I think there is also the national story of manifest destiny, taming the West, living on your own in the wilderness without depending on the government for help. There was a point in time when it made sense for everyone in certain areas to have multiple guns, if they could, purely to survive--hunting game to eat, defending oneself from wild animals and also from human criminals when law officers were few and far between. And when a respected person, with a gun and the will to use it, could BE the local law officer, by acclamation rather than official appointment.
Nowadays there is a certain hysteria that often appears, when there is talk of controlling, limiting, or banning any guns. Like people think they are going to be immediately stripped of their weapons and tossed into the middle of Wyoming, miles from any town, surrounded by a pack of hungry wolves. Like we are all living in a Western. I think the guns become, in a real sense, like a security blanket for people. Probably most people never use their guns, except for renewing their license or whatever, but feel better knowing it's there. (I do have family members who own guns to hunt, in the Midwest, as a hobby. I think they are responsible people, and I don't recall ever hearing them say anything about guns or gun control one way or another.)
I wish I could say, it's strange but benign, just have your gun if it makes you feel better. But the fact is, so many guns end up being part of accidents at home, and easy access in general means that people who are planning mass shootings have easy access to them as well. The statistics about gun deaths in the US, versus in other comparable countries, are staggering. If that many more people were dying in car accidents, we would be saying, "What is wrong with our cars, our roads, our drivers?! We need to fix this, NOW!" It just takes a few people getting sick from tainted lettuce in a salad to send that company's stock price plummeting. But whenever there's a mass shooting, with dozen of people DEAD, gun company stock goes UP, because sales go UP, because people buy MORE guns (so I have heard)--either to protect themselves from the rising tide of violence they see, or because they think someone will try to stop the guns from being sold soon.