I fail to see how me going into restaurant to sit peacfully for a meal is antagonizing simply because someone else i know was asked to leave for doing the same thing already.
Sometimes you have to give people a little nudge for changes to be made, they dont just happen on there own and or overnight.
... and remember, open carriers are an economic force! educate the merchants to understand that where the OCer goes, his money goes.
Allow me to put this in it's proper perspective if you will.
The business owner, whether it be the owner of this restaurant, or The Buckhorn, or the executives at Starbucks have a great deal of power with respects to what open carry advocates do at their business. While Starbucks was not goaded into prohibiting lawful behavior at their coffee shops by the Brady Campaign, little 'Mom and Pop' locations will be much more easily influenced if they think that they will lose customers over it. Right now, alot of people are broke, including these 'Mom and Pop' businesses. Starbucks has more than 7,000 company run locations in the U.S. and there is
one Flapjack's Cafe. All it takes is a handful of complaints and it won't matter how many open carry advocates show up to 'nudge' them, they will not risk their income,...
their job... to take a stand on something they are not politically vested in.
Another thing that is not being taken into account, is that here in California, gunowers are a largely rural minority. Of all the gunowners in California, only a small percentage of them even support open carry and even fewer practice open carry with any frequency. Would you like hard numbers? There are only about 400 members from California registered here at OCDO. I would wager that fewer than 10% of those open carry on more than one occasion a month. Besides myself, I can count on my hands members that open carry with any frequency. This is not an overwhelming majority. Yes, we spend money and tip well. But this isn't enough to compel acceptance of open carry in every situation.
If a business owner asks you to leave, do it without making a scene or causing them any more grief. The OP did the right thing by trying to smooth things over and educating them about the law. But businesses should not be made a target of some ill-conceived effort to force them to accept your point of view in the same manner that the Brady Campaign has sought to with Starbucks and other businesses- we have more class than that.