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Once more, with feeling

I mentioned a bit back the NRA telling open rifle carriers in Texas that maybe slinging your AK on your back and heading to the local restaurant wasn’t a good idea. And, then, the admonishment disappeared from the website. Well, NRA has said it again and they mean it. And by mean it, I mean it’s still there instead of in the memory hole:

Recently, demonstrators have been showing up in various public places, including coffee shops and fast food restaurants, openly toting a variety of tactical long guns. Unlicensed open carry of handguns is legal in about half the U.S. states, and it is relatively common and uncontroversial in some places.

Yet while unlicensed open carry of long guns is also typically legal in most places, it is a rare sight to see someone sidle up next to you in line for lunch with a 7.62 rifle slung across his chest, much less a whole gaggle of folks descending on the same public venue with similar arms.

Let’s not mince words, not only is it rare, it’s downright weird and certainly not a practical way to go normally about your business while being prepared to defend yourself. To those who are not acquainted with the dubious practice of using public displays of firearms as a means to draw attention to oneself or one’s cause, it can be downright scary. It makes folks who might normally be perfectly open-minded about firearms feel uncomfortable and question the motives of pro-gun advocates.

Good for NRA for calling out these unhelpful asshats.

22 Responses to “Once more, with feeling”

  1. Walpurgis Says:

    I’m beginning to think that Open Carry Texas is a branch of Moms Demand Action.

  2. LKP Says:

    Leonard Embody has cousins!

  3. Patrick in Michigan Says:

    Very well put.

  4. Kevin Baker Says:

    NRA short form: Don’t scare white people.

  5. Mr Evilwrench Says:

    Agents provocateurs? I’d like to see us get some ID on these dumbasses and find out if there are any interesting connections.

  6. Geodkyt Says:

    remember who the guy is that started and heads up OCT.

    Yeah, he’s a Leonard Embody who is determined to “stick it to the man” with a loaded AR15.

  7. Geodkyt Says:

    Because “ego got bruised”.

  8. Bubblehead Les Says:

    Saw that the AP is spreading the NRA response, which means most of the MSM has the right to spread it around.

    Of course, they’ll twist, bend, fold,spindle and mutilate the response to fit their Anti-Freedom Agenda, but it looks like OCT is going to be up the creek w/o a paddle.

    Too Bad this will put a dent to allow OC in other states, though.

    So, bottom line, the effort to recognize the Right to Bear Arms outside the home has taken a setback due to a bunch of Idiots.

    Morons.

  9. Blackwing1 Says:

    I once walked into a convenience store with a bolt-action .30-06 slung over my shoulder.

    Nobody even looked at me twice, since the bolt was open, I was dressed head-to-toe in orange, and I ended up in line with a bunch of other guys who were waiting to register their deer. I hadn’t wanted to leave the rifle sitting in the open back of the jeep with the deer. The store was in the middle of nowhere northern Minnesnowta, and the clerk didn’t even bother to go look at the deer to make sure it had antlers, just processed my tag and said, “Next”.

    That’s about as “open-carry” as I’d ever care to get. Some things just depend on context.

  10. Jim Says:

    If the OC crew was truly serious about advancing the matter, they’d recruit a bunch of smokin’ hot babes to carry some real Tactical Barbie gear with ’em.

    Remember the posters with all the oooogly Democrat women, vs. all the hot Conservative ones?

    The OC “dateless wonders”, are the former, and they don’t cause people to either want to be with them, nor identify with ’em.

    Jim
    Sunk New Dawn
    Galveston, TX

  11. mikee Says:

    “We’re here, we hold rights dear, get used to it!”

    Or something similar.

    The “We’re Queer!” protesters, who disrupted Masses with their loud obnoxious antics, eventually won, despite being roundly decried in the press and by those whose decorum they upset, because they were correct – they should not be oppressed under law because of their sexual orientation.

    Despite the cries of the anti-gunners and the NRA, the open carry jerkwads are just as correct – they should not be oppressed under law because of their LEGAL behavior. Tell them to dress better, perhaps, but I won’t join the anti-rights crowd in saying that anyone offended by the sight of a gun gets to veto the right to carry it.

  12. Matthew Carberry Says:

    mikee,

    These idiots are using methods that have -no- rational relation to their stated goal in the minds of the public whose opinions they are trying to sway and whose support or neutrality they -must- have to achieve that goal.

    They are open carrying -rifles-, which, as the NRA and a bunch of us have pointed out, has -never- been “normal” for self-defense in urban areas in this country except in limited instances on the frontier.

    Further, they are choosing rifles that, right or wrong, carry the baggage and optics of “scary assault rifles.” By doing so they simultaneously cloud their message for people who aren’t offended -and- hand the anti’s and press (but I repeat myself) a way to distract from that message on a silver platter.

    Further, even if carrying long guns wasn’t an asinine tactic, they carry not in a casual way, with grandpa’s innocuous wood-stocked shotgun or deer rifle slung over their shoulder, but with loaded AR’s slung at the ready, like they are on patrol for tangos in the Galleria, which is horrible optics.

    The goal is -handgun- OC, their methods should be narrowly tailored to that objective with the best, clearest optics they can manage. Carry empty holsters or BP -pistols- to point out it is dumb that they can’t simply tuck in their shirts behind their currently CC’d pistols without worry. That should be their one and only message, they want a bit more convenience in doing what they -already- are doing: carrying -handguns- safely and responsibly and discretely.

    They already have the right to OC long guns (though the cases where that in urban areas will ever be appropriate are very rare), all they can do in that area is -lose- that right and take hopes of pistol OC down with it.

  13. SPQR Says:

    “…but I won’t join the anti-rights crowd in saying that anyone offended by the sight of a gun gets to veto the right to carry it.”

    Mikee, your comment shows that you are completely missing the point. Completely.

  14. mikee Says:

    I also missed the point when the gay protesters took their screaming campaign to places like Christmas Mass in St. Pat’s that had no rational connection to their protests for government action.

    So that makes me two for two, from your perspective.

    Perhaps, SPQR, I am making a point different from that which you are making. If it is legal but scary, it is still legal.

  15. Geodkyt Says:

    Mikee — most astute observers of the politics behind gay raights understand that the ACT-UP crowd actually put the gay rights agenda BEHIND.

    What advanced it was gays willing to come out of teh closet, and people going, “Hey, Bobby’s kid Jimmy is gay, and _he’s_ normal.”

  16. SPQR Says:

    mikee, indeed it is legal. If you thought you were “making” that point, it was made long before.

    Legal. And setting back the cause of expanding gun rights.

  17. Will Brown Says:

    the ACT-UP crowd actually put the gay rights agenda BEHIND. Which so neatly explains why ACT-UP basically owns San Francisco politics now – and thinks the rest of the country recognizing gays as “different, but normal” is a huge loss for gay rights.

    Which will work as a metaphor for what follows.

    As I understand things, OCT was started with the specific intention of influencing Texas politics toward legalizing open carry of handguns in the state, and deliberately chose to illustrate the logical consistency of that position by demonstrating the already legal public open carry of rifles and shotguns by Texans.

    Subsequently, it appears that at least some of the affiliate groups (specifically the one in Tarrant Co. – much of Dallas, essentially – and Austin) have been taken control of by individuals who deliberately conflate state political activism with federal 2A activism, and manage to consistently achieve a completely predictable mess of both as a result.

    Holding public rallies featuring citizens carrying their “long guns” in public in support of a desired state legislative change is (and has been) well received by most citizens in the state. Texas law prohibits the carrying of “modern” sidearms (defined in this case as being manufactured after 1899) on your body outside of a very few specific activities, but a sizable percentage of state citizens are licensed to carry them concealed. Making the point that the same people can carry all (Ok, a couple of :)) their guns at the same time, but some of them have to be kept out of plain sight, makes a legitimate political point.

    And, if that was the message actually being sent consistently, most gun owners in other states probably wouldn’t get too excited.

    By expanding the OCT effort to also challenge federal law regarding 2A exercise, the basic OCT message is obscured and activists from other states are understandably enough more than a little annoyed that their efforts on the national level are being inhibited by these people badly making an argument in support of a strictly state-level issue (no matter how many different states have a similar effort underway).

    The part I find most annoying is that, mostly as a result of college football rivalry, the Texas legislature will probably go ahead and vote to approve OC of handguns (probably only to those who have a CHL) next session, because Oklahoma just passed their version of OC earlier this year. Which means that these dillweeds in Dallas and Austin will no doubt be loudly claiming credit for how effective their efforts were and what A-holes the rest of us were, etc.

    At least I could go back to wearing T-shirts that fit next year (or the following, depending).

    I’ve tried to make the point about this before, but the OCTers involved have a well-practiced routine of arguing the other point whenever challenged and dismissing any naysayer as being anti-2A and so unworthy of offering criticism (and mostly won’t even acknowledge what I say anyway) (not that I’m anybody special). Fortunately, the out-session committee work is being largely done over the course of this week (6/2 thru 6/6), so much of the urgency these people are currently feeling will recede shortly.

    Hopefully OCT as a state-wide group will get a better grip on their group message discipline before next year’s legislative session. Also, anyone working in their own state (or on the federal level) can find plenty of lesson material for their efforts from all this – some of it even good (ask yourselves, how many of the other local Texas political demonstrations [using the same basic format] on this issue have you heard mention of?).

  18. JTC Says:

    mikee, since you have used the same non-sequitur (gay rights/gun rights) ad nauseum, let’s put it out of its misery with a little quiz.

    How do 90% of sheeple form their opinions on controversial issues?

    A.) Logic, Reason, Facts, Research, Discussion.
    or
    B.) Media, Celebrities, Facebook, Politicians

    Both gay and gun rights issues have solid support from A. But while gays have rabid support of B. to offset the in-your-face idjits you credit with altering public opinion, gunnies face rabid opposition from B. and have only their own effort and behavior to generate positive public support…which recent history proves to be very effective. That is in spite of the behaviors of some elements who are ostensibly on “our” side, and the OC clowns you champion are so negative to the cause that it causes many (see comments) to accuse them of being on the payroll of B.

    Dude, you are so wrong on this that I think you should take a refresher course in the elements of A.; there’s just no comparison in the issues of gays and guns.

  19. DocMerlin Says:

    “Subsequently, it appears that at least some of the affiliate groups (specifically the one in Tarrant Co. – much of Dallas, essentially – and Austin)”

    1) OC TARRANT is not part of OCT, they just share similar names.
    2) Austin over a hundred miles from Tarrant county. Dallas is not in Tarrant county, its in Dallas county.

    “By expanding the OCT effort to also challenge federal law regarding 2A exercise”
    – You are wrong, we don’t talk about federal law.

    “the basic OCT message is obscured and activists from other states are understandably enough more than a little annoyed that their efforts on the national level are being inhibited by these people badly making an argument in support of a strictly state-level issue (no matter how many different states have a similar effort underway).”

    – Very few states have a similar effort underway because its already legal almost everywhere.

  20. JTC Says:

    Looks like the Law of Zumbo is kicking in again:

    http://t.news.msn.com/us/pro-gun-group-rolls-back-open-carry-criticism

  21. mikee Says:

    I stand by my point that I will not do the work of the anti-gunners for them, by denouncing even a most likely misguided, but legal, form of protest.

    I’d rather shout at the anti-gunners that this kind of mess is what one gets when one infringes fundamental rights, and that the anti-gunners should stop doing so.

  22. JTC Says:

    The actual point is that these “misguided” protesters are the ones doing the anti’s work for them, far better and far cheaper than any Astro moms and mayors.

    Further, they are infringing the rights of private businesses, turning uninvolved and heretofore silent and passive third parties into active corporate anti’s.

Remember, I do this to entertain me, not you.

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