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ShootDontTalk wrote:Maybe I need to use simpler words? My response was to the statement that the antis are falling apart and was intended to be tongue-in-cheek. Maybe the quote button just failed?

Maybe we need a "quoted in jest" button.

ShootDontTalk wrote:

The Annoyed Man wrote: I don't mean to be disrespectful, but.....seriously? It's not like these conversations haven't already taken place. When you try often enough, and the answer that keeps comes back from them is that you don't love the 2nd Amendment or that you're a closet socialist because you won't embrace their tactics, who's shooting whom in the foot?

I apologize if I missed a sit down meeting with OCT. Perhaps you can remember when and where that took place? And not to be disrespectful or argumentative, but meeting over a keyboard on the internet accomplishes nothing. I would simply point out the many repetitive discussions of OC here on this forum. Lot of mud slinging and little else. Has anyone ever called a sit-down meeting with these folks?

I have had these discussions with militant OC advocates, and I am telling you that was the result. True, it wasn't with OCT specifically....it was with other members at OpenCarry.org. But even OTC has a problem in that its president, CJ Grisham, is a very problematic character for a number of reasons, all of which are well-documented and don't need to be listed here. If he is in charge of it, then I want nothing to do with it; because he's an "Elija Muhammed" rather than an "MLK". To the average muggle, guns are scary enough. But a firebrand with a gun is downright terrifying to them, and Grisham is a major firebrand.

ShootDontTalk wrote:

The Annoyed Man wrote:Tell me, who got more done for the cause of equal rights and racial reconciliation.......Martin Luther King Jr., or Elijah Muhammed? Both were active in the civil rights cause, but MLK accomplished far more than Muhammed. All Muhammed did was drive the wedge between black and white Americans even deeper. The most radical, in your face, OC protesters are the Elijah Muhammeds of the gun world.

Again, respectfully, were you ever present at a MLK march? If you were, can you with all intellectual honesty say the mere presence of a large group of people of color marching through downtown was not seen as the ultimate in-your-face event? They didn't need to carry guns to bring the haters out of the woodwork. People were scared. Surely you haven't forgotten the images of the cops with billy clubs and dogs? And surely you know that the kind of rhetoric you offer makes any kind of working together toward a common goal impossible?

Absolutely, I have been to some these marches.....if not directly with MLK, then with his disciples. My (white) family was very involved in civil rights activism in the 1960s, and I am old enough that I was there, and I remember it. These people pulled it off because their "sword" was a protest sign or a banner, and not a Garand or M14 (analogous back then to our "black rifles" today). Things would have gone much worse if the protestors had been openly armed. Certainly, black men and women had the right to be PO'd enough back then to march with guns in their hands.....but they were wise, and they did not.

ShootDontTalk wrote:

The Annoyed Man wrote:They scare the rest of the public, removing any common ground on which we can meet to convince them that gun owners/carriers are not the danger to them that they fear. Meanwhile, the rest of us to are in it for the long haul and recognize that it is a long fight, are the MLKs of the gun world. We are bridge-builders, not bridge-wreckers.

Again, respectfully, no. I am also under no illusion that the reason I am accepted in my travels is because my weapon is hidden. I sense there is a perceived difference between those, like you and me, who carry a gun loaded and ready to be used in a moments notice with someone carrying an unloaded rifle. You honestly think you won't scare the nervous nellies if your concealed firearm ever is seen or drawn? You honestly think those who witness the horrible scenario of our having to take a human life are ever going to look at us the same? There are a lot of threads on here and stories in the news that would contradict that view. My friend, you and I are the real scary people.

Of course, I do understand this......which is precisely why I think that the "aversion therapy" being practices by long gun OC activists is counterproductive. It took a long time of incrementally grinding away rights to get us to where we are today. To get us back to where we should be is going to take grinding it out over the long term and taking incremental steps. I liken it to training an animal. You don't try to get the dog to jump through your scary looking hoop right from the get go. First you get him to accept the presence of the hoop in the room. You let him sniff at it a bit. You get it closer and closer to him. You reach through the hoop to give him a treat, getting him a little closer to the hoop each time. You eventually get him to where he will reach his head through the hoop to get the treat. Pretty soon, he is jumping through the hoop to get the treat. We are the enlightened trainers, the antis are the dogs laboring in ignorance. Waving the hoop in their faces is not going to get them to jump through it.

ShootDontTalk wrote:And can we, as a group, really claim we are bridge builders when so many stones are cast so quickly at those who bring the subject of open carry up on this forum? Were I one of them, which I am not, I would never come here. I would hope that I can sit down face to face with an honest man and come to some understanding with him. I'm just as frustrated as anyone else about how some people act. But I refuse to believe everything that could be done has been done.

Perhaps not, but I can tell you that I have personally been the target of some vicious attacks on sites like OpenCarry.org simply because I agreed with the goals, but stated, respectfully, that I thought it would be more productive and lasting to take the long-term incrementalist approach. I was called a socialist and a hater of the Constitution (a document I revere second only to the Holy Bible), and other names. I never went back. They can all go pound sand. I have stated, MANY times, in MANY places, not just this forum, that I am a vocal advocate for Constitutional Carry. But I am also a realist who accepts reality that people laboring in ignorance will resist my attempts to enlighten them, unless I coat that enlightenment in honey. Waving a "big scary black gun" at them (and make no mistake, to a frightened muggle, carrying a slung AR is the same as "waving it at them") isn't going to bring them into the light.

ShootDontTalk wrote:

The Annoyed Man wrote:I no longer try to reason with people like this because the most vocal of them—the instigators—have already proven that they can't be reasoned with. Wrestling with a pig just gets you covered in pig slop, and it annoys the pig. I call these people fools because they have already refused to listen to wisdom......not because I never tried to lend them any of it.

I have no idea how to respond to this, so I won't. I doubt MLK would have put it that way in his frustration, but I think I understand yours. I think I said something similar when my kids reached their teens.

Well, yes, I am frustrated by people whom I see as acting in a manner contrary to the long term interests of the cause. The fact is, I can accept honest disagreement about how to go about it. That won't change my opinion, but I can work alongside people with whom I have a disagreement in detail, but with whom I share a common long term goal. But when their reaction to my opinion is to call my integrity and patriotism into question, then I lose all desire to deal with them........and that is their doing, not mine.

They had a long gun OC demonstration in Hurst on Monday. My son went by it as he was driving over to my house in Grapevine. He said that he was tempted to go get his AR and join them. I said, do as you wish, but here are my reasons why I won't. In the end, he elected not to.

ShootDontTalk wrote:Why not try to sit down with them over a glass of your favorite and lend them some wisdom? Provide them with the kind of leadership that might have a chance at altering their tactics to enhance other efforts rather than detract from the overall strategy? I think you sniping at them and them sniping at you is a losers strategy. Or is it not worth the effort to go see if you can work with them and change what will surely happen if you just sit back and snipe? Even if they reject any efforts to work with them, would it not be better to at least have tried?

I don't mean to be disrespectful, but.....seriously? It's not like these conversations haven't already taken place. When you try often enough, and the answer that keeps comes back from them is that you don't love the 2nd Amendment or that you're a closet socialist because you won't embrace their tactics, who's shooting whom in the foot? Tell me, who got more done for the cause of equal rights and racial reconciliation.......Martin Luther King Jr., or Elijah Muhammed? Both were active in the civil rights cause, but MLK accomplished far more than Muhammed. All Muhammed did was drive the wedge between black and white Americans even deeper. The most radical, in your face, OC protesters are the Elijah Muhammeds of the gun world. They scare the rest of the public, removing any common ground on which we can meet to convince them that gun owners/carriers are not the danger to them that they fear. Meanwhile, the rest of us to are in it for the long haul and recognize that it is a long fight, are the MLKs of the gun world. We are bridge-builders, not bridge-wreckers.

I no longer try to reason with people like this because the most vocal of them—the instigators—have already proven that they can't be reasoned with. Wrestling with a pig just gets you covered in pig slop, and it annoys the pig. I call these people fools because they have already refused to listen to wisdom......not because I never tried to lend them any of it.