[Glenn E. Meyer]

One problem in changing minds is that there are two channels to opinion change. One is emotional and one is rational.

However, for most people - the emotional channel is quick and more powerful.

Sen. Feinstein lived through the assassination of the Mayor of SF Moscone and Harvey Milk. The latter was killed in part because of his stand on gay issues.

Thus, convincing her that privately owned firearms are worthy would be a hard sell by controversial appeals to risk/benefit ratios. Some folks might argue if all had guns, then you could defend yourself. But others might argue that their elimination would lead to less bloodshed. It is an empirical question which would be the case. The emotional appeal of the antigun position is stronger for her.

I would also (and don't want to start a gay rights controversy) opine that correlated opinions also influence the debate. Given that White was dead set against gay rights as are many of the political right and that the right is progun for the most part - she would have a hard time identifying or accepting the logic of one of the political totems of the right (the RKBA) given it would seem related to a hateful person who used a gun to cause death close to her. It would be part of a package of unacceptable beliefs.

Once you have an emotional set - then you selectively process new information to match your beliefs - confirmation bias.

It takes a lot to break such a set. So don't expect her to do so.

Just because we see the RKBA as intrinsically obvious doesn't mean that others will. Most social issue debates have each side thinking that its position is so blazingly obvious that the others must be nuts, stupid or part of some evil conspiracy to do something really evil.

It takes deliberate training and thought to evaluate policy issues on merits. Even very intelligent people cannot do that at times.