"Texas Gun Owners Divided on Best Aaproach to Legalizing OC

[Cedar Park Dad]

{snip}

It would be better IMO if TX and VA had carry laws like AZ or AK. Constitutional carry is very attractive to me. If you are legal to own you are legal to carry it however you wish. As far as being antagonistic and causing more 30.06 signs. I don't think we have anymore no gun signs than TX does. Truth be told I saw more 30.06 signs in my two weeks in San Antonio than I have seen in ten years in and around Richmond.

{snip}

There it is boys and girls, ladies and gentlemen. IOE, mamabearCali is spot on correct.

In our annual travels, we don't see any more "gun buster" signs in Oklahoma, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, the Dakotas and Arizona than we see 30.06 signs in Texas. Now then, what is the real problem? Maybe have statewide OC with metro preemption?

But the opposite happened in California.
I'd appreciate better results then anecdotes from small states who's aggregate population is less then Harris County.

[mamabearCali]

So we should base what we do on California? Not very productive in my opinion.

Arizona is a pretty big state. Virginia though not constitution carry is a pretty big state. With enough of a population that we were carpeted with election nonsense for two years before the last election. I don't know how big Harris county is but VA has a population of over 8 million.


03Lighteningrocks

That guy is an internet meme. It is not the honest truth. If in a state like Va you were to go around like that you would be arrested because you must carry long guns in a sling if not being used to hunt. Just like you can't walk around with your glock in your hand pointing it at people, you can't do what he is doing. So you are arguing about a person that does not exist.


What I was attempting to say is that the picture above is being used as a strawman argument. That guy is ridiculous thus all OC is ridiculous. I have seen people at gun rallies here in VA open carry rifles/shotties. I have never ever seen anyone who looked like that guy.

However if I did see a guy like that I would watch him. Not shoot him on sight. For all I know he may have a legitimate reason to be dressed like that.

[03Lightningrocks]

You focus on the movie aspect only, there are other potential reasons you might see someone dressed up like that. To simply shoot someone for appearence could easily become a tragic mistake and can easily put you in prison or the grave. I would hope beyond hope you get some better training than what you got in your CHL class and avoid the mall ninja mindset, by making the statements above you have placed yourself in the same category as the guy in the meme photo. As CHL holders we are the good guys, we are people who can think and reason not sheep dogs. As such we have a duty to observe, rationalize, and act responsibly. One does not have to wait until someone starts shooting to know they are a bad guy, and take action to stop them, but at the same time you can not act preemptively. Additionally how do you know the ammo and shotgun are real? I have seen some VERY realistic replicas. It would be sad if you killed a mall employee with replicas preparing for a publicity photo shoot, or someone participating in a hidden video TV show, or even a LEO responding to a shooting themselves. Unless you know for a FACT do not engage a target. Statements like yours hurt all efforts to further gun rights and I hope you do not encounter any of the OC crowd walking around with long guns because they might just set off your inner sheep dog.

BTW, I am trying to keep this thread on topic while addressing your statements, if you want to continue this discussion I would suggest starting a new thread for this topic so this one doesn't get hijacked and thus locked by the admin or staff.

I never once said to shoot a person simply for the way they look. I said to shoot that guy...that look.

From what you just posted, it is probably wise for you to hunker down and wait for the cavalry. It sounds like you have trouble discerning a real weapon from a fake one. It appears your situational awareness is possibly lacking. Funny thing, many people in a theater in Colorado said they thought that shooter was a gimmick. Some even said they thought he was firing blanks. Too bad the first person to spot him coming through the door dressed for battle did not put him down before he could murder innocents. Thanks for the moral judgements just the same. Meanwhile, back at the ranch....

[03Lightningrocks]

So we should base what we do on California? Not very productive in my opinion.

Arizona is a pretty big state. Virginia though not constitution carry is a pretty big state. With enough of a population that we were carpeted with election nonsense for two years before the last election. I don't know how big Harris county is but VA has a population of over 8 million.


03Lighteningrocks

That guy is an internet meme. It is not the honest truth. If in a state like Va you were to go around like that you would be arrested because you must carry long guns in a sling if not being used to hunt. Just like you can't walk around with your glock in your hand pointing it at people, you can't do what he is doing. So you are arguing about a person that does not exist.

And so are you. Giving me duff for stating I would shoot that "imaginary" person? Pot. Kettle, Black.


What I was attempting to say is that the picture above is being used as a strawman argument. That guy is ridiculous thus all OC is ridiculous. I have seen people at gun rallies here in VA open carry rifles/shotties. I have never ever seen anyone who looked like that guy.

However if I did see a guy like that I would watch him. Not shoot him on sight. For all I know he may have a legitimate reason to be dressed like that.

No, what you did was present your own straw man argument by inferring I would shoot a person in VA for simply open carrying a handgun on their side. I said nothing of the kind. Now you realize the folly of your response and the lack of merit it held as a response to my post and try to swerve. Nope.

[03Lightningrocks]

Just for the record, this thread is not about how one feels about open carry. The topic was about how one feels about "in your face" tactics by a very small but very vocal minority of OC proponents. Somehow it is being twisted to discuss how one feels about OC and how prevalent it is or will be.

[mamabearCali]

So we should base what we do on California? Not very productive in my opinion.

Arizona is a pretty big state. Virginia though not constitution carry is a pretty big state. With enough of a population that we were carpeted with election nonsense for two years before the last election. I don't know how big Harris county is but VA has a population of over 8 million.


03Lighteningrocks

That guy is an internet meme. It is not the honest truth. If in a state like Va you were to go around like that you would be arrested because you must carry long guns in a sling if not being used to hunt. Just like you can't walk around with your glock in your hand pointing it at people, you can't do what he is doing. So you are arguing about a person that does not exist.


What I was attempting to say is that the picture above is being used as a strawman argument. That guy is ridiculous thus all OC is ridiculous. I have seen people at gun rallies here in VA open carry rifles/shotties. I have never ever seen anyone who looked like that guy.

However if I did see a guy like that I would watch him. Not shoot him on sight. For all I know he may have a legitimate reason to be dressed like that.

No, what you did was present your own straw man argument by inferring I would shoot a person in VA for simply open carrying a handgun on their side. I said nothing of the kind. Now you realize the folly of your response and the lack of merit it held as a response to my post and try to swerve. Nope.

Ahhah!!! Then he would have gotten me. I would have shot an innocent mall ninja! I think the OC radicals should be required to wear a sign that says, "Please don't shoot me, I am trying to impress the other guys on an internet forum." No sign??? It is a good shoot!

I'd appreciate it if you come to an OC state (like VA) that you don't shoot me just cause I am carrying OWB. I don't carry signs around though.

In all seriousness....since this is apparently a meme. Yall should know this is not what open carry is or what those of us that open carry look like or act like.

I know yall are kidding around, but really it is just as annoying as when they show the militia belonging to, cammo wearing, long bearded chain smoking 60 year old man as what all gun owners are like. It is good for a laugh, but it is not the truth. Eventually it starts to wear on a person being portrayed as an idiot when we are not.

This is what I said. No straw man there. Perhaps you can read it more carefully now. I was primarily addressing that this is not reality. That the man there is an internet meme. And as such it is starting to annoy.

I was also addressing the idea that you would shoot a person on sight......which would be ill advised no matter how they are dressed. I was trying to do so in a lighthearted manner. Giving you an opportunity to say "of course not MBC, this is not real so my threat is not real, if I saw you OCing in VA you would look very different from that guy, so I would wander over and talk gun talk."


The strawman in this argument, is the picture. It is not real. It is a caricature. It is an internet meme. It is not how OC occurs in an OC state. To argue against open carry by arguing against that picture is a strawman argument.

[mamabearCali]

Just for the record, this thread is not about how one feels about open carry. The topic was about how one feels about "in your face" tactics by a very small but very vocal minority of OC proponents. Somehow it is being twisted to discuss how one feels about OC and how prevalent it is or will be.

They are being pushed into making ridiculous in your face tactics due to the fact that they are dismissed by gun owners and CHLers on the whole. If they had not been dismissed as kooks and dissed by Internet memes as above, perhaps they would have been able to be more circumspect. People ignored, who desire the freedoms they have been promised, will tend towards more and more drastic action.

Is it wise? Probably not. But they have been patted on the head and told to sit down and shut it for years. So after being polite and getting no where they are trying a new tactic. Can you blame them? I don't.

Now is it smart to go this way, maybe not, but the liberals get their way much of the time by screaming their heads off.

Say what you like. They care about freedom. Even if their tactics are off, they are at least trying to effect change.

[jimlongley]

I never once said to shoot a person simply for the way they look. I said to shoot that guy...that look.

I would love for you to explain the logical difference between the first sentence and the second. If you are going to shoot "that guy" for "that look" you are advocating shooting a person for the way they look, which places you squarely among the ranks of those who want to outlaw guns for the way they look.

Suppose, for instance, that guy just happens to be a LEO coming into the mall to warn of an active shooter situation going on in the parking lot and everyone is to stay inside? And you just shot him in the face?

From what you just posted, it is probably wise for you to hunker down and wait for the cavalry. It sounds like you have trouble discerning a real weapon from a fake one. It appears your situational awareness is possibly lacking. Funny thing, many people in a theater in Colorado said they thought that shooter was a gimmick. Some even said they thought he was firing blanks. Too bad the first person to spot him coming through the door dressed for battle did not put him down before he could murder innocents. Thanks for the moral judgements just the same. Meanwhile, back at the ranch....

Sorry, it seems to me that your own situational awareness is lacking. You are NOT a LEO (that I know of) and as a CHL you are NOT supposed to be making such snap judgements, and even if you are a LEO, you still need to determine what is going on before using deadly force. Time for you to hunker down yourself.

---------------------------------------------------

Back on topic, the "demonstration" outside the meeting was totally peaceful, nobody was "brandishing" (a favorite term of the antis these days) and the only reason anyone got into the positions they are in for the picture was for the picture. Unfortunately the meeting participants decided to bring in to play their fearful nature by getting cooperative media to make a big deal out of their feeling threatened by the mere presence of firearms and the bad guys carrying them.

That tactic fits squarely in their strategy by exploiting their own alarmist attitudes to inflame passion in the media and the minority who agree with them.

The OCers' tactic fits squarely within their strategy of letting people know that OC (of long guns) is legal and non-threatening, and taken by itself without the histrionics of the opposing group would probably pass unnoticed. If they even staged their rally a couple of blocks away there probably would have been no notice, which is the reason they staged it where they did.

In the end the OCers' tactic was a net loss for them because they did nothing to change public perception and they lost points with "us" who would normally be their allies, and the meeting participants' tactic was a net win because the initial media frenzy was pretty much all in their favor and because the follow up articles that told something closer to the true story, rather then the knee jerk pictures, showed up on different pages of the paper.

[03Lightningrocks]

OK... here we go again JIm. You really want to debate me saying I would shoot a "zombie"? Why not. First... NO cop is going to just come walking in the mall dressed like that with no other circumstances going on to call for it.

I have to question your situational awareness when I have to tell you how to know when a situation is out of the norm or when cops are involved in a situation that calls for a Bane outfit. I suppose you would have liked my post better had I said I almost drew on a suspicious looking guy walking up to me at the gas station.

[Cedar Park Dad]

Just for the record, this thread is not about how one feels about open carry. The topic was about how one feels about "in your face" tactics by a very small but very vocal minority of OC proponents. Somehow it is being twisted to discuss how one feels about OC and how prevalent it is or will be.

They are being pushed into making ridiculous in your face tactics due to the fact that they are dismissed by gun owners and CHLers on the whole. If they had not been dismissed as kooks and dissed by Internet memes as above, perhaps they would have been able to be more circumspect. People ignored, who desire the freedoms they have been promised, will tend towards more and more drastic action.

Is it wise? Probably not. But they have been patted on the head and told to sit down and shut it for years. So after being polite and getting no where they are trying a new tactic. Can you blame them? I don't.

Now is it smart to go this way, maybe not, but the liberals get their way much of the time by screaming their heads off.

Say what you like. They care about freedom. Even if their tactics are off, they are at least trying to effect change.

If you act like a bunch of kooks, you will be treated like a bunch of kooks.
How many marches have there been without carrying and having arrests?
How many write in campaign and other lobbying efforts?
The OC method of attempting to influence appropirate legislation is at best blurred, at worst incoherent.

[03Lightningrocks]

Just for the record, this thread is not about how one feels about open carry. The topic was about how one feels about "in your face" tactics by a very small but very vocal minority of OC proponents. Somehow it is being twisted to discuss how one feels about OC and how prevalent it is or will be.

They are being pushed into making ridiculous in your face tactics due to the fact that they are dismissed by gun owners and CHLers on the whole. If they had not been dismissed as kooks and dissed by Internet memes as above, perhaps they would have been able to be more circumspect. People ignored, who desire the freedoms they have been promised, will tend towards more and more drastic action.

Is it wise? Probably not. But they have been patted on the head and told to sit down and shut it for years. So after being polite and getting no where they are trying a new tactic. Can you blame them? I don't.

Now is it smart to go this way, maybe not, but the liberals get their way much of the time by screaming their heads off.

Say what you like. They care about freedom. Even if their tactics are off, they are at least trying to effect change.

If you act like a bunch of kooks, you will be treated like a bunch of kooks.
How many marches have there been without carrying and having arrests?
How many write in campaign and other lobbying efforts?
The OC method of attempting to influence appropirate legislation is at best blurred, at worst incoherent.

I agree with Cedar park Dad. In addition I challenge the assertion that OC is being dismissed by gun owners and CHLers. As Charles posted earlier, he has and is working toward legislation that will grant OC.

We talk about freedoms that have been promised but we forget that the freedom we are discussing has never been an all out carry anywhere, anytime you want freedom. Even in Colonial times there were situations when people were asked to leave their firearms at the door. Same for the old west. I bet they have places you cannot carry in the State you reside. So what is this freedom we speak of? Where in the original amendment did it say "everyone except for felons"? Lines have been drawn over time. We have to work with it the best we can. In a peaceful manner. I am not sure the RKBA ever has been a pure freedom in that anyone could own and carry a weapon anywhere they please. Even where you reside.

I would not mind OC one bit. With the following desires. I do not want OC to cause a concealed carrier to be bound by a simple gun buster sign. I would not like OC if it created a situation that caused 30.06 signs to pop up in more places. Heck, I might even OC on occasion myself.

But the "Starbucks Tactics" have resulted in negative reactions, not positive. Again, it is not the message we have a problem with. It is the tactics used to convey the message. I cannot understand why it makes me anti gun to feel we should strive to get OC in a peaceful manner that does not incite fear or resentment.

[Oldgringo]

{snip}

It would be better IMO if TX and VA had carry laws like AZ or AK. Constitutional carry is very attractive to me. If you are legal to own you are legal to carry it however you wish. As far as being antagonistic and causing more 30.06 signs. I don't think we have anymore no gun signs than TX does. Truth be told I saw more 30.06 signs in my two weeks in San Antonio than I have seen in ten years in and around Richmond.

{snip}

There it is boys and girls, ladies and gentlemen. IOE, mamabearCali is spot on correct.

In our annual travels, we don't see any more "gun buster" signs in Oklahoma, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, the Dakotas and Arizona than we see 30.06 signs in Texas. Now then, what is the real problem? Maybe have statewide OC with metro preemption?

But the opposite happened in California.
I'd appreciate better results then anecdotes from small states who's aggregate population is less then Harris County.

There you go. Let's do it like alcohol except that the amendment is reversed; i.e., the state is OC with political jurisdictions being allowed to vote no OC. Happy now?

[03Lightningrocks]

There you go. Let's do it like alcohol except that the amendment is reversed; i.e., the state is OC with political jurisdictions being allowed to vote no OC. Happy now?

I don't like that idea one bit. How would a person know when they crossed into a City that forbids OC?

[mamabearCali]

Just for the record, this thread is not about how one feels about open carry. The topic was about how one feels about "in your face" tactics by a very small but very vocal minority of OC proponents. Somehow it is being twisted to discuss how one feels about OC and how prevalent it is or will be.

They are being pushed into making ridiculous in your face tactics due to the fact that they are dismissed by gun owners and CHLers on the whole. If they had not been dismissed as kooks and dissed by Internet memes as above, perhaps they would have been able to be more circumspect. People ignored, who desire the freedoms they have been promised, will tend towards more and more drastic action.

Is it wise? Probably not. But they have been patted on the head and told to sit down and shut it for years. So after being polite and getting no where they are trying a new tactic. Can you blame them? I don't.

Now is it smart to go this way, maybe not, but the liberals get their way much of the time by screaming their heads off.

Say what you like. They care about freedom. Even if their tactics are off, they are at least trying to effect change.

If you act like a bunch of kooks, you will be treated like a bunch of kooks.
How many marches have there been without carrying and having arrests?
How many write in campaign and other lobbying efforts?
The OC method of attempting to influence appropirate legislation is at best blurred, at worst incoherent.

You only hear about the kooks. The media has no desire for you to know of anything else but that. In the Richmond area there is an OC breakfast every week. There is an OC dinner every month. So here in VA there are 60+ open carry events every year just in the Richmond area. Every year at the capital there is an OC rally.....no one gets arrested.

But if course you don't hear about that. There is
more to OC than what you hear on the news.

[mamabearCali]

I am not saying what they are doing, the "kooks" that is, is effective. I think it is much more reasonable to try and do it quietly. But frustrated people, ignored people, sometimes do desperate things. I understand that.

I don't think you are anti-gun. I just think perhaps you don't understand the level if frustration that some are under. In CA for example in many counties it is nearly impossible to get a chl...so if you wanted any level if protection you had to OC. Now because people found a way to legally protect themselves the antis made sure to close that option for the common people.

I don't blame the OCers in CA. I blame the voters for being such statists intent on making criminals' lives easier.