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Yes, this again.

skidmark

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http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Societ...How-important-is-civility-to-open-carry-video

Yes, gun owners can do this, and maybe it does some good by raising awareness that this is the law,” says Brian Anse Patrick, a University of Toledo communications professor and author of the upcoming book “PropaGUNda.” “But there’s still this funny area around etiquette and frightening people” that draws a line between “Second Amendment ambassadors and Second Amendment exhibitionists.”

Today, even as gun-free zones are shrinking, many gun owners maintain a strong sense that gains made on Second Amendment rights could be quickly lost. In that way, many open-carry advocates, especially, are attempting to make gun-carry policy politically palatable by changing what Americans think of as normal, à la gay marriage laws and legal marijuana.

“This is what lefties have done for decades, and it works,” writes University of Tennessee law professor Glenn Reynolds on his “Instapundit” blog.

In interviews, gun owners who draw attention to themselves with their weaponry often acknowledge they’re making both a personal and political statement. One motivation is protecting family and others in case of an attack. The other motivation is to provide “a little bit of a political push” to make people more comfortable around guns, says a Kalamazoo, Mich., man who last year brought a gun to a grade-school reading hour at a library.

Even inside the gun rights movement, the issue of open-carry decorum is looming larger ....

TL/DR - Yes it's your right but .... + we are responsible for other people's emotions.

Fisking the article is not worth it. The only proper response, IMHO, is to demand documentation of horses fainting, women stampeding, and the gutters overflowing with blood from shootouts over parking spaces. (Well, that or possibly a 2x4 up side the head. :D)

stay safe.
 

utbagpiper

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I'm not reading more than you've posted.

I will say that if our goal with OCing is to advance the social and thus ultimately the legal acceptance of RKBA, then it does behoove us to consider our decorum while OCing. This is very different than suggesting we should not being OCing.

If a person's goal or reason for OCing has nothing to do with the stated purposes of OCDO, if he doesn't give a moment's care to whether his conduct will advance or retard the social acceptance of RKBA, then my above statement doesn't apply.

We are not responsible for others' feelings. But anyone mature enough to be walking around in public with a loaded firearm is plenty mature enough to recognize how his conduct will reflect on RKBA and other OCers if he is visibly armed. Ideally, those carrying with the intent to improve social acceptance of RKBA will give some thought to their conduct and comportment.

Half a dozen tweenage boys running around being stupid are just a bunch of stupid kids. Put them all into BSA uniforms and suddenly they are contributing to the public image of the Boy Scouts of America, for good or for ill. Joe Random camper accidentally starting a forest fire is a problem for Joe Random. When Troop 1037 accidentally starts a forest fire it is a major black eye for all Boy Scouts.

Charles
 

deepdiver

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Southeast, Missouri, USA
I'm not reading more than you've posted.

I will say that if our goal with OCing is to advance the social and thus ultimately the legal acceptance of RKBA, then it does behoove us to consider our decorum while OCing. This is very different than suggesting we should not being OCing.

If a person's goal or reason for OCing has nothing to do with the stated purposes of OCDO, if he doesn't give a moment's care to whether his conduct will advance or retard the social acceptance of RKBA, then my above statement doesn't apply.

We are not responsible for others' feelings. But anyone mature enough to be walking around in public with a loaded firearm is plenty mature enough to recognize how his conduct will reflect on RKBA and other OCers if he is visibly armed. Ideally, those carrying with the intent to improve social acceptance of RKBA will give some thought to their conduct and comportment.

Half a dozen tweenage boys running around being stupid are just a bunch of stupid kids. Put them all into BSA uniforms and suddenly they are contributing to the public image of the Boy Scouts of America, for good or for ill. Joe Random camper accidentally starting a forest fire is a problem for Joe Random. When Troop 1037 accidentally starts a forest fire it is a major black eye for all Boy Scouts.

Charles
SSsoooo don't start forest fires while OC? Got it! :)
 

skidmark

Campaign Veteran
Joined
Jan 15, 2007
Messages
10,444
Location
Valhalla
I'm not reading more than you've posted.

I will say that if our goal with OCing is to advance the social and thus ultimately the legal acceptance of RKBA, then it does behoove us to consider our decorum while OCing. This is very different than suggesting we should not being OCing.

If a person's goal or reason for OCing has nothing to do with the stated purposes of OCDO, if he doesn't give a moment's care to whether his conduct will advance or retard the social acceptance of RKBA, then my above statement doesn't apply.

We are not responsible for others' feelings. But anyone mature enough to be walking around in public with a loaded firearm is plenty mature enough to recognize how his conduct will reflect on RKBA and other OCers if he is visibly armed. Ideally, those carrying with the intent to improve social acceptance of RKBA will give some thought to their conduct and comportment.


Charles

Wish you had read a bit more. Much of the open carry mentioned/referred to was the OC of long guns. That automatically takes it out of the realm of the stated purposes of OCDO.

What about Blacks, or Native Americans? Given the social response to the mere presence of them by some parts of the population, should they eschew OC because of how "the public" might perceive their behavior as indecorous? What about anybody perceived to be Middle Eastern?

I disagree with your assertion that it "behoove us to consider our decorum while OCing" primarily because it is not how we believe we are behaving but how the public sees us as behaving. Moms Demanding Action/Everytown and other hoplophobes seem to be insisting that I conform my behavior to their mores and ideals. For quite some time I have had it up to here *holds hand above his head* with people telling me that I can only perform completely legal acts if I do it their way which includes not doing it where they can see it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtfCRaNg5EU

stay safe.
 

deepdiver

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Joined
Apr 2, 2007
Messages
5,820
Location
Southeast, Missouri, USA
Wish you had read a bit more. Much of the open carry mentioned/referred to was the OC of long guns. That automatically takes it out of the realm of the stated purposes of OCDO.

What about Blacks, or Native Americans? Given the social response to the mere presence of them by some parts of the population, should they eschew OC because of how "the public" might perceive their behavior as indecorous? What about anybody perceived to be Middle Eastern?

I disagree with your assertion that it "behoove us to consider our decorum while OCing" primarily because it is not how we believe we are behaving but how the public sees us as behaving. Moms Demanding Action/Everytown and other hoplophobes seem to be insisting that I conform my behavior to their mores and ideals. For quite some time I have had it up to here *holds hand above his head* with people telling me that I can only perform completely legal acts if I do it their way which includes not doing it where they can see it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtfCRaNg5EU

stay safe.

The '68 GCA was passed in large measure in response to minorities marching en masse with loaded long guns through the streets of major cities like San Francisco (OMG gun control has racist undertones? Say it isn't so! /s). So, if they had been more circumspect in how they carried and appeared more like a troop of boy scouts on parade than an armed mob where would gun control politics have headed and would we still have ended up with a '72 GCA or a Carter's GCA? Or would we have mostly dodged that bullet entirely with the gun control movement never really gaining national prominence but instead remaining just an urban blue state hypocrite culture?

I think the history of gun control, of feral, bored moms' demanding action (well I demand a sammich so why aren't you in the kitchen kvetching about this) and lots and lots of astroturfing (Bloomberg and Soros in particular of late) shows that public sentiment can shift quickly and lead to really bad constitutionally infringing laws that take decades to even begin to unravel and repeal. So where is the balance between exercising the individual right however you darn well please and considering your decorum while exercising it such that you are the 2A analog of the 1A exercise of friends and neighbors having a polite, if spirited, political disagreement rather than the homeless looking guy standing on a box down at the corner waving his arms and screaming about redemption or something.

It is an interesting question and a tension within the 2A movement it seems. I think many people, mindful of the history, are too afraid to upset the boat as it were leading to a new raft of restrictions. On the other hand, it wasn't wallflowers who clawed back our 2A rights over the 25 years.
 

solus

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here nc
Deep, et al., you might find this The Atlanta article quite interesting:

THE EIGHTH-GRADE STUDENTS gathering on the west lawn of the state capitol in Sacramento were planning to lunch on fried chicken with California’s new governor, Ronald Reagan, and then tour the granite building constructed a century earlier to resemble the nation’s Capitol. But the festivities were interrupted by the arrival of 30 young black men and women carrying .357 Magnums, 12-gauge shotguns, and .45-caliber pistols.

The 24 men and six women climbed the capitol steps, and one man, Bobby Seale, began to read from a prepared statement. “The American people in general and the black people in particular,” he announced, must take careful note of the racist California legislature aimed at keeping the black people disarmed and powerless Black people have begged, prayed, petitioned, demonstrated, and everything else to get the racist power structure of America to right the wrongs which have historically been perpetuated against black people The time has come for black people to arm themselves against this terror before it is too late.

Seale then turned to the others. “All right, brothers, come on. We’re going inside.” He opened the door, and the radicals walked straight into the state’s most important government building, loaded guns in hand.

Along with providing classes on black nationalism and socialism, Newton made sure recruits learned how to clean, handle, and shoot guns. Their instructors were sympathetic black veterans, recently home from Vietnam. For their “righteous revolutionary struggle,” the Panthers were trained, as well as armed, however indirectly, by the U.S. government.

Republicans in California eagerly supported increased gun control. Governor Reagan told reporters that afternoon that he saw “no reason why on the street today a citizen should be carrying loaded weapons.” He called guns a “ridiculous way to solve problems that have to be solved among people of good will.” In a later press conference, Reagan said he didn’t “know of any sportsman who leaves his home with a gun to go out into the field to hunt or for target shooting who carries that gun loaded.” The Mulford Act, he said, “would work no hardship on the honest citizen.”

A 1968 federal report blamed the unrest at least partly on the easy availability of guns. Because rioters used guns to keep law enforcement at bay, the report’s authors asserted that a recent spike in firearms sales and permit applications was “directly related to the actuality and prospect of civil disorders.” They drew “the firm conclusion that effective firearms controls are an essential contribution to domestic peace and tranquility.”

INDISPUTABLY, FOR MUCH of American history, gun-control measures, like many other laws, were used to oppress African Americans.

www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/09/the-secret-history-of-guns/308608/

it is quite an interesting essay...

ipse
 
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FreeInAZ

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Whenever the phrase gunCONTROL is used, that is how it should be read IMHO. The easiest people to control? Ones that are disarmed!

Simple really. Want to oppress people, disarm them. Want a free society? Make sure ALL rights are backed up by the ability to defend them, should it come down to that last resort.

IMHO / this is why today, we have a group of plutocrats pushing hard to disarm the "little people", once accomplished, they will no longer need to trifle with rights, laws, etc, etc...

They will be the lords of all "common men", as they know better than the simple folk.

Same story though out history, we just refuse to learn it, in many cases.

In short - "it's good to be the King!"
http://youtu.be/sztf4hcGrB4
 
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utbagpiper

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Utah
Wish you had read a bit more. Much of the open carry mentioned/referred to was the OC of long guns. That automatically takes it out of the realm of the stated purposes of OCDO.

Which means it would be against the rules to much discuss here anyone. So no major loss, right. :)

What about Blacks, or Native Americans? Given the social response to the mere presence of them by some parts of the population, should they eschew OC because of how "the public" might perceive their behavior as indecorous? What about anybody perceived to be Middle Eastern?

A right unexercised is a right lost. Right?

Clearly, in this nation a man's rights (no longer) depend on his race.

That said, a young man, a black man, or a man dressed in middle eastern garb might get a different reception than a middle-aged, fat, balding white guy, or a woman who uses a wheelchair.

I disagree with your assertion that it "behoove us to consider our decorum while OCing" primarily because it is not how we believe we are behaving but how the public sees us as behaving.


I understand the frustration with being told what to do and how to do it. I feel much the same way about a lot of non-RKBA stuff.

But I'm going to disagree with you a bit.

On the one hand, IFF our goal is to promote increased social and legal acceptance of RKBA through our daily actions, we have to give some thought to what current norms are.

To look to another minority that was--until recently--rather unpopular, consider on how the homosexual community has advanced their message. We don't have the popular media support they did. But notice how rare it is in media portrayals--whether news or mainstream entertainment--to see two men engaged in overly sexual conduct. Rather, the image is usually of two women, most often women who are likely to be attractive to heterosexual men. I won't recount the decades long progression from homosexuals being hated and scorned and thought to suffer from mental illness to be cured, to pitied, to laughed at, to now generally accepted. But a recollection of the media portrayals you've seen over the years (from "Soap" to "Will & Grace" to "Gray's Anatomy") should reveal a progression in the images you saw, an ever constant, but subtle pushing of boundaries. Ellen Degeneris got a little ahead of the curve and derailed her career for a season, while possibly also advancing the cause a bit in the process.

Obviously, the homosexual community is not monolithic, and many individuals disagreed with the strategy that played out in the popular media. But it was an active strategy by those who took the time to think of what strategy would most likely work. And it has certainly worked in spades.

The RKBA community isn't likely to enjoy mass media support anytime soon, and we are not starting in the same place, so we can't match that strategy exactly. But there are lessons we can learn.

One lesson is that public perception does matter. Pushing the envelope of social norms a bit is well proven. But to do that, we have to know what the existing envelope is both nationally and in lots of various locations.

On the flip side, we are exercising our rights and we don't let a few extremists on the other side dictate what we can do. We are, however, looking to the great middle, to that mythical "reasonable man."

Our conduct and comportment also matter should it come to individual legal difficulties. We and (honest) witnesses can state objective facts that determine whether our conduct was reasonable, or whether it was inciting or alarming. Were we handling guns, or referring to them? Were we loud, boisterous, or threatening? Or were using profanities or vulgarities? Were we intruding into others' personal space or were we maintaining respectful distances when possible? Were we drinking alcohol or refraining? If smoking, did we litter our butts or dispose of them properly? Was our dress within the broad ranges of what would be considered normal for the event, location, or occasion? Were we argumentative or were quick to de-escalate? Were we short tempered or patient?

I'm not saying we have to dress up and quietly say "yes sir, no maam" if we are going to carry. But comportment and conduct are matters that will affect how reasonable men and women perceive us and our RKBA.

We are unlikely to ever win the hearts and minds of the true believer gun haters. And the true believer gun lover isn't much concern either. It is the great middle we aim to influence by OCing if/when we OC for the purposes of OCDO.

Of course, a man might carry without any concern for how his conduct affects the image of the larger RKBA community. And that is his right. So, I don't think there is much to discuss there.

Charles
 

solus

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piper, when was last time you were in a group at a party enjoying the company of like minded individuals and have the police storm in and begin to harass, push around, (read as abusing their power) and beating those who, under the influence of frustration generated testosterone, push back at the unwarranted intrusion. this occurs regularly, on a weekly basis. your friends are arrested, careers are ruined, and so forth every week by the nice abusive police.

finally, you and your friends decide enough is enough rebel and in 1969 decide to push back against the police and force the issue in an ensuing riot...the event, known as the stonewall riots is a pivotal point in the GLBT crusade almost 45 years ago.

what followed has been severely chastised by main stream str8s with the initiation of campaigns called Pride parades, slowly building steam from modest means in singular cities to events around the world all geared to point out the inadequacies within the GLBT community, from medical care to recent partner equality. yes, in time the parades morphed to the extreme GLBT factions pushing the envelopes (I liken them to the LGOC crowd who are only pushing to get their 15 minutes of fame).

you whine about such mundane things on this forum:
1. be infected with HIV, your life line costs 2.5 ~ 3.0K a month for your med(s), how do you pay?
2. you are not allowed to leave the country or if you do you're not allowed back in.
3. you have your life long partner of 30 years dying of non HIV type cancer and as you are overseeing their medical care per their wishes, your partner's parents walk in and say their child is not going out w/o the best medical care your insurance can buy. doesn't matter your partner signed a MOA giving you decision making authority to let them pass in dignity. unfortunately, you have no legal standing as you are in a same sex relationship and the parents are kin...

this minority in our worldwide society has succeeded against all odds against religious, str8s, and a whole gaggle of other zealots which make the Bloomberg, nra's ila, and other antis, crowd look like a church choirs.

steady, forward, concentrated nationally directed campaign(s) pushed and overcame all adversity to succeed in reaching their goals and the funny thing is, this group didn't have a dedicated amendment to assist.:
(side bar: GCA when down when?

to those who ask my point...this minority comprised of GLBT activists have succeeded with a viable national campaign fighting for equality while the 2A crowd's egos haven't seen the benefit of joining forces across this nation, as proven by each Texas entity deciding which way to go in the state which turned into a complete fiasco.

ipse
 
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