Open carry Texas

[boomerang]

If you've read my comments on Americans' right to own firearms, you know I'm a believer in second amendment rights.

But--this is downright frigging CRAZY.

Open Carry Texas - Gun Rights For Texas

Should we check our air and water for strange toxins here? Too many cell towers? Tainted discount beer?

I believe our new governor, Mr. Abbot, has gone on record as in favor of open carry for Texas.

Nuts nuts nuts.....

 

[Charlie Prime]

What is crazy about it?

 

[Burnt State]

What's fascinating about America is its ability to occupy multiple time periods at once. Here we see Texas returning to the wild, wild west where we can meet each other in the bar with our guns on our hips and if we don't like someone's look or sneer we can call them out onto the street and have a good ole fashioned man to man gunfight to settle things.

What's really bizarre is that the images on the website remind me the most of not law abiding citizens who want to keep their society safe, but it looks a lot more like a jihadist training camp with people merrily waving guns around in the air, like somehow that's a safe way to be. This is something that needs some analysis if you ask me. Lots of guns do not promote safety, only fear. I wonder if Texans are jealous that they don't get to celebrate things by firing bullets up into the air to express their joy? Just surreal.

 

[boomerang]

What is crazy about it?

Oh, I dunno...making America look a little more like Afghanistan for starters.

Let's say you are rear-ended at an intersection by someone who turns out to be proudly packing heat. Will you conduct yourself any differently? More importantly, will the weapons carrier conduct themselves any differently? Would asserting yourself in an appropriate fashion in confrontation with someone brandishing a weapon put you at a real or perceived disadvantage? I recall an off duty conversation with a police officer about people's behavior from the cop's point of view. "Just start to reach back in the area of your gun if things get loud and it's amazing how fast they can get quiet." There's a reason why only commissioned police are allowed to openly wear firearms.

The potential for social miscarriage in the form of mistakes, misunderstandings and just downright bullying should be obvious. This is not exercise of the second amendment. It is abuse of it. This would have been considered over the top even in the wilder west days of my youth.

Open carry is the kind of crazy crap that winds up with our losing precious rights.

 

[Erno86]

It's not much different than concealed carry, though I support either one --- since I live in the state of Maryland --- which severely restricts the right to carry, and passed Senate Bill #281 last year; which is one of the toughest anti-gun laws in the nation.

 

[Charlie Prime]

The potential for social miscarriage in the form of mistakes, misunderstandings and just downright bullying should be obvious.

It's not obvious. I remember your same emotion-based arguments being asserted back in the 1990s when Concealed Carry was proposed. They were wrong.

It is a simple fact that when people have better means of self-defense, crime is reduced.

I realize you have been brain-washed to worship top-down authority and always to seek child-like relinquishment of responsibility, but you can overcome that if you try.

 

[Burnt State]

Actually the more guns in a country the higher rates of firearm crime and death. You can research study after study and in developing nations the US leads the pack in firearm ownership and firearm crime, specifically homicide. If anything, more guns just means more dead kids in America. 1/5 gun crimes involve youth. Packing weapons and owning weapons will only increase your death rate. All the NRA offers is propaganda like lower crime rates, big deal, so less small cimes but more murders? That certainly sounds like a sane reason to increase gun possession and gun displays.

Youth and firearms in Canada | Position statements and practice points | Canadian Paediatric Society

Higher Rates of Gun Ownership Don't Correlate to Less Crime | Motherboard

High gun ownership makes countries less safe, US study finds | World news | The Guardian

 

[boomerang]

There's a qualitative difference in carrying a weapon out of public view as opposed to toting one around on public display. The first is strictly personal unless drawn for use. The second is, unavoidably, a personal statement.

Concealed carry seems to be a success and I have little problem with it. Call me old fashioned, but I was "brainwashed" as a child that the proper and polite thing to do with firearms, when finished hunting or target practicing, was to clear the chambers and stash them away.

 

[Charlie Prime]

Concealed carry seems to be a success and I have little problem with it. Call me old fashioned,

I understand. I don't open carry when I visit a state where it's legal, precisely because it seems pretentious to me. I did it once in New Mexico a few years ago just for the novelty. I admit, I felt silly walking around like that.

A few months ago I saw an enormously fat guy in Phoenix standing in line at a bank with a HUGE Glock strapped to his hip. He was also wearing short-shorts, and sandals WITH SOCKS. I wish had taken a photo.

Texas outlaws open-carry because of racism. Back when I was young it was legal to carry a pistol only when "traveling". Traveling was not defined. If an old white guy got caught with a gun in his car on the way to the golf course, the local judge (probably a fellow Mason) would rule he was traveling. If a young black guy had a gun in his car on his way from Houston to Oklahoma City, he was not traveling, and would go to jail. Our knife carry laws are the same way.

A big benefit of removing gun restrictions is that it reduces opportunities for police to jack people up and rob them with fines and probation. Carry if you want. Don't if you don't. That's how it should be.

 

[Charlie Prime]

Actually the more guns in a country the higher rates of firearm crime and death.

In my country it is a simple fact that when people have better means of self-defense, crime is reduced.

 

[Burnt State]

Yes, the stats say less crime but more deaths. That's what comes with guns -more deaths. That's a simple fact too.

 

[Charlie Prime]

Most of the firearm deaths are criminals killing each other, or people who chose to end their lives with a gun, which is an inconsiderate thing to do. Making it more difficult for criminals to ply their trade is a good thing.

One of my best friends shot himself in the head a couple of years ago. He was considerate enough to go out in his back yard and sit in a lawn chair, but we still had to pick up pieces of his skull from the grass and clean up the gore.

I understand why he chose to end his life, but I'm still a bit angry that he did it without consulting me.

 

[Creepy Green Light]

I'll start by saying I have/have had a concealed carry license for Maine, Washington & Oregon. I owned one gun. I'd carry it with me everywhere I'd go. I was married & have two daughters. I can list 100 reasons to have a gun in the home, but this one scenario is all the justification I need; When my first daughter was born, she would lay in between me and my wife in bed upstairs. One night I paused the TV and asked my wife, "What could we realistically do right now if we heard the downstairs back sliding door shatter and then heard footsteps in the house?". The best I could come up with is to tell my wife to take the baby and hide in the closet while I look for my cell phone - which half the time I'd leave downstairs before bed. I was definitely not going to go out by laying in fetal position begging for my life or the lives of my family. At least with a firearm, we'd have a chance.

That being said; I find the people that parade around town with guns slung on their shoulder and/or at the hip just to PURPOSELY want someone to call 911 so that when the officer shows up that they can act like a wiseass, quasi attorney rattling off the 1st and 4th amendments are complete and total d-bags. I will say if I were ever at the park with my kids and saw some jackhole walking around the park with an AR-15 on his shoulder, I would be on edge. I'd get my daughter in the car, call 911 and leave. If these people think Im going to wave & smile to them as I'm pushing my daughter on the swings, they are dead wrong. NOBODY would just think "oh cool, this guy is excercising his rights." But yet they do it so that they can record the encounter between themselves and the officer and then post it to youtube. Because they think "Ha! I showed them I'm up on the law and I'm not afraid to exercise my rights." These people are morons and highly embarrassing. I would never do that for the sake of just doing it. In fact, they should not be surprised if in the previous scenario they get shot themselves. The person would be able to say "I saw this crazy looking guy with a rifle on his shoulder and another gun on his hip approaching us and I was scared for my family's lives. That's why I shot him."

I'm a gun owner and a concealed carry holder - and find the NRA highly embarrassing as well as 80% of their members. Just my opinion.