Why wouldn’t she? That argument could be used for anything. Why would she carry it to the grocery store? Why would she carry it while hanging out in the country? Why would she carry it driving to work? The idea that a Kid’s soccer game is a weird place to carry a gun just shows that you think any place is weird. If someone is likely to go postal at a kid’s soccer game, not having a concealed permit is rather irrelevant. Like you need a permit to massacre a bleacher full of parents and siblings.
Better to have a gun and not need it than need a gun and not have it as they say.
Serious question: back in the “good old days”, was it in fact common for people to openly carry handguns around in urban areas? I would have thought this was more of a frontier type habit, but I admit that I do not really know.
You’re probably right. Though I think it was a lot more common to carry weapons. I knew people growing up in New Mexico who hip holstered a side arm. It was notable, but not a particularly disturbing habit.
That taking away the lady’s concealed carry permit won’t change it. If she wants to go postal she will. People are not made safer by harassing this woman.
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I think carrying a gun on an airplane is a federal law; when I traveled a lot, I always carried a pocket knife with a three inch blade, just because I automatically put it in my pocket. I probably couldn’t do that anymore.
Open carry was legal when I lived in Arizona; my first exposure to it was in a theater lobby when a very big guy walked in carrying two 45 caliber automatics in shoulder holsters. Startled me. I don’t know if open carry is still legal there.
At one time, long before 9/11 and the insanity that followed, I believe the Phoenix airport led the nation in gun seizures, simply because people attached a holster with a gun inside it to their belts as a matter of course.
I’d say tamer, for whatever that’s worth. Of course, there was already a police presence there anyway.
Apparently you’re assuming all killings are premeditated massacres. I’m pretty sure that isn’t the case, so bringing Virginia Tech, Luby’s or any number of other extremely rare occurrences doesn’t contribute much.
Some people are uncomfortable around young black men, and consider it a matter of “safety” because part of their prejudice is a belief that young black men are inherently disposed to criminality.
This is no more or less rational than fear of law-abiding people carrying firearms. In both cases, it’s possible for the person to do you harm, but you have no rational cause for considering it to be sufficiently likely to constitute a genuine threat.
A black person isn’t a weapon. :rolleyes: A gun, regardless of who is holding it, is a weapon.
Look, I’m not arguing for a ban on guns here and I said earlier that the woman in this story, while doing something I consider pointless, was not breaking the law and should not have been treated as if she were. But I think these comparisons of guns to iPhones, beards, and now black people, shade the issue without addressing what a gun actually is, and why it might be rational to treat it as something different from those things, even if freaking out is not warranted. People can feel threatened unjustly by things that are not weapons, but that doesn’t mean feeling threatend by something that actually is a weapon is unjust or unfounded. Anyway, plenty of people use their iPhones and cell phones irresponsibly (while driving, for example), so the assurance that gun owners are responsible, while true in general, does not apply to every gun owner.
In my experience, a person with a cell phone and an automobile are much more likely to cause me injury or death than someone legally carrying a gun. Just last month I was turning left at a light on my motorcycle and a woman in an SUV rolled through her red light and turned to her right, right into the lane I was occupying. If her window had been rolled down I could have reached in and taken her phone away from her.
Exactly. We can’t take weapons onto planes because the risks outweigh any potential benefit. Scary doesn’t factor in. “It’s scary” is an intangible matter of perception and belief. Danger is a quantifiable datum that some number cruncher can work up an actuarial table on. The purpose of carrying a gun is for protection. If the screeners have done their jobs properly, that potential need doesn’t exist on an airplane. Therefore, risk from violent person = 0. Need for firearm = 0.
What makes it out of scope is that it’s an entirely different set of circumstances and controls. Plane = closed, screened access. Public areas = anyone can bring in a weapon.
Five year old soccer games can be very dangerous. It amazes me that everybody in attendance wasn’t carrying. Perhaps it should be mandatory. There can never be too many guns around. Some silly people did not know how much safer they were when she had her gun.
So lobby to make cell phone usage while driving illegal.
Equating guns to beards is ridiculous and a dishonest argument position - a more apt comparison would be people carrying around axes and chainsaws. They’re just tools, right? Tools that are highly dangerous in the unlikely event that the person has a murderous intent or flips their nut or gets drunk or gets angry. Or if somebody near them with the physical ability to take the tool away (ie: hands) does any of the above.
Sounds exactly the same to me. So, argue from that position.
“Scary” is risk assessment. Fear is risk assessment. And the reasons for wanting to keep a gun out of the plane are exactly the same as wanting to keep them out of anywhere else - the mere presence of a gun makes the situation more dangerous.
I find it deeply ironic that the way that the screeners make it okay for you not to have a gun is by taking your guns away.
(Not to say that I’m necessarily in favor of banning guns, but if these are the best arguments against it, we probably should go ahead and ban 'em.)
I carry a cell phone on my person because I might, at some point in the course of the day, have need to contact someone. A person who straps on a gun in the morning does so because they might, at some point in the course of the day, have need to kill someone. Personally, I’m a bit uneasy around people who get up in the morning and plan for the possibility that they might need to kill someone. And frankly, I would be equally uneasy about such a person, even if I knew that they were not currently armed.
You know what really terrifies me, though? Quoth Projammer:
It’s absolutely terrifying for me to think that there are actually people out there who think of guns as “accessories”. A person who has that kind of attitude towards guns is not safe for society.
People hope for the best and prepare for the worst every day of their lives. That’s what the insurance industry is all about. Every time you get into your car you are prepared for the possibility that you will be involved in an event that you will need financial or legal assistance with. The same holds true for carrying a weapon. A person doesn’t go out of their house thinking, Gee, I’m going to get mugged/raped/murdered today. These things tend to get thrust upon them despite their best efforts to avoid it. Having some protection against those actions seems to me to be a good thing.
You seem to have stopped reading that post before you got to the end. Let me fill that in for you.
Please don’t cherry-pick my comments to try to make a point.
What if they were actually preparing for the possibility that they may need to defend themselves, rather than planning on killing someone. Is that less scary? Because it is far closer to reality.
I bet I would scare the ever living shit out of you. I neither fear guns nor cower in their presence. While I don’t consider my CCW rig a fashion statement, I also wouldn’t hesitate to ask a person who was carrying how they liked their holster, their gun, or what kind of ammo they use. Why do you have to project your own fears upon those of us who have no such limitations? Feel free to insert a penis reference at this point in the discussion. It’s about that time.
Do cops open carrying give you the heebie jeebies too? Or is it ok if they are prepared to defend themselves? Maybe they wake up planning on killing someone everyday as well huh?
