I think one issue that we're dealing with here is really a demographic question. In say, the 1920's, a much larger percentage of the population lived in rural areas,
and so had more exposure to folks that owned firearms or hunted. Even rural folks that don't own guns know friends or relatives that do, and tend to realize that
gun ownership by law abiding people is perfectly OK. Today, a much higher percentage of the population lives in cities, and are completely ignorant about firearms.
You can't really blame them: they typically don't have any positive exposure to them, they often don't know anyone that owns them, and in the urban world they
live in, the only people that seem to have them are the police, or criminals. While it's important to resist stupid gun laws, I think gun owners also need to present
responsible firearms ownership in a positive light, and help educate people who view gun ownership as aberrant. If the public simply views gun owners as negative
and obstructionist, we'll never win anything.
I had an interesting conversation with a (urban) neighbor of mine a few years ago. Somehow in a conversation, I mentioned I had gone bird hunting. She basically told me
that my killing birds was immoral. So, I asked her if she ate meat, and she answered yes. I (carefully, and politely) pointed out to her that when she bought meat
from the store, she was paying someone else to do the killing for her, and that by buying meat, she was in part responsible for the death of the animal. This might seem
obvious, but she had never even thought about it. To her credit, she didn't push back and she did think about it. We can rant about how folks like this are stupid, or
we can try to educate them.