White conservatives have committed a large part of their political and cultural identity in the right to bear arms, which has fueled the growth of gun culture. For them, guns aren't about hunting, self-defense, the frontier spirit, or any of the other parade flags that are waved around whenever their true objective is revealed. It's about establishing the supremacy of a collective identity.

According to an article written by Sharon Risher, "(The) deadly connection between white supremacy and guns runs throughout our history. In 1866, armed Confederate loyalists stormed the Louisiana Constitutional Convention, murdering 34 Black Americans in an attempt to block suffrage for freed slaves. In 1898, an armed White mob in Wilmington, N.C., proclaimed a “White Declaration of Independence,” then killed at least 60 residents before replacing the multiracial local government with white supremacists. In 1921, mobs of armed White residents of Tulsa attacked the Black neighborhood of Greenwood, murdering as many as 300 Tulsans for the crime of being Black and successful. In 1955, ­Emmett Till was tortured and shot in the head by White vigilantes."

Not to mention, the mass shootings at the Sikh Temple in Oak Creek, Supermarket in El Paso and now this. All of these are racially motivated massacres carried out by white supremacists filled with prejudice and hate towards those they deem inferior to them. According to Brady United, black Americans are twice as likely as white Americans to die from gun violence and 14 times more likely than white Americans to be wounded.

Gun ownership puts BIPoC more at risk than anyone else. It is rooted in white supremacy, racism, islamophobia, xenophobia and is a deadly expression of toxic masculinity.