“Want to #StopAsianHate? Buy a rifle,” Gun Owners of America shared on Twitter on March 19, 2021, just three days after the Atlanta spa shootings occurred, where a man went on a rampage at three spas and killed eight people, including six Asian women.
In initial interviews with investigators, the shooter, Robert Aaron Long, said he had a sex addiction and that he targeted the spas that he viewed as a sexual temptation — a confession that experts have pointed toward a racial motive reinforced by the fetishization of Asian women.
In an attempt to cash in on fear of such hate crimes, the gun industry, which is known for intense political lobbying efforts, has also been dialing up its marketing toward the Asian American and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) community, pouring money into lobbying and partnering with Asian American spokespeople. While the industry’s immediate goal might be selling more guns, its longer-term goal is influencing the AAPI community’s views on the Second Amendment.
In the wake of the mass shootings in Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay in California, gun stores are seeing an increase in Asian and Asian American customers buying or considering purchasing firearms for protection in response to the racial discrimination fueled by the COVID-19 pandemic, according to gun control activists.
Although gun violence has long plagued the U.S., the numbers of gun deaths in the country broke records in 2020, 2021 with 2022 not far behind at more than 44,000. In 2023, around 15,000 people died of gun violence as of May.
Data from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also show that gun deaths among the AAPI community rose nearly 10% from 2016 to 2020.
The continued rise in gun violence coincides with a sharp rise in firearm sales and annual lobbying on gun rights. In 2021, gun lobbyists spent a record-high $15.77 million on gun rights. Its leading clients include the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), which has spent a total…
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