WHY PEOPLE LIKE THE AR-15:

To Champion, the AR-15 has wide appeal because everyone from hobbyists to hunters enjoy shooting it.

“What’s good about it is that the ammo is cheap – 30 cents on the dollar compared to any hunting round – it’s accurate from 200 yards, you can hunt with them, they’re versatile, they’re good for home defense, it’s easy to maintain, easy to take down, you can spiff it out with new quad rails, lights, lasers – it’s a fun thing to do,” he says.

Yes, it’s a geek’s gun.

Meanwhile, although Patrik Jonsson, who reported this piece, is an honest reporter who’s done good gun coverage, I note this:

The notion that guns make society safer is much-debated. John Lott is a primary proponent of the claim. A study by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in 2015 polled 150 scientists who study gun violence and found that 84 percent disagree.

Lott has analyzed extensive data on crime and shootings. A poll of “scientists who study gun violence” isn’t at all comparable.