Self defense is a bear
India has riots. We have cow vigilantes - people who go and kill other people suspected of killing cows. Our police force is old and antiquated. Their response times are abysmal. I have NO idea if dialing 100 even works to summon help. Women have a tough time getting around safely. Children get sexually assaulted and murdered. Legislators and lawmakers are seemingly above the law. Filmstars run over homeless people in the dead of the night, then turn around and endorse driving schools.
This is 21st century India.
For a while, I was considering supporting gun rights for everyone. I'd hate to have to worry if my relatives will come back home alive and unmolested from a trip downtown. I'd hate to get caught by some fundie, no good lowlife who decides I can't eat meat on a religious holiday or can't hold hands with my significant other in public. Fuck that shit! You try that shit with me, I'd like to have the means to blow your guts out.
And then you hear about events like Las Vegas and Sandy Hook. People point out that of late, the worst non terroristic massacres have happened in the States. People seldom end your life in self defense in other parts of the world. Research into gun violence isn't banned at the federal level anywhere else in the world. What are you afraid of finding out when you don't allow scientists to study the link between guns and gun deaths?
In response, you read comments on discussion boards where people say variously (a) they have the constitutional right to bear arms (b) there are too many guns in circulation already (c) it won't work, is un American, (d) people, not guns, kill people (e) Mexico, that lawless third world hell hole is next door.
The same guns which cause mayhem in gay bars like Pulse and on the Vegas strip also drive down person on person crime. The biggest deterrent a thief breaking into your house faces is not a padlock, it's the sound of a gun cocking. The reason why certain stores were left alone in LA during the Rodney King riots was because some store owners formed self defense groups and were carrying guns.
Crimes against your person are low in America because you never know who's going to mow you down. The incident in Germany where hundreds of women were groped at a Year end party would be unlikely in America because one woman there would just whip out her cute little purse gun and end your life right there.
If you've walked home at night through a gritty part of any American city, you wouldn't question the shield afforded by a gun on your person. In comparison, you hear stories like that of my friend S who, on a trip to Mumbai, was chased by a sexual predator in a car down narrow streets. The impunity with which this happens suggests that people are not afraid of consequences of their actions to their person. If every couple of years someone shot a predator to death and was summarily acquitted by a local court, you can bet your last ₹ that the incidence of groping and "Eve teasing" would quickly subside.
What is the answer for Indian society? Before we open up our society to guns, we have to remember that as a society becomes wealthier (like India is), the ties that bind us also fray. Access to mental health services is already weak in India so throwing guns into the mix can be a dangerous idea.
On the flip side, law and order services are poor. Courts are over burdened. Vigilantism and sticking ones nose in other people's business is a national pastime. Each of these, by themselves, are reasons to arm yourself for self defense. Yet, the same economy which is improving should also strengthen the social net and keep people too busy to indulge in prurient people shaming.
My impression is that if we can grow the economy fast enough, we can escape the need for guns. Now comes a related question - can we grow our economy given the kind of population we possess? That discussion, though, is for a different post.