If it was a co-guest at a party hosted by someone else, I would quietly leave and call the host from my car to tell him/her why I left, and ask him/her if they wanted me to call the police. If it were someone who is a guest in MY home, I would ask them to leave (with my heart in my mouth the entire time.) Or possibly take another guest aside and ask them to go out to their car and call the police.
Pretty much the same here. Someone carrying guns in public just isn’t normal for me, and at a social event, it’s even less comfortable. Factor in the alcohol, and no thanks. I don’t know if I’d leave the party outright, but I would definitely avoid the gun-toting person. If they were being aggressive and potentially violent, I’d most likely leave. No sense in being at a party where I feel I have to constantly look over my shoulder, wondering when the shooting might start.
- Notify the host, as unobtrusively as possible.
- Leave.
If the party’s at a restaurant, I’d notify the shift manager.
If I’m the host, I’d let my wife know what’s up, and have her ready to call 911 in a heartbeat if there was any sign of objection or upset when I politely requested the person with the gun to take it off the premises and stow it securely in his car.
This pretty much sums it up for me. Plus, carrying a gun like that is illegal in Illinois, so it wouldn’t even be that the person was exercising a legal option for them.
Obviously, a lot depends on circumstances. In general though, given the laws in my state, if I saw someone carrying a gun at a party, I might casually ask “You got a license for that?” in a very conversational way and see where it goes from there. If it was a party hosted by me I would be shocked and horrified that someone would bring a gun without checking in with me first.
Leave.
I don’t like parties.
Then why not go to a range that offers rentals and lessons? I find a zen like relaxation in target shooting. I like knowing that if I have to use my gun, I will be able to use it safely and competently. Disassembling and cleaning the gun can also be relaxing [if you are of the putter sort of people]
I have a feeling that if more people actually took the firearm safety class and experienced firing one under controlled conditions they might be more comfortable around people with guns.
Why? I am not currently in a security position, but I am licensed to carry. I also happen to have a stalker with violent tendencies and a I have a vested interest in staying alive. Luckily he prefers using his hands, and since he is larger, stronger and not physically disabled I need the edge of being able to take him out before he gets to me.
Not everybody who carries is intending any sort of harm towards anybody. This type of thinking is absurd, along the same lines that if you are black or hispanic you are dangerous to white folks. There is a huge difference between a gang member and most people who carry legally. I dont even intend to harm anybody, but be able to defend myself if I am caught alone in a personally dangerous situation.
I’d call the police, then depart the party.
As mentioned above, alcohol and firearms only mix in a room full of people who are as convinced as our last poster here that the gun they are carrying is perfectlys safe and reasonable to carry, whereas those bad bad gangbangers are somehow carrying a more lethal weapon than they are.
:rolleyes: It is a desperate need to justify the capacity to deliver deadly force on a whim that is most disheartening. I’m in public and see a gun? I call the police. It’s their job to sort it out. I have done so in the past, and will do so again in the future.
Cartooniverse
Mr. K’s crazy uncle Walter used to get drunk and start waving his gun around at gatherings. Then someone would call Mr. K and he’d have to go over there and take the gun away from him. God, what an asshole uncle was.
Um, that question is out there. I guess I’d be creeped out and leave the party?
I’ve never known anyone who owns a gun much less brings one to a party.
Better safe than sorry. I have no way of knowing why the person is carrying the weapon, and I do not want to be in a small, enclosed space where there are guns. The potential consequences of being around someone who DOES intend to use the weapon in an aggressive manner, or even someone who gets drunk and starts doing stupid things with it, are much, much worse than the consequences of accidentally socially snubbing a responsible person who is carrying a weapon for legitimate reasons. Sorry, but that’s the way it is.
I don’t know where I fall on your scale, carrying or even owning guns isn’t normal for me, but it’s common in my family. My parents have been big into hunting and sport shooting my entire life, so I was raised with gun safety rules being drilled into me. Dad and Mom both have carry permits, although Dad is more likely to carry than Mom is. All of my siblings and their spouses own guns, but only one spouse-in-law carries I think. Hunting is a very popular pastime among my friends and coworkers, so just seeing a gun isn’t very unusual by itself.
That said, if I’m at a party and see that someone’s carrying, I just ask them about it. Either there’s likely to be drinking, in which case they don’t need to have it that accessible in case anyone gets stupid, or it’s a family thing with kids running about and I’d tell them to put it away since we’re unlikely to be beset by marauders in that situation.
The only instance I can imagine being skeeved out by would be if I were at a party where most of the crowd were strangers, like if I were invited by a coworker or something. Then I might be more interested and alert, but I still don’t think I’d necessarily leave unless things seemed a bit off.
Since nearly anyone here can get a carry permit, I presume it’s pretty likely that in any given group someone might be carrying. I’d have to become a hermit if I were that weirded out by it, it’s just generally not a big deal.
Honestly? I’d think the person was crazy. As in mentally ill. The parties I go to are usually of the potluck and board games variety. Why the fuck would you bring a gun to that? And I would be very much inclined to make my excuses and leave.
I agree. The need to keep a gun concealed on one’s person suggests deep insecurities to me. If everyone else can be out in public without a gun, why does this person have to have one tucked away some where? I think the kind of person who feels the need to carry a gun on his body is exactly the kind of person I don’t want to have a gun: insecure, frightened, unable to feel confident without his handgun fetish.
Now you know why it’s called “Concealed Carry”. With few exceptions, mostly foreigners, every one of the people who responded have been in contact with someone carrying a weapon. It is a statistical certainty. But because they didn’t know they were perfectly fine with the person.
What makes the person different if you know something that you didn’t before? I understand the discomfort factor, but don’t you think it’s an illogical discomfort? It’s roughly analogous to me backing away from someone because they have AIDS. It genuinely makes no sense to me.
Mischaracterizations and insults never get old, do they? :rolleyes:
It would depend on the type of party and the person carrying. If the gun were properly tucked into a concealed holster, my seeing it was a pure accident, and the person carrying it wasn’t in any way acting belligerent, I’d ignore it. If it was shoved into the waistband of his pants, he was drinking a lot, and acting up, I’d leave and/or inform the host. Then I’d wonder what in the world I was doing at a party like that to begin with.
By the way, I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a handgun on a person in public who wasn’t a cop or a gun store owner (and then only at the store). Open carry is illegal here, and I’m pretty sure it’s an offense to allow your concealed weapon to show. I only know two people personally who have their concealed carry license: a former coworker who comes from a military family (she’s not former; I am) and my brother-in-law (who has to make large money deposits from his place of business.)
This kinda happened to me.
I was at a conference with a group of coworkers. We got talking to a guy who gave an interesting talk and was one of the few people at the meeting from our geographic area. He seemed nice enough so we invited him to join us for lunch. He had the biggest car so he volunteered to drive.
I was sitting in the backseat, along with my friend. Her foot kept brushing against a hard thing and she reached down to pick it up. It was a gun! The guy was too busy talking to the person in the front seat to notice our horrified expressions. She put the gun back down on the floor and the two of us just kept quiet, feeling a mixture of bemusement and fear.
I think it was scary because we didn’t know the guy and we didn’t know if the gun was loaded. Also, it was kind of weird that the guy didn’t seem to care about us finding his gun, as he didn’t know us either. We could have been psycho too.
If I was at a party, my reaction would depend on how I had discovered the gun. I’d feel more scared if I caught a glimpse of it in someone’s purse or bookbag than I would be if I saw it in a holster (which would indicate law enforcement to an unsophisticated person like me). Also, if I didn’t know the guy, I’d feel more uncomfortable. If he/she were a friend, I would have some knowledge about their craziness and criminality. But a stranger would have a lot of unknowns.
Not necessarily. I grew up around hunters, and my husband hunts and owns a rifle-barreled shotgun. He doesn’t have ammo for it in the off season. However, I still don’t like the idea of people just walking around with handguns. CCW is not legal in this state so, as Airman alluded to, if someone around me was carrying either they’re a cop (which I’m fine with) or they’re illegally carrying, which I sure as hell am not.
In your case I sympathize, but for the vast majority of people, I don’t think they have a need to be carrying.
I’m not trying to be insulting. That would be my honest response. I don’t hang out with any law enforcement officers or military folks, so I don’t know any people who use guns regularly in the course of their work. And the kind of parties I go tend to be fairly sedate, family-friendly affairs, usually attended by teachers, non-profit workers, and librarians. If someone bought a gun to one of those parties, I would seriously be concerned about their mental state.
I understand rural folks having guns for critter control, hunters having guns for sporting reasons, and people having guns for home security (even though I don’t feel the need). But if you feel unsafe enough at an early evening get-together in a friend’s home to need a firearm, that worries me.