Gun protests in US raise hope for positive change

Demonstrations across the United States last weekend by hundreds of thousands of predominantly young US residents raised the prospect that a new generation will finally overturn the country's dominant gun culture.

The "March for Our Lives" protests included survivors of the latest mass shooting at a high school in Parkland, Florida, in which 17 people were killed last month. The demonstrators were demanding tougher rules on ownership of guns in the US.

As someone brought up in a non-gun culture Britain, it has frequently struck me on my frequent stays in the US, including some of its wilder reaches, that the basis of the country's gun culture has more to do with emotion than with self-defense or historical rights.