Here's the question at the root of the present dispute: "Have the actions of some individuals participating in Open Carry Texas rallies damaged the cause of gun rights?" (I know some people are asking a rather different question, which is "Have the actions of Open Carry Texas damaged the cause of gun rights?") It would appear that Bladed is arguing that the answer is "yes" and that StealthyEliminator is saying "no."
Let me ask the both of you a hypothetical:
What (hypothetical) event would convince you that you are wrong?
I can guess what would convince Bladed: the bill actually passing. If something short of that would convince you, sir, please chime in.
Stealthy Eliminator has stated right here that even if open carry goes down in flames this year, he won't believe that the long rifle demonstrations hurt the cause. Well, given the way the legislature is structured, that's valid. But what hypothetical event would it take to convince you, sir? Perhaps enough otherwise pro-gun legislators saying "this issue is now poison thanks to those clowns?" Would that do it, or would you then take the easy way out (easier than questioning one's own beliefs) and just decide that they're really not pro 2A and just looking for the excuse they need to stab us in the back? Maybe you wouldn't, since you seem to be one of the more rational people here, but I wouldn't put that sort of "reasoning" beyond some of the others. On the other hand, you've already declared some of the pro-gun lobbies to not really be pro-gun, because they are saying similar things. That may or may not be valid depending on their history but that in itself is dicey, you can't even get "people of the gun" to agree about whether the NRA is truly pro-gun, and the NRA has a much more visible past record people can point to to support their arguments.
We should all ask ourselves this question. And if the answer is that there's nothing at all that could happen that would convince you that you are wrong, you are not being objective about the issue. (And no, I am not talking about the question of principle, the "right"ness of open carry, here, I am talking about the narrower question of fact, whether some of the actions of some of the individuals in OCT have damaged the cause of gun rights.)
I've seen the sort of behavior Bladed is alluding to, before. I was on a forum once that was packed full of Ron Paul fans (this was in 2008, not 2012, BTW). These people were so busy talking amongst themselves they couldn't imagine him not winning the primaries; everyone they knew was in favor of him. When he started losing--as anyone outside their group could have predicted--the accusations of vote stealing started flying. Now that was an echo chamber much like Bladed is trying to describe. Okay, so that's a bunch of dufuses on a small internet forum. But it can happen elsewhere. One other case of this is the liberal journalists in 1968 who simply could not believe Nixon had won the election because they knew no one who had supported him. (I guess they didn't even interview a good cross section of people as part of their fricking jobs, either.)
Everyone here is for Open Carry and most have no issue with that moment of behavior, captured forever by camera, by those two people in Chipotle. But this board is not a representative cross section of society, not even in Texas, and certainly not the corporate boardrooms where "please don't bring your guns here" statements are emanating from. What would such a representative cross section say? I don't know. I am pretty sure the answer would be different in DC than it is in Texas, but I could well imagine a significant number of Texans thinking "those OC whack jobs..." based on the photos that have gotten a lot of hostile publicity.
Bladed's accusations of living in an echo chamber may or may not be true, but (and I am addressing everyone here, including people who are on Bladed's side of this question) you'd be an utter fool not to step back for a moment and really consider whether or not you are doing that to yourself. And not to be satisfied with the first easy answer you get. Talk to people you have never spoken to about this issue, in venues that aren't clearly "gun oriented" as well as those that are. Because if your evidence consists of all the people you are seeing on line in the open carry community, or at OCT rallies, you haven't really answered the question.