SNIPPED Were you out to video tape the encounter and make the police look bad? Or was it just an encounter that happened because some idiot called them or they spotted you? Was your intent in carrying that day to have a police encounter?...
I think I agree, idiots out to just harass the police arent helping us...people doing the legal thing and sticking to their rights are what we need...
I never go out to video police encounters. I go out in the hope that there will be NO encounter with police and that other citizens will ask about the right to bear arms. The vast majority of the time (I have encountered police 3 times in 4 years and I carry every day) there is no police encounter. Still, I carry recording devices because, as we all know, if you aren't carrying one there is only one "credible" side to the story AND that's when you're going to be unlawfully detained or worse.
As I always say when there is no police encounter, or there is and no rights are violated, "it's been a good day". To date, I have not had my rights violated in they eyes of the law but I have been harassed by law enforcement (stopping a law abiding citizen doing nothing unlawful is harassment in my opinion).
If I were to call 911 and report "a black man just walked past my house" or "a guy just walked by talking on the phone and he had a turban on" or "a guy just walked by with his dog and he didn't have a license on the dogs collar" I would be told "911 is for emergency calls only" and they'd probably dispatch a police car to me, the caller, to explain that I am abusing the 911 system.
Why isn't that done with open carry which is just as lawful as all of the above situations? Because it's politically incorrect. However, the 1st amendment allows us the freedom of expression to be politically incorrect, the 2nd to carry that weapon, and the 4th to tell the police to pound sand when they attempt a "consensual" encounter.
So....if I'm being totally within the law and my rights, HOW is that harassing, baiting, or otherwise "messing with" the police? The proper and constitutional view is that the police are harassing the citizen for constitutional, but unpopular to some, activity......PERIOD. The government is specifically prohibited from doing so.