I completely agree with this.srothstein wrote:Casingpoint,
I have to disagree with the officer in your post for two reasons. First and foremost, is that I strongly support the right of the people to carry, openly or concealed. It really does not make any difference to me. If we had a law allowing open carry, I would not be stopping people to check them out just because they had a gun. That poster was correct that in today's society, carrying openly would get a person a lot of comments, calls to the police, and stops - possibly at gunpoint. But that is not right if the state allows open carry. That is what we should be working to change.
Secondly, and much more importantly, this attitude reveals a significant problem in today's police. They WANT to be the nanny and decide what is right or wrong, who can defend themselves, etc. They think they know better than you. If the law allows open carry, there is absolutely no reason a police officer should be stopping the person to check if he is a criminal. As a matter of fact, the conclusion the officer should draw is that he is a law-abiding citizen since he is not breaking the law. I will freely admit that I am in the minority on the theory of cops defending people's rights and not stopping people who are not clearly breaking the law, but that IS what we should be working for. And we should all be supporting those who want to open carry, just because they can. If it is within the law, we should all get upset when they get stopped and harassed. The only way I can protect my rights is to yell and scream when their rights are violated, regardless of whether or not I agree with what they happened to be doing at the time.
If open carry was legal, then what reason would the officer have to "check you out?" In my book, probable cause still applies. You could play the "safety" card because an armed person obviously has the capability to seriously injure someone... but so does a guy with a 2" lockblade on his belt. Or a plumber carrying a wrench. Or a lady with a baseball bat. Or a <insert one of a thousand other people here>. Is the cop who made that post going to "check out" each of them... at gunpoint?
I think that a cop who is only on guard when he can see a weapon is a cop who is going to find himself way behind the curve if he ever comes across someone who is willing to use deadly force against him.
Personally, I have no desire to open carry. I would not do it even if it were legal. But that doesn't mean that people who choose to exercise that right where it is available deserve to be hassled for exercising that right.