Consumer Activism by Generation Z regarding the Sale of Assault Weapons

• In Event: Poster Session: Civic Engagement

Abstract

The March for Our Lives movement against gun violence emerged in the aftermath of a mass shooting in Parkland, Florida and quickly gained support among young people across the United States. While protests have been the most visible of the movement's activities, supporters have engaged in a variety of tactics to advance their goals, including consumer activism. Forms of consumer activism such as boycotting and buycotting are important forms of civic engagement (Zukin et al 2006). Consumer activism related to social issues has long been a successful method of securing responsiveness from businesses. For example, during the civil rights movement, sit-ins and boycotts successfully changed the discriminatory policies of some companies before this discrimination was prohibited by law.

Yet, since consumers' views are rarely monolithic, responsiveness related to divisive issues can also result in significant backlash. Amidst the backdrop of a significant rise in mass shootings and gun deaths, few issues in American society have become more visible or divisive than gun policy. Among the March for Our Lives movements' policy demands are an assault weapons ban and a ban on high-capacity magazines (Hogg and Hogg 2018). Yet, polling data indicates 45 percent of Americans, including 43 percent of those between the ages of 18 and 34 oppose a nationwide ban on the sale of assault weapons (Quinnipiac University Poll 2022). Thus, consumers, depending on their views, are likely to respond differently to business' decisions about whether to continue to sell assault weapons in the midst of pressure from supporters of this movement.

As the purchasing power of Generation Z grows, so, too may their ability to affect change through their purchasing decisions. We explore, through survey experiments fielded among 18–25-year-olds via Amazon mTurk in November 2022, young adults' decisions to reward or punish sporting goods companies for their responsiveness to pressure to stop selling assault rifles, along with the sensitivity of these purchasing decisions to small differences in costs. Interestingly, we found that young people’s opinions about firearm regulations are not strongly related to whether they support March for Our Lives. About a quarter of those who identified as March for Our Lives supporters said regulations are too strict.

We discover that for the conditions where sporting goods stores announce they will no longer sell assault rifles to help end gun violence in response to pressure to stop doing so from individuals and groups who want to end gun violence, young people respond to the price difference and are not more likely to purchase from such stores if it costs them just two percent more. However, for the conditions where sporting equipment stores announce they will keep selling assault rifles in defense of Second Amendment rights despite pressure to stop doing so from individuals and groups who want to end gun violence, young adults exposed to these seem just as willing to purchase from them if it costs them two percent more than if it does not cost them anything extra. The results suggest that those who think firearms regulations need to be stricter are more moved by price in their purchasing decisions than others are. This may limit the movement’s success at using consumer activism to affect change.

Yet, besides views on guns and the cost involved, preliminary results confirm insights from the literature that consumer activism decisions are also influenced by ideology and interest in politics (Copeland and Boulianne 2022). However, our results also show that peer civic engagement among young adults’ friends has an important impact on their purchasing decisions. This suggests that personal connections, and not just support for the movement, may be important influences on decisions to engage in consumer activism.

Authors

• Laurie L. Rice, Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville

• Ken Moffett, Independent researcher