conversation. We’re complaining about the NRA’s lobbying budget, when what we really need to be talking about is why trust has eroded in so many elements of society.
According to the Pew Research Center, only about two-in-ten Americans (22%) trust the media. Similarly, according the latest NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll, Americans have limited confidence in public schools, courts, organized labor, and banks, and even less confidence in big business, the presidency, and political parties. And of course, not surprisingly, the institution Americans trust least is Congress, coming in at only 8%.
Ironically, the only institution in which a majority of Americans expressed a great deal of confidence was the military, at 53%.
An institution is typically defined as “a social structure or organization that helps to regulate social behaviors.” Because institutions themselves perform a wide variety of functions, likewise, the reason for the decline of trust in institutions is also multi-fold, but basically comes down to three basic factors: (1) negative events; (2) greater flow of information; and (3) increased awareness of (1) because of (2).
In The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of Like-Minded America is Tearing Us Apart Bill Bishop and Robert Cushing describe how starting in the 1970’s, conveniences of modern life began to work against our sense of community and trust. As the Baby Boomer generation was coming of age, individual experience was elevated above authority and traditionally-held community values involving institutions such as family, marriage, religion, academia, and government. As a result, people expressed their personal opinions more, and often trusted authorities less. This phenomenon has only increased in recent years, with the addition of the internet, social media, and smartphones in our daily lives.
In other words, we’ve spent 50 years learning to self-regulate more based on what feels good to us as an individual. Communal regulation of social behaviors has mattered less and less, causing many institutions to lose their once revered position in our society.
Of course, this isn’t all bad. People have more choices about what career path to follow, when to marry, whether to have children. However, without the guiding principles of trusted institutions, many people are overwhelmed by the amount of choices that are available to them as they try to define themselves in the age of individualism.
Once people feel overwhelmed, instead of turning to a supportive community, whether it be their immediate family, a religious organization, academic institution, or government group, they are often overcome by feelings of depression. Although depression as a worrisome trend is certainly not a new concept rates of depression are now nearly 30 times higher and affecting people younger than they were a century ago when American’s sense of community was stronger and trust in our institutions was higher.
This concept is perhaps best highlighted by looking at how veterans struggle to transition to civilian life after war. As highlighted by Sebastian Junger in the book Tribe: On Homecoming And Belonging, part of why veterans struggle with PTSD and depression during their time of transition is that they feel alone. They’re no longer part of a platoon, no longer sleeping shoulder to shoulder with people that they would, literally, die for. And as a result, they feel like they don’t belong in the society they fought for. Junger notes that, historically, veterans who came home to a cohesive, tribal-based society recovered from trauma much more quickly than veterans in most modern societies do.
When it comes to school shootings, the perpetrators are most often described as loners, outcasts, and social deviants. Reports usually verify that they suffer from depression or other forms of mental illness.
Therefore, if we want to have a meaningful conversation about reversing the trend in mass shootings, then we need to have a conversation about how to regain trust in our institutions — family, religion, politics, the media, all of them.
As recently noted by S.L.M. Goldberg, for many troubled youths, this begins at home, as children who grow up without a father are more likely to commit school shootings and other acts of violence.
Beyond the home, there must also be a greater focus on the local community as well. Those who feel loved and supported are less likely to lash out violently. Although the word “tribe” has become outmoded (I believe the kids today prefer “squad,” a phrase glamorized by Taylor Swift, but I digress), humans naturally have a strong desire to belong to small groups defined by a clear purpose and mutual understanding. When this natural desire goes unmet, our institutions erode, and depression sets in for many.
In the book “The Power of Habit,” Charles Duhigg tells the story of Paul O’Neill, a former CEO of Alcoa Steel who transformed the company by focusing on the issue of employee safety, rather than buzzwords such as synergy, rightsizing, profit-margins. In the case of the current gun debate — we’d be wise to focus on institutional trust, rather than buzzwords such as background checks, bump stocks, and age limits.
When asked how he did it, O’Neill stated “I knew I had to transform Alcoa. But you can’t order people to change. That’s not how the brain works. So I decided I was going to start by focusing on one thing. If I could start disrupting the habits around one thing, it would spread throughout the entire company.”
Similarly, gun control advocates will get no where telling the majority of citizens that grew up believing in the Second Amendment that it is no longer valid. But, by focusing on one thing — and in this context, that one one thing being institutional trust — we could start to shift the mindset from the NRA’s activities to promoting greater emotional health and stability that would prevent many tragic shootings in the first place.
In other words, systemic change begins by attacking a keystone habit, not by legislating behaviors. As Duhigg continues in The Power of Habit, “keystone habits start a process that, over time, transforms everything.” As an example, Duhigg cites to the fact that regular exercise goes hand-in-hand with better eating habits and effective weight loss than attempts at either of these things alone.
Likewise, a caring community with trusted institutions goes hand-in-hand with less gun violence and greater emotional health than focusing on either of these things alone. In other words, democratic cries for gun reform become unnecessary, because the laws we have now will be better enforced due to more trust in institutions such as law enforcement and government, and those who would consider breaking those laws will be intercepted by trusted members of their community who will be paying attention.
Although the type of communal connectivity that many of us instinctively crave has largely been lost in modern society, refocusing the debate around trust may be the keystone habit that leads us to the effective gun reform our politicians keep searching for.
