Claiming regulation is futile absolves the gun industry from moral responsibility

Evidence

Construing gun regulation as futile is a novel form of moral disengagement in gun violence operating at the effects locus of moral control. In a mass shooting at a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, one of the weapons was a military-style semiautomatic rifle. As we have seen, this type of assault weapon had been banned for civilian use. However, lawmakers allowed the ban to expire in 2004. Immediately after the mass killing, the governor of Colorado argued against stricter regulation of the gun industry: “If there were no assault weapons available and no this or no that, this guy is going to find something, right? He’s going to know how to create a bomb” Recall that the killing power of firearms is heightened by enlarged ammunition clips and semiautomatic firing. — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 1141

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces ‘futility justification’ as a distinct moral-disengagement mechanism operating at the effects locus, extending Bandura’s existing framework.