samsonradu asks> "Can you please elaborate on why guns are so sacred in the US? Is it for cultural/historical reasons?"
FWIW use of the term "sacred" is somewhat iffy as many an atheist has picked up a gun to defend himself.
America was taken over and settled by Europeans who brought firearms for hunting and protection. There were already 20-100 million indigenous American Indians here: they covered the land. But the Europeans brought diseases that few American Indians had resistance to, and most (up to 90%) of the American Indians died of disease before they had so much as _seen_ a white man. Indian societies collapsed and re-coalesced from the fragments. Meanwhile...
Newly-arrived Europeans advanced into a "wilderness" that held the burnt-out remnants of multiple civilizations. Only the very earliest arrivals saw the destruction their diseases had wrought in front of their advance.
With the Europeans came ideas of real estate (ownership rights to land etc.) which the American Indian tribes previously maintained by allegiances and territorial behavior. Anyway, conflicts ensued, new allegiances formed, broke and reformed. This all involved conflicts, fighting and wars. In every step, guns were used by both sides (e.g., American-Indian Wars, Revolutionary War, Civil War).
Early settlers were often on their own. They often had disputes and unpleasant encounters with their own and others. The gun could be used for protection as well as an important food-gathering tool. Although the American Indians could do so easily, living in the wilderness without a firearm was difficult and rare for someone of European descent.
So the use of firearms goes back to the pre-colonial and colonial periods. Guns were always available in the New World and remain available today.
FWIW use of the term "sacred" is somewhat iffy as many an atheist has picked up a gun to defend himself.
America was taken over and settled by Europeans who brought firearms for hunting and protection. There were already 20-100 million indigenous American Indians here: they covered the land. But the Europeans brought diseases that few American Indians had resistance to, and most (up to 90%) of the American Indians died of disease before they had so much as _seen_ a white man. Indian societies collapsed and re-coalesced from the fragments. Meanwhile...
https://www.cracked.com/article_19864_6-ridiculous-lies-you-...
Newly-arrived Europeans advanced into a "wilderness" that held the burnt-out remnants of multiple civilizations. Only the very earliest arrivals saw the destruction their diseases had wrought in front of their advance.
With the Europeans came ideas of real estate (ownership rights to land etc.) which the American Indian tribes previously maintained by allegiances and territorial behavior. Anyway, conflicts ensued, new allegiances formed, broke and reformed. This all involved conflicts, fighting and wars. In every step, guns were used by both sides (e.g., American-Indian Wars, Revolutionary War, Civil War).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_campaigns
Early settlers were often on their own. They often had disputes and unpleasant encounters with their own and others. The gun could be used for protection as well as an important food-gathering tool. Although the American Indians could do so easily, living in the wilderness without a firearm was difficult and rare for someone of European descent.
So the use of firearms goes back to the pre-colonial and colonial periods. Guns were always available in the New World and remain available today.