Wow. Lots of passion on this one. Wonder if a guy can comment without getting flamed like a few pounds of Kingsford Mesquite Charcoal Briquettes. I bet I can, most of the folks on this board are pretty decent. I'll warn you, this is a long post. But it is a considerably deep subject and worth exploring in detail, because on both sides, the consequences are not meager or trivial to the Texans it will affect.
First off, no I'm not from 'Kalifornia' and yes, I am a native Texas who is a hardcore Reagan conservative. I used to yell at Rush on the radio for being too soft when explaining his points. I am lifetime member of the 'Enraged to the Point of Bulging-Eyeballs RINO Hater's Club' and would shoot Rick Perry, Joe Straus and John Cornyn to the moon in half a yoctosecond if I got the chance. I believe strongly in the 2nd Amendment and have been an NRA Member longer than most hipsters have been alive. So this is not coming from some squishy do-gooder. Having said that....
Nope. I simply don't think open carry is a very good idea. From a tactical standpoint, it accomplishes nothing excepts telegraphs that there is now a loaded firearm in every situation, conversation and confrontation, and those who would seek to depart that machinery from you now have a greater motivation to do so than before - it's hanging right in front of their eyes.
I don't believe open carry will deter or minimize any crime, especially violent crime against persons, because of any 'immanent threat' to criminals that a holstered weapon might present. In fact, I think it's the opposite. Instead of being a potential target of violent crime by persons who don't care if you live or die, you've just given them a certifiable reason why you SHOULD be attacked - their fully loaded, semi-auto motivation is in plain view. Spending 20 years in police work, I can tell you crooks, thugs and gang bangers don't think the way you think they do...it won't scare them away. It will attract them. That gun on you is an easy $200 street sale an hour from now, or a tool to rob someone else that can be tossed in a dumpster easy, 'cause it cost them nothing.
But aside from any tactical reason against it, I believe there are far more important political reasons why it's not a good idea, much longer ranging reasons with a stable of 'unintended consequences' attached to it. Frankly, I think it will set the Gun Rights Movement back decades. It is political powder keg waiting to blow up in our faces the first time it goes badly wrong, and statistically speaking, it will sooner or later.
Intelligent, mature students of our Republic understand that every Freedom has a boundary - limitless freedoms with no thought regarding those we share our communities with is called Anarchy. While I agree that under the recent administration, there are assaults on them to a fascist degree, historically we have had sensible limits to speech, religion and possessions. They are rules we agree to create a civilized society, and do we want to really throw those away to get something that really doesn't offer any real benefit?
Yes the 2nd Amendment does guarantee the right to bear arms, but it doesn't say 'openly and in plain view.' We on the right scream at the left all the time for Judicial Activism, for reading into the Constitution, accusing them of manipulating it to fit their needs. For example, there is no 'Right To Abortion' in it, but lefties staunchly argue it's in there somewhere. There is no 'Separation of Church and State' in the Bill of Rights or anywhere else in the Constitution, it doesn't exist; but we get red faced angry when the Loony Left says it exists when it most certainly and clearly does not.
Now, aren't we doing the same thing here? Let's read it again:
"A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."
Where does that say openly, in a mall or movie theater, or a crowded business? Or school? It doesn't. Let's not use the tactics of liberals here. No one is taking away our right to bear arms on our person...it's still there, WE STILL HAVE THE RIGHT TO CARRY, only we are carrying those guns, sensibly, concealed and out of sight. That protects us more than anyone, and not being able to display them like we're extras in a John Ford movie is NOT an infringement of a right. It a limit on a freedom, that is a totally different legal argument.
Let's not fall into the trap the left uses, saying that if we don't get EVERYTHING we demand RIGHT NOW then we're somehow getting our rights stomped, being marginalized and those that don't agree are 'evil' and 'the enemy.' That only drives away folks from our real argument, that people have a right to own and use firearms.
Again, there are natural, sensible limits to EVERY freedom. You can't set a tire fire in your front yard and let the smoke blow over into your neighbors house, it's offensive and caustic and they'd be right to complain. Young hoodies can't blare rap music at 3am waking up the whole neighborhood, it's disturbing and unsettling. You can't practice a religion that throws puppies into volcanoes, you can't go into a theater and scream the F-bomb for 2 hours during a film, you can't practice 'self love' in the park during lunch hour.
These are reasonable limits that were put into place by our communities, which includes us, because we and our neighbors, even our gun neutral, non-pistol owning neighbors, have a right not be scared poopless or made 'freak out'-level uncomfortable for no reason. There are lines we agree to not cross because of mutual respect and for reasons of civility.
Sure, we might get the right to walk into a Tex-Mex restaurant with a strapped on .40 S&W, and thereby scaring half the patrons. But why do it to them? Aren't we trying to convince the undecided that WE are right? That what we do is also for their protection, and their rights too? How are we convincing them to join us if we cause them to blow a 30cc bladder dump in Chipotle when we walk in with an El Paso Saddlery rig hugging up a nickel plated Colt Python? Or a huge Glock 21 that, for all they know, might reach out and bite them?
Especially when we can carry the EXACT same gun in the EXACT same business, having the EXACT same freedom of self defense, and they never know it, don't wig out and no scene is caused? How did we improve the situation by carrying in open mode?
One simple untucked shirt is worth ten of millions of dollars of PR work by the NRA that they won't have to spend trying to defend an action that majority of the public we live with simply will not understand; is this really about trying to win folks over, or just getting to wear a gun in public for all to see?
In the end all that open carry is going to do is provoke the vast majority of folks neutral on guns into being frightened away from our side. They can't and won't understand why a Concealed Handgun License isn't enough. If the purpose of carrying is to protect yourself, how is doing that improved by scaring those around you that know nothing about guns? How is your carry right diminished by making yourself a walking, talking spectacle of weaponry? The fight for the 2nd Amendment should be more important to us than the desire to walk around with a customized 1911-A1 for all to see. We need to think broader here, about how our actions can affect that far more important fight.
Open Carry seems to be the gun-politics equivalent of a group of evangelical Christians trying to spread the Gospel by walking to a Starbucks and slamming a Bible down on the table of other customers and announcing "YOU ARE GOING TO HELL AND BURN IF YOU DON'T LISTEN" – saying "to the devil" with those who might be frightened away by our actions, just so we can open carry, will boomerang on us politically without question. It is the very image of a divisive act when one is not needed – no one is taking your right to carry away, you can still have a CHL.
If we really care about our message ultimately getting through, we should be careful about how we deliver it. What is most important to us, here? Just getting our way in the short, or furthering our 2nd Amendment 'gospel' by getting more folks to join the NRA and understand our point of view?
Someone said, 'It's a choice.' Well, so is farting loudly in a crowded elevator - you can, but it's rude, obnoxious and drives people away from listening to you. It may sound crude, but open carry is going to accomplish the same goal. We already have CHL laws, and they’re great, I'm glad we have them. So, do we really want to risk undoing the last 20+ years of goodwill accomplished by discreet, polite carry by wearing guns in such a fashion as to repel or scare those who could be potential future allies or brothers and sisters in the NRA?
It isn't always about getting what we want personally. It isn't always about winning or defeating those who disagree. Demanding something simply because we can and screaming down anyone who disagrees until we get what we want is EXACTLY what the left does.
How do normal, mainstream folk look at groups like Code Pink, Acorn, MoveOn.org or NARAL when they march and demand their way? They look at them like scary extremists. Do we want to get painted in the light? We will. Remember those guys that carried rifles into a coffee shop a few years ago? How many folks did they convert? How many people said "Oh I see, yeah I get it now. I'll join the NRA and buy a .45 because those guys just made that barista and his customers do a Hershey quirt in their BVD's. Yeah, that makes sense, I wanna be a part of that."
Now I know that 99.9% of the folks who will open carry are certainly NOT extremists, but are most likely patriotic, God fearing Texans who simply want to exercise a right. Ok. But in today's climate, with the media using instant info sharing to spread extreme bias and twist the truth more than a Twizzler, should we risk losing any high ground by being painted as extreme nutso batcrap crazy gunslinging wannabe's? Do we want to set ourselves up like that? We will be. I remember how the media in Texas roasted everyone who wanted a college campus carry bill for teachers, in the wake of the Virginia Tech shootings. They went crazy, and THAT bill made sense, and it lost the popular opinion of Texans everywhere after the media got done with it. Again, that was a GOOD idea. Just imagine how they’ll paint ALL gun owners after folks start carrying openly. What good can come of it?
See, right now the political landscape regarding CHL’s is cool and calm, mostly I think because the media can’t see the hundreds of thousands of guns that are carried every day in Texas. That invisibility is a huge asset and a thin shield, as thin as a shirt or windbreaker, but it might as well be the Iron Curtain because what they don’t see they don’t scream about regularly. Its outta sight and outta mind; they have no real world context of how many folks carry in Texas. The numbers are there, but without the visual confirmation of the reality of a loaded pistol before their eyes, they are simply clueless.
And they are an enemy that is far better off to us when clueless. But open carry will arm them with something we can never take back...a million pictures of "right wing thugs playing Clint Eastwood, just waiting for a chance to kill"; of course you and I know that’s garbage and BS, not true at all. But those are images we can't take back after they’re fashioned into ammo against our cause. Right now, that media narrative won’t play; it's bogus because they don't have the visual fuel to twist it into a story. But when open carry guns rigs start popping up like popcorn, they WILL have the images to misrepresent us at every possible step.
And woe to the first person who draws and fires from an open rig and kills someone, particularly if it’s a ‘on the bubble shoot’ – there will be a media feeding frenzy that will be twisted into a hell fairly close to that which George Zimmerman is still living through. Sure they were wrong about 'gunfights in the streets' with CHL... but the hidden, unseen gun made that argument quickly fade when it didn't happen. But the open gun will always BE there in plain sight, and to the majority of uninformed Texans, the shocking reminder that a gunfight "is right there, waiting to happen!" (as the media will certainly play it) won’t go away. It will be the boogeyman they use to scare neutral folks away from our side.
There are other everyday consequences, too. Businesses will be scared off in bigger numbers than ever before about letting in gun toters. In Texas, any business can opt of letting CHL holders in their store by putting a sign from Texas Penal Code Section 30.06 that says, in essence, don’t bring your CHL in here. And you can’t by law, period. Open Carry will provoke more and more businesses into getting spooked by now-visible guns and that same law which is used to ban CHL holders will be used to ban open carry, and they will go up everywhere.
Think about it, Texas CHL holders. Stores, restaurants, business that let you carry NOW, because they can’t see your piece and are ok with it as long as it’s invisible, will make a decisive choice to ban ALL guns with PC 30.06 once we start open carrying. Get used to having to leave your gun in your car EVERYWHERE, because that’s coming, along with more vehicle burglaries from crooks smart enough to know that there are more and more guns being left in cars parked in front of PC 30.06 opt-out businesses.
Not to mention more cities or counties getting complaint after complaint from spooked citizens and reacting by passing ordinances to prohibit open carry in the end anyway. I hate government like I hate cancer, and believe 90% of politicians are maggots, but when people complain in numbers to elected officials that they’re ‘scared’, government maggots act fast and their reaction is always the same…ban something. Open Carry is only setting us up for fights we don’t need.
And think of your civil liability and responsibility, how open carry may change that. Right now, in the Texas CHL classes they stress that a CHL holder is absolutely NOT bound to respond to any threat or dangerous situation. They are NOT to get involved if they don't want to, and can walk away - that CHL is designed to defend your self and you are NOT a public protector. Ok, but now with Open Carry, say you're carrying while refueling at your local Stop n' Rob, which gets hit while you’re at the pumps. The bad guy shoots a clerk and runs off. Witnesses SEE you with a gun. "Why didn't you get involved sir? Why didn't you help my client? You had a gun, you could have intervened. You're lack of willingness to step in caused my client's wife to die." Or what if the bad guy was just running off after robbing it, sees your gun and thinks you’re the police, THEN starts shooting and someone dies. Then in court it will be “Sir, the presence of your gun caused my client to be paralyzed. If you had left your gun in the car sir, can’t you say honestly that that would not have happened?” In a civil trial, you wanna risk your entire financial life in front of jury that only needs 51% convincing in their mind that you were in the wrong? Is that really worth the risk just to be able to show off your handgun?
And if you DON'T get involved at every confrontation, open carry will brand you as a coward possibly making you civilly liable if you choose NOT to act, and when you do act, it can easily brand you as a cowboy Wyatt Earp wannabe. You can't win here easily, especially in civil court- damned if you do, damned if you don’t. But with a simple untucked shirt and your CHL, you can remain invisible and tactically protect yourself and your loved ones unless you absolutely HAVE to get involved, no one will no you're armed unless you do get involved - no unintended escalation, and you can probably walk away.
Open Carry will force most every issue greatly, escalating situations needlessly because now everyone, including the baddie, will SEE a gun on your hip and that WILL change the situation dramatically. And not for the better; he will most likely think you're a cop. Do you really want to walk around having to keep up the same level of mental and situational awareness that a uniformed officer has to ALL DAY LONG expecting a gun fight at every turn, waiting for that slime bag that will inevitably try to take you out simply because you have a gun on? You don’t, trust me. It gets tiresome.
Goblins won't know open carry armed citizens from non-uniformed police, like detectives. They will assume the worst, as all humans do, that their luck is crappy and a cop just walked in on them. And you get to deal with that. Yippee. Do you really want to walk into a theater/gas station/book store/whatever and stumble into a robbery, theft or mugging with the bad guy suddenly believing he sees a cop (you)? I'll bet a million bucks that in that frikkin' Hell of a pucker factor moment, that open carry guru will be wishing to All Sweet Heaven and Mothers on Earth he had chosen to be a CONCEALED handgun carrier instead. When things go south badly, really badly, they do it in single digit seconds.
With a CHL you have more potential to stay unseen and potentially walk away. But open carry can cost you a personal attack, shots fired around you that can hit you, your family nearby or innocent citizens, a civil trial and financial ruin or maybe even a grand jury indictment for getting/not getting involved because witnesses say YOU with a gun and you can’t deny it.
And for what? What does it REALLY accomplish? In real world terms? Really, seriously? What improvement, benefit or enhancement does Open Carry vs. CHL carry really get you? Besides "It's my right and I want to" how does it really benefit the pro-gun argument? How does it improve your ability to defend yourself? How does it present the 2nd Amendment crowd and gun owners as safe, reasonable, decent normal folk like everyone else, living with everyone else and being no different than anyone else except for owning/carrying a gun?
We will be making a target of ourselves that only serves to hurt our own cause in the long run by providing a picture perfect image fit to be twisted all to Hell by those on the left and in the media who are always on the hunt to shred the truth concerning gun owners already. We are loading their ‘gun’ for them for reasons that cannot in anyway provide significant enrichment to our own gun rights cause or our right to self defense.
It is a miniscule achievement in the face of potentially drastic negatives that cannot be recovered from.
Yes I know farmers, ranchers and other rural guys would like to carry on their property or in the field and not worry about the local police when they go into town. Ok, fair enough. Here’s a compromise (and and one I really don't even like) - only allow it in rural areas and in cities with less than 50K population, make it essentially a 'rural bill'. Yes, I know that means no open carry in the larger cities in Texas, but the vast majority of Texas is rural anyway, and that means 85% would be OK to open carry.
If someone wants to open carry in Mineola, Alpine, Crockett, Zephyr or Shamrock, okay I can live with that. But do we REALLY, REALLY need to open carry in downtown Houston, Dallas, Ft Worth, San Antonio or Austin? Is walking around the Riverwalk, Kemah, Zilker Park, the West End or Fossil Rim Wildlife Center with a S&W .357 Magnum on our hip gleaming in the noonday sun really, really necessary to our personal defense or Constitutional rights? Especially when we can do it legally and more safely anyway, with a CHL?
Do we really need to make ourselves targets in the most crime-present cities of the state, as well as making ourselves a target for the leftist media that dominates those cities? What are we really gaining here?
CHL has been a resounding success in Texas, in no small part because those that don't have a CHL, don’t carry at all and may not even own guns are pretty much OK with it. They’re basically on our side by not joining the other side. To them, a hidden gun means discreet, polite and reasonable, they don’t see it, they don’t care. But a big, fat Colt .45 hanging in front of their faces in plain view will be taken as aggressive, threatening and extreme. Advocates of the 2nd Amendment and personal liberty do not need the hassle of being unnecessarily categorized in that manner, particularly when the rewards for carrying openly are infinitesimally small.
It ultimately means risking being a large tactical and political target for the return of virtually nothing except "because I can", causing potentially irreparable damage in the long run.
Just one old Irishman’s opinion…
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