Can a relationship survive a fight over owning a gun?
Are we doomed?
Hi Jake,
My boyfriend grew up in Mississippi and insists we need a gun in the house to protect ourselves as a gay couple. I hate guns and don’t even want one under my roof.
The confusing part is I kind of get where he’s coming from. Growing up in the Deep South, he was bullied for being gay, called slurs, and often felt like he had to watch his back. He says those experiences taught him that the world isn’t always safe for people like us.
Now, whenever there’s a story about another anti-gay hate crime, he brings up getting a gun again. His argument is that he’d rather have one and never need it than need one and not have it.
I see it differently. To me, bringing a gun into the house would make me feel less safe, not more. I worry about accidents, impulsive decisions during moments of anger or drunkenness, or it being taken and used against us.
We’ve been arguing about this for weeks. I know he thinks I’m being naive about how hostile the world can be toward people like us, but I think he’s letting his fear get the better of him. Neither of us seems willing to budge. He can’t understand why I wouldn’t want us to have a way to protect ourselves. I can’t understand why he’d want a gun in our home, knowing it’s going to make me uncomfortable every single day.
So I guess my question is, is this the kind of disagreement we can work through, or is it one of those things where we’re just fundamentally incompatible?
Feeling…Triggered
Dear Feeling…Triggered,
I don’t think this is really a disagreement about guns. I think it’s a disagreement about safety.
Your boyfriend grew up in a part of the country where being openly gay had legitimate risks. He probably learned early on that not everyone would be accepting, and that sometimes the safest thing to do was stay alert and prepared. Experiences like that don’t simply disappear because you become an adult or move somewhere else.
And while acceptance has increased dramatically over the past few decades, we’ve also seen a recent rise in anti-LGBTQ rhetoric, political attacks, and public hostility. It’s not hard to understand why many LGBTQ people feel less safe and less accepted today than they did just a few years ago.
When people feel threatened, their natural instinct is to protect themselves and the people they love. Your boyfriend believes a gun is the best way to do that. He’s probably reacting not only to today’s political climate and headlines, but also to every locker room he had to endure, every homophobic dig he brushed off, and every other experience that taught him that being openly gay could make him a target.
None of that makes your reaction unreasonable, though.
For you, the gun itself feels like the threat. The very thing that makes him feel safer would make you feel less safe. That’s the paradox at the heart of your disagreement.
When couples reach an impasse like this, arguing harder rarely helps. Instead, I’d encourage you to get curious about what safety actually means to each of you. Try to understand each other’s fears before trying to convince each other who’s right.
When your boyfriend imagines having a gun, what fear is he trying to calm? When you imagine a gun in the house, what fear gets activated in you? Is there another way your boyfriend could feel safer without a gun? Is there perhaps a way you could feel safe with one in the house? Are there alternatives that address either of your concerns without violating the other’s boundaries?
The goal isn’t necessarily to change each other’s minds. It’s to understand each other better.
Sometimes those conversations soften our positions. Other times, they reveal a compromise that wasn’t obvious before. And sometimes, they clarify whether a disagreement is bridgeable...or not.
The good news is that the two of you aren’t fighting because one of you doesn’t care about the other’s well-being. Quite the opposite. You’re both trying to create the same thing: a life where you both feel protected. You just have different ideas about how to get there.
The challenge is figuring out how to build a home where you can both let your guard down.
And if you can’t, that’s not necessarily a sign that either of you is wrong. It may simply be a sign that you’ve discovered one of those rare issues where love and compatibility aren’t always the same thing.
If there’s something on your mind, send it to jake@askjaketherapy.com
Your question may be part of a future Ask Jake, answered anonymously.
And if you’re looking for a queer therapist who actually understands what you’re dealing with, you can find one at LGBTQTherapySpace.com.