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I think answer you're begging for here is "crime" or "violence against other humans"

Truthfully, I was thinking more along the lines of "identity", "entertainment" and "machoism". And while these often unfortunately do interesect with "crime" and "violence", I wouldn't think they were the primary reasons because I don't think that would be reflective of most people's actual attitudes and behaviours (regardless of nationality). I did not mean to imply that the dominant reason is "crime", lean on the stereotype of gun violence in the US or paint every gun owner as a psychopath. I can see how that might have been construed based on the way I wrote it. But I don't actually believe in any that.

My main point was that the actual reasons for both owning and using guns are not related to the reasoning of the 2nd amendment eventhough it is the law that makes all of this possible. And how could they be related - that reasoning is centuries old and simply nomlonger valid due to the way power is exercised in the 21st century.

The discussion of whether the reasons have more to do with crime or entertainment is an interesting one that I didn't really actually mean to touch on in my first comment because its kind of a side point to the main point I was making (though still obviously important). As you point out, and this seems to be corraborated by Pewpew, most Americans use their guns for the stated reasons of "go shooting" or "go hunting". Interestingly, you can hunt or go to a shooting range in most other developed countries and the fact they don't have an extensive right to bear arms enshrined in their constitution doesn't seem to be limiting that entertainment value. Nor has it impacted the ability of people in those countries to fight against tyranny. What it has done, however, is significantly limit gun violence, to the point where there are several hundred times more gun-related deaths in the US compared to Western European countries. Not even gonna mention countries with even tougher gun laws like Japan - the difference is staggering - in the thousands of times, at least according to the University of Washington.

Culture and ideology are the primary words here, I think. As the epistemological crisis deepens, I fear ideological violence will continue to rise, and guns will be a very combustible ingredient in that dynamic.

Again, did not mean to paint all gun owners as looney criminals. But the relationship to the culture of power is most definayely there and we should very much be afriad of those who use the notions of self-defence and democracy as a guise to enact their power fantasies, or even worse - as a tool of ideology and politics.