[hnlmorg]

This has been the case for a hundred years already.

It is why Santa is dressed in red. Why people buy diamond engagement rings. Why cigarettes were readily available for literally decades after they were already known to be harmful. And why American gun control laws have never matured despite all the evidence that proves the status quo isn’t viable.

[CM30]

Just gonna point out that the modern image of Santa Claus (or him wearing red) wasn't actually created by Coca Cola:

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/the-claus-that-refreshes/

It probably helped cement that as the standard image of the character, but that was becoming the default look anyway.

[hnlmorg]

I didn’t mean to suggest they invented Santa. Just popularised the red and white colour scheme.

Yeah it existed before, but it wasn’t the standard representation. And now it absolutely is.

[diogenes4]

> And why American gun control laws have never matured despite all the evidence that proves the status quo isn’t viable.

Tbh I don't think this has anything to do with marketing. Guns are just a part of our culture regardless of whether we want them to be or not. If we were capable of changing this we'd be capable of doing a hell of a lot of other things, too, instead of sitting on our hands and loudly babbling about individual freedoms as a form of politics.

[wiseowise]

> Guns are just a part of our culture regardless of whether we want them to be or not.

"Owning slaves is just a part of our culture regardless of whether we want it to be or not."

And I know what you're thinking: "comparing owning guns to owning human beings is wrong". Yes, but saying that something is "our culture" and can't be changes is just plain silly. Especially when it comes to guns.

[somsak2]

owning people was never part of the bill of rights

[Clent]

Gun ownership isn't in the constitution, it's an amendment.

However, the constitution does have the 3/5 clause which is 100% about slavery

[diogenes4]

Owning handguns ain't either.

Anyway, the constitution was written to specifically enable slavery, so your point is moot.

[diogenes4]

> Owning slaves is just a part of our culture regardless of whether we want it to be or not.

This was true for the confederate south.... Denying this doesn't seem to get us anywhere.

Anyway, my point was not that this can't be changed, that's what you brought to the conversation.

[hnlmorg]

And culture is driven by marketing. Which comes right back to the point I was making.

If gun culture was so fundamental to peoples beliefs then the NRA wouldn’t need to spend as much on lobbying as they do. The entire reason that culture hasn’t changed in the last hundred years is because of marketing, not in spite of it.

[diogenes4]

> And culture is driven by marketing.

Sure but you haven't shown how advertising drives specifically gun culture. Someone's eighteenth gun? Sure, but that's a rounding error in terms of gun ownership.

> if gun culture was so fundamental to peoples beliefs then the NRA wouldn’t need to spend as much on lobbying as they do.

You're conflating marketing a product to a market and bribing politicians to not restrict the sale of guns. There isn't any overlap.

[hnlmorg]

> You're conflating marketing a product to a market and bribing politicians to not restrict the sale of guns. There isn't any overlap

I disagree. In the case of gun ownership, lobbying creates the market, and the more generalised marketing helps to grow it. They're two tines of the same pitchfork.

Lobbying is, after all, just highly focused marketing at specific demographics (politicians) and in often underhanded ways.

[diogenes4]

> They're two tines of the same pitchfork.

If we're discussing the market, there's several billion other tines you missed.

[hnlmorg]

I was illustrating a point with an example, not documenting an exhaustive list of the NRAs expenditure. And the fact that you're picking meta-arguments rather than refuting my point head-on, speaks volumes.

Culture is driven by marketing.

[littlestymaar]

Guns are as much part of the American culture as SUVs are: mostly fabricated by advertisement and corporate lobbying (which too is “part of the American culture”, I guess).

[whelp_24]

No.

Guns literally are part of the founding od America. We got the second Amendment precisely because England tried to do things like take guns and quarter soldiers. Guns are and always have been part of American culture. I would also research the history of gun control the U.S, it may surprise you.

[littlestymaar]

> Guns literally are part of the founding od America.

Guns are the founding part of basically every country, because in the end “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun”.

You got the second amendment for the same reason the French got paragraph 35 of the Declaration of the Rights of the Man and of the Citizen of 1793: «Quand le gouvernement viole les droits du peuple, l’insurrection est, pour le peuple et pour chaque portion du peuple, le plus sacré des droits et le plus indispensable des devoirs.», because when their newly founded state relied on people's insurrection to exist, they made sure that they wrote their fundamental texts in a way that guarantees it. Then the political structure of the US made the constitution very stable compared to the French ones.

The second amendment's history was then co-opted by the NRA in their marketing campaign, but this has little to do with what the second amendment is really about, that “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State”. And the current gun culture is in fact mostly “conservative culture in the Reagan era and after”.

[whelp_24]

You can support gun rights without the NRA. In fact, I sorta thought i was clearly implying the "people's veto" of gun rights.

Reagan put the first gun restriction laws of California in place because of the Black Panthers. I wasn't defending him.

[UncleSlacky]

You got the second amendment from the English Bill of Rights of 1689 (along with most of the other 10), which states the same right (for Protestants only):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_of_Rights_1689#The_Act

[nojvek]

Guns are part of constitution, really really hard to take it off. It needs super majority, not even a majority suffices.

Amending the constitution is legit really hard.

[diogenes4]

They actually aren't in the constitution at all. You have a right to bear arms. You do not have a right to purchase, wield, and use a handgun (which, by the way, would be hilariously ineffective in an uprising against the government and is mostly good for killing the people in your house). We just have spineless politicians on our hands.

[nojvek]

The Supreme Court ultimately rules what “bear arms” means, so not just the politicians.

The constitution is vague, so it’s upto interpretation. And Supreme Court judges aren’t elected.