Warning from the IL State Rifle Assoc.
- Thread starter H Richard
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Jc,
Maybe you can tell me what I CLEARLY don't understand...
I said I am angry about this activity
I said that is happens in all big cities and Chicago is no different
I said that IL needs to get real with its gun laws and join the other states in the US
I said I am not going to let fear generated by a bunch of thugs keep me out of downtown
I said since concealed-carry is not currently an option, you have to do other things to lessen becoming a a vicitim
So the alternative is to just stay out of the city?? Really?
Maybe you can tell me what I CLEARLY don't understand...
I said I am angry about this activity
I said that is happens in all big cities and Chicago is no different
I said that IL needs to get real with its gun laws and join the other states in the US
I said I am not going to let fear generated by a bunch of thugs keep me out of downtown
I said since concealed-carry is not currently an option, you have to do other things to lessen becoming a a vicitim
So the alternative is to just stay out of the city?? Really?
JcMack
Member
Yes really. I was born in Chicago in 1947. My family lived in a middle income neighborhood until 1965, until thr neighborhood started to "change". A woman was accosted in front of my house by two men and the intent was to rape her. My father heard the noise, chased the two guys off with a ball bat, and led the terrified woman into the house. She told us (myself, my Mom, and Dad) she offered the offenders her purse and they told her "we want you"!! The police came, the woman's husband came, and after the story waas told the couple went home. After our guests left Mom told Dad "we are out of here". 2 months later we moved 50 miles into the suburbs.
For the last 40 years I've worked in Chicago and it's disgusting. I worked all over North, South, West, and far east as the lake. The crime is everywhere. There are little enclaves of younger people that like the city and live there because it's nightlife is so varied. Those people are now prayed upon because they don't understand everybody is not as nice as them.
Chicago is a black hole money pit. Chicago is the real problem with Illinois failing economy. The whole town is blacklisted for trade shows. If people would just stay the heck out of there and spend their entertainment money money in the safer suburbs maybe the point would be made and the city politicios would attempt to return the town to it's former glory.
Why do you love Chicago?
Why do I love Chicago? Too many reasons to list...sports, food, museaums, art, concerts, lakefront, and a lot more.
My dad's family lived on the west side, it too changed. Heck, my own suburb is changing (over tha past few years, an increase in home invasions, murder, robbery, assaults), but I am not staying locked in my house, and it is still a great place to live, shop, eat, walk around, etc. You have to have common sense and be careful. Take nothing for granted. Be aware.
I'm not sure that simply staying out of the city is going to solve anything. You can't live in fear, and not enough people will stay out to make a difference. Simply staying out of the city because it has changed sounds a lot like something a former Detroit mayor said about who should go where and who should stay out of parts of that city. Look where that idea got them.
I have lived my entire life in a state that does not allow concealed-carry. Thus, I have learned to make good choices (for the most part) about where to go and what to do and when to do it. Being able to carry isn't going to change that behavior; if anything it will make me more aware. I certainly am not going to go looking for trouble just because I might be able to carry some day. In the meantime, I will continue doing what I have done and know that while nothing is sure, I have gotten this far without any horrible consequences.
My dad's family lived on the west side, it too changed. Heck, my own suburb is changing (over tha past few years, an increase in home invasions, murder, robbery, assaults), but I am not staying locked in my house, and it is still a great place to live, shop, eat, walk around, etc. You have to have common sense and be careful. Take nothing for granted. Be aware.
I'm not sure that simply staying out of the city is going to solve anything. You can't live in fear, and not enough people will stay out to make a difference. Simply staying out of the city because it has changed sounds a lot like something a former Detroit mayor said about who should go where and who should stay out of parts of that city. Look where that idea got them.
I have lived my entire life in a state that does not allow concealed-carry. Thus, I have learned to make good choices (for the most part) about where to go and what to do and when to do it. Being able to carry isn't going to change that behavior; if anything it will make me more aware. I certainly am not going to go looking for trouble just because I might be able to carry some day. In the meantime, I will continue doing what I have done and know that while nothing is sure, I have gotten this far without any horrible consequences.
AS noted in my "Road Trip to Chicago!" thread in The Lounge, I will be in Chicagoland this afternoon.
Will be posting my observations...hopefully affirming why I, too, still love Chicago.
Be safe.
Will be posting my observations...hopefully affirming why I, too, still love Chicago.
Be safe.
Sebago Son
Member
Sudden Attack, Mass Aggression, Anonymous Perpetrators.
This tactic is called "Swarming".
Around here it's so far been limited to a sudden mobbing of convenience stores by 15-20 shoplifters who brazenly enter the store as a group, overwhelm the store's staff by their numbers, quickly seize items and depart just as suddenly, simultaneously leaving in several vehicles going in different directions. While these are not violent attacks, they do constitute a sever loss for the store's operator and in remote areas, there are few arrests.
Given the organized, premeditated nature of these events, I am often forced to wonder if they are a prestage, almost "training" for another type of attack.
I've added another magazine to my CCW ensamble...
This tactic is called "Swarming".
Around here it's so far been limited to a sudden mobbing of convenience stores by 15-20 shoplifters who brazenly enter the store as a group, overwhelm the store's staff by their numbers, quickly seize items and depart just as suddenly, simultaneously leaving in several vehicles going in different directions. While these are not violent attacks, they do constitute a sever loss for the store's operator and in remote areas, there are few arrests.
Given the organized, premeditated nature of these events, I am often forced to wonder if they are a prestage, almost "training" for another type of attack.
I've added another magazine to my CCW ensamble...
Do you remember the song American City Suite by Cashman and West?
mrerick
Member
Rule 1...
I'm a graduate of Massad Ayoob's "Lethal Force Institute".
Mas' rule #1 is "Don't go to the bad places..."
That tends to keep you out of trouble.
Now, it seems that the "bad places" are coming to randomly selected "good places"...
It's certain that the bad actors in these swarming events are bolstered by the confidence that the victims can't defend themselves.
I was raised in a town adjacent to Chicago. Just visited the area a week ago. Just into the city, I saw street scenes loaded with idle groups of young men hanging out together in the mid-day and up to no good. I left the areas quickly.
The graft and corruption that has become Illinois has a price. That now appears to be playing itself out in crime, gang violence and further economic destruction.
All the fine culture in the world cannot bring back a lost life or a wasted life.
It's unfortunate, but as long as you can't adequately and legally defend yourself in Chicago or Illinois, there is very little reason to visit there, and much less reason to try and live there.
Concealed Carry exists as much to protect all of society as to permit defense of the individual.
Marc
I'm a graduate of Massad Ayoob's "Lethal Force Institute".
Mas' rule #1 is "Don't go to the bad places..."
That tends to keep you out of trouble.
Now, it seems that the "bad places" are coming to randomly selected "good places"...
It's certain that the bad actors in these swarming events are bolstered by the confidence that the victims can't defend themselves.
I was raised in a town adjacent to Chicago. Just visited the area a week ago. Just into the city, I saw street scenes loaded with idle groups of young men hanging out together in the mid-day and up to no good. I left the areas quickly.
The graft and corruption that has become Illinois has a price. That now appears to be playing itself out in crime, gang violence and further economic destruction.
All the fine culture in the world cannot bring back a lost life or a wasted life.
It's unfortunate, but as long as you can't adequately and legally defend yourself in Chicago or Illinois, there is very little reason to visit there, and much less reason to try and live there.
Concealed Carry exists as much to protect all of society as to permit defense of the individual.
Marc
nawilson
US Veteran
Amen. If the good guys ever stop standing up and fighting for civilized society, then we are lost.
I like what Marc has to say about avoiding trouble. In fact, as a CC holder, you are even more obligated to avoid those situations. It's common sense even without CC. When I go into the city, I don't go outside of the lakefront, Streeterville, Michigan Ave, The Loop, The Gold Coast, or the areas around the museums. I have no problem driving directly to Soldier Field, McCormick Place, The Cell, or The United Center (I have no reason to visit Wrigley Field
). But I go directly there on expressways, main routes, and always use the big public parking areas. I have had no trouble taking the Metra train to and from the city and grabbing a taxi to/from where I need to be. I would never take the EL or the local trains.I don't put myself into those bad areas, and know that getting even 1 extra block too far away from McCormick, the UC, or the Cell can get you into trouble (it only takes once to drive through off the beaten path to learn that). But I don't go there.
So I guess that would qualify under Ayoob's rule. So when the "wilding" or "swarming" or "multiple offender incident" comes to the good areas, what are you to do? Avoid the good areas even though this behavior is not the norm? (And it's not the norm even though the media would have you believe it is. Fear sells papers.) Should I move out of my awesome, safe subrub because a few doors down there was a home invasion tied to a drug deal gone bad? And I live in an affluent western suburb. Or what about the next town over where a family was the victim of a home invasion (the teenaged daughter raped while the parents were tied up)? And that was in a upscale neighborhood too.
There are two issues underlying this back-and-forth about Chicago.
1) Concealed carry. My fellow Illinoisans, CC is coming -- I truly believe it. It's just not here yet. While it may make people feel safer, if you don't go into bad areas, the chances of ever getting into a fight are going to be small. I am not saying that it can never happen outside the bad areas. I am not disputing the fact that the Chicago politicians have made it nearly impossible to protect yourself inside the city limits. Not debating that at all. Something needs to be done to give that power back to its residents.
2) Chicago as a good or bad place. If you don't like it, please stay out, but don't give the impression that it is a horrible cess-pool that you are lucky to get out of alive every time you go in or that you need body armor in order to survive. Give me a break. Hang out on the west side, yeah you're obviously going to get into trouble. Walk on Michigan Ave., take a boat tour, and eat at Milennium Park before watching a concert and 99% of the time you will be just fine (just like the 99% of the time in my affluent neighborhood -- until news of a boyfriend gunning down his estranged girlfriend in her driveway hits the local papers).
Like Marc (and Ayoob) said, choose where you go carefully and most of the time you will be fine. And when you do go, be alert for that 1%.
Do people have a right to defend themselves? Absolutely!! But it all starts with common sense.
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