In a SOC 119 session at Penn State, Dr. Sam Richards opened with an unusual disclaimer.
This wasn’t an anti-gun lecture, he said – it was a sociological conversation.
He told his students he grew up with firearms and started shooting at age five.
The goal, he stressed, was to understand how “normal” looks different depending on where you stand.
The timing was heavy. At the time, in 2023, a recent campus shooting at Michigan State hung over the room.
Dr. Richards wanted respect in the room for gun owners and for those unnerved by guns. Both realities were welcome, he said, because sociology is about context.
When The Bizarre Becomes Normal
To explain “normalized reality,” Dr. Richards shared a memory from childhood.
He described school nuclear drills: sitting on basement floors, heads tucked into laps, as if that would save anyone from fallout.
It felt normal then.
It feels bizarre now.
Today’s version, he said, is the lockdown drill. That, too, has become routine – another ritual we accept because we must.
He ran through numbers to anchor the discussion. Roughly a billion firearms are in global circulation, with about 85% in civilian hands.
The United States leads civilian ownership by a wide margin. On average, there are more guns than people.
He contrasted gun murders across wealthy countries. The U.S. rate is far higher than peers like Japan.
He also showed a state-by-state scatter plot. More guns in a state, more firearm deaths per 100,000 – an intuitive but sobering correlation.
Then he offered a stark comparison.
Korea had about 10 gun deaths in 2019; scaled to U.S. population, that’s 60 – what the U.S. experiences roughly every 12 hours, he said.
First Impressions: “You Hear About Shootings All The Time”
The microphone moved to the international students. This is where the room got honest.
Daniel, from Indonesia, said gun drills weren’t a thing where he grew up – earthquake and fire drills were. In Jakarta, guns are illegal, and gun deaths are rare.
He admitted to owning a rifle back home, used for shooting rats. But ask him what’s more likely to kill you in Jakarta? A car crash, not a bullet.
Coming to an American college, though, was different. “Kind of scary,” he said, given what he’d heard about school shootings.
He also shared the advice his father gave him before he left. If conflict happens, walk away – because here, you never know who has a gun.
That simple line captured the distance between two worlds. In one, a fight might be a shove; in the other, it could escalate to a firearm.
Worry From Afar, Numbness Up Close
A student from China, Ming Shi, echoed the caution. Her parents also urged her to avoid conflict at all costs.
She said that back home, guns weren’t something she ever thought about. In the U.S., it felt like a distant threat – something you hear about, but not something you expect to hit your doorstep.
That paradox came up again and again. International families are worried; students acclimate faster.
Another student, Mohammed from Saudi Arabia, didn’t sugarcoat it. “I was pretty scared and paranoid,” he said, and still feels that way.
Back home, public safety felt predictable. Arguments might get physical, but the presence of guns wasn’t a default fear.
Here, he said, there’s a higher chance an argument ends in something fatal. Even in a dorm, he added, the insecurity lingers.
The Global Mirror: “Be Safe Over There”
Dr. Richards offered a twist that landed hard. He remembered Americans warning him to “be safe” when he traveled to the Middle East.
He flipped the script. “Be safe over here,” he quipped, pointing to the contradiction many outsiders see.
Nelly from India recognized that narrative. From abroad, the U.S. often carries a stereotype – lots of guns, lots of shootings.
Her family worried when she came. But day to day, she said, you don’t constantly think about it unless it happens to you or near you.
Another student suggested acclimation plays a role. You settle into a place; fear subsides unless news breaks close to home.
Dr. Richards compared it to living in a conflict zone. You hear explosions in the distance, but because they’re not here, normal life continues.
That’s normalization in real time. It doesn’t erase risk; it dulls the edges of fear.
Two Realities, One Campus
What struck me listening to this exchange is how America’s gun conversation often talks past itself. The data can look clear to one side and irrelevant to another.
Dr. Richards put charts on the screen that would satisfy a statistician. Higher gun prevalence correlates with higher death rates; the international comparison isn’t flattering.
At the same time, he called for respect for gun culture and gun owners. He said it plainly: this is not an anti-gun class.
That balance matters. It’s the only way to keep the room open.
For students like Daniel and Mohammed, fear is rational. Their home countries treat guns as exceptional; in the U.S., guns are ubiquitous.
For gun owners who grew up responsibly with firearms, fear can feel like caricature. They see lawfully armed citizens, safety courses, and a constitutional tradition.
Sociology doesn’t need to pick a side to learn something true. It needs to describe what is – and ask why it feels so different depending on who’s speaking.
“Don’t Engage” – The New Traveler’s Rule
One theme kept returning: de-escalation as survival strategy. Multiple students said their parents gave the same instruction: avoid conflict at all costs.
“Let it go,” Daniel recalled being told. Your wallet isn’t worth your life.
That advice isn’t uniquely American, but it takes on a sharper tone here. Because if a verbal spat can suddenly involve a gun, the cost of pride skyrockets.
Is that an indictment of the culture? Or just a pragmatic rule for a society with many firearms and many people?
Dr. Richards didn’t call it either way. He asked students to sit with the reality first, then make sense of it.
I think that’s wise. It’s also rare in a media landscape that prefers quick conclusions.
The Numbers We Carry And The Stories We Live
The Korea comparison was a perfect teaching moment. Sixty gun deaths in a year, scaled to U.S. population, sounds modest until you learn we hit that every half day.
But statistics alone don’t settle culture. People live stories, not scatter plots.
The international students’ stories were consistent. They arrived with caution, felt parental fear, and then gradually normalized the risks they heard so much about.
That doesn’t make the risk imaginary. It shows how humans adapt to their surroundings – sometimes wisely, sometimes dangerously.
It also explains why America can be both a place of constant headline tragedy and one where most people will never personally experience gun violence.
Two truths can exist at once.
Listening Before Labeling
What SOC 119 modeled – credit to Dr. Sam Richards for setting the tone – was disciplined curiosity. He affirmed gun-owner identity while laying out data many gun owners dislike.
Then he handed the floor to people who see the U.S. from outside its fishbowl. Their words were not about policies or legal doctrine; they were about fear, caution, and acclimation.
I think those accounts deserve weight in our debates.
Not as trump cards, but as reminders that “normal” is learned, not given.
I also think the “don’t engage” rule is telling. It’s the kind of folk wisdom societies create when formal safeguards feel uncertain or slow.
Americans pride themselves on rights and responsibility. Bridging those ideals with a reality that pushes young visitors to walk away from conflict at all costs is a conversation worth having.
That’s not anti-gun.
That’s pro-honesty.
In this class, the honesty came from students – Daniel of Indonesia, Mohammed of Saudi Arabia, Ming Shi of China, and others – who spoke plainly about worry and normalization.
And it came from Dr. Sam Richards, who refused to turn a complex culture into a simple slogan.
If more conversations sounded like this one, we’d disagree less about motives and more about solutions. That’s where real progress usually starts.
UP NEXT: “Heavily Armed” — See Which States Are The Most Strapped
Image Credit: Survival World
Americans have long debated the role of firearms, but one thing is sure — some states are far more armed than others. See where your state ranks in this new report on firearm ownership across the U.S.
A former park ranger and wildlife conservationist, Lisa’s passion for survival started with her deep connection to nature. Raised on a small farm in northern Wisconsin, she learned how to grow her own food, raise livestock, and live off the land. Lisa is our dedicated Second Amendment news writer and also focuses on homesteading, natural remedies, and survival strategies. Lisa aims to help others live more sustainably and prepare for the unexpected.