Gun Crusaders: The NRA's Culture War (review)

Adding to the literature describing the gun culture in the United States, Gun Crusaders: The NRA's Culture War provides a unique examination of the most devoted members to the National Rifle Association's cause. Scott Melzer balances a critical discussion of this group of gun owners and their beliefs as framed by the NRA while making the point that guns are social artifacts to which we attach social meaning. In this approach, he allows the reader to discover the complexity of the gun ownership issue. Melzer's focus is predominately on what he refers to as Gun Crusaders. These Gun Crusaders can be divided into two key groups: "...the 'Critical Mass' includes the most committed NRA members and, not coincidentally, the most politically conservative; and the 'Reserves,' who are somewhat less committed to the NRA and conservative politics but remain largely loyal to both."(17)

This nucleus of the NRA's 4 million members is the force behind the political power of the organization and through which a conservative culture war is fought on many issues beyond gun ownership. The main point of the book is that for the NRA's leadership and the Gun Crusaders the NRA is not just an organization concerned about gun rights, rather it is an organization that is concerned about every freedom that is threatened by liberals. In response to these threats, the NRA frames each challenge to individual rights as an attack on gun rights as they are the foundation of all rights and freedoms that Americans possess. Within this discussion lies the important account of the influence the NRA wields in national politics as well as mainstream society.

Melzer's work relies on Goffman's frame analysis to describe how the NRA constructs meaning for members. Combining this with a discussion of frontier masculinity, Melzer humanizes the NRA and its members by illustrating how threats to this masculine identity result in political action. Instead of describing NRA members as "gun nuts" the discussion shows how through the framing process Gun Crusaders come to "believe what they feel" as they are exposed to the conservative partisan messages of the organization. While Melzer does not directly cite Herbert Schiller's packaged consciousness, parallels can be drawn. Contrary to the reality of the issue being framed, the NRA provides to its members a complete way of thinking about their social world that goes beyond guns into such social issues as feminism, welfare, taxes, gay rights, race, terrorism, crime, immigration and affirmative action as well as others. In his discussion, Melzer is careful to illustrate that Critical Mass members are more likely to be in agreement on their views of these issues while showing the greater variation in viewpoints held by the Reserves. For any scholar who is concerned with one of the aforementioned issues this book is a valuable read as similarities can be seen in other conservative social movements including the Christian Right, White Nationalism, as well as the Tea Party.

Melzer skillfully illustrates that the NRA was socially constructed over a period of years to become an organization that creates threats to gun rights as "...threats to all individual rights and freedoms through a culture war."(247) While he views the NRA as an organization with serious challenges to maintain its strength and influence in the future, Melzer also points out, "The depth and breadth of NRA support is not about to vanish."(250) While the NRA remains politically strong it is an important influence in conservative politics. His argument here would have been strengthened with the inclusion of how gun ownership can be viewed as a measure of social stability. Gun owners in general are members of various demographic groups that are typically conservative due to their membership in other politically and socially conservative groups. The NRA is simply a microcosm of this larger trend within mainstream society and as long as Americans continue to experience threats to these identities the NRA will have a base of like...