In a poll that will surely make gun control advocates squirm, 60 percent of young Americans plan to, or are considering owning a gun later in life according to an American University (AU) survey released this week.
The national survey, which consisted of 4,000 high school and college students, revealed that 40 percent of participants planned to one day owning a firearm, while another 20 percent were considering it.
Editor's Note:
Should Obama's Gun Ban Be Approved? Vote Now in Urgent Poll
"I think the major contribution of the poll results is to demonstrate that now is certainly the time to have a serious conversation about gun control since the next generation is no less likely to plan to own guns," said
AU professor Jennifer L. Lawless.
Lawless, director of AU's Women and Politics Institute, conducted the survey with Loyola Marymount University Professor Richard L. Fox.
The survey also showed that of those polled, 40 percent of females and 50 percent of black participants feared gun violence, while 69 percent of whites and 68 percent of males did not fear gun violence.
Additionally, Democrats are nearly twice as likely to fear gun violence as their Republican counterparts, with 45 percent of Democrats fearing gun violence, while just 25 percent of Republicans feel the same.
Reacting to the polls findings, Lawless, who apparently favors further restrictions on gun ownership, told Campusreform.org: "The next generation plans on owning guns, so if we want to avoid the tragedies that we’ve seen . . . We obviously need to move quickly and if an executive order is the way to do it, then that is the way to do it."
Lawless' view was not shared by David Burnett, public relations director of the conservative student group Students for Concealed Carry.
"With every single spree killing we’ve seen in this nation in the past twenty years, with every sexual assault that takes place, nine every day on college campuses, with every robbery report we have, with every campus that goes on lockdown, these gun free zones are proven to be indefensible and impractical," said Burnett in an interview with Campus Reform.
Editor's Note:
Should Obama's Gun Ban Be Approved? Vote Now in Urgent Poll
"College campuses put pictures on the door and expect psychopaths to abide by them . . . I think more and more college students have been waking up to this reality in the past five years since Virginia Tech and they don’t want it."
Of the 4,000 students polled in the survey, just 33 percent of the participants were raised in households in which guns were owned.
© 2013 Newsmax. All rights reserved.