A comment: if every person at the soccer game knew this person to be a responsible gun owner, and a person of even temperment, I would agree that there would be no reason for concern. Sports parents (and I was one at one point) tend to have little control of emotions like anger, so a parent with a gun could be seen as threatening. I think it was a poor choice on her part to carry it in the open.
Once again someone gets out the freaking broad brush. As a youth sports coach for the last 5 years, on the whole, “sports parents” can keep their emotions in check as well as anyone else. Give it a rest. :rolleyes:
Rather than a few cites of parents behaving badly, can you provide proof that parents whose kids play in sports in general, have little control of their emotions?
Reading comprehension problem? I said it was my bias; i.e, it is my opinion.
More comprehension problems? I said my community.
I think the fact that you feel the need to carry a gun every day is something to discuss with your therapist, I don’t think I can help you. The fact that it is legal to do so has no bearing on my view of it being odd. It’s legal to walk around quacking like a duck, but I would find it odd if you did that too.
And I asked what community. Your family, your social club, your city, your state, society as a whole…? Because if you live in a state with CCW, odds are you encounter people carrying every day. Comprehension works both ways pal.
How nice. Believe it or not, I don’t have or need a therapist. Happiness is a warm gun after all. :rolleyes: Do you think the same of women who take self defense courses? How about those who achieve belted status within martial arts? Aren’t they “carrying” all the time as well? So does your diagnosis center more on how someone chooses to defend them self, what they use to do so, or the mere fact that they defend them self at all?
None of my friends or family think it is sensible to carry around a loaded weapon. The places I have worked did not allow employees to carry guns on person or in their car. I know that some people in Oregon carry, but no one in my social circle does. It just wouldn’t occur to us that life is so dangerous that we need to be armed.
I admire people who take martial arts classes for the right reasons, and am concerned about the kind of people that take martial arts and keep pit bulls. You know the type I’m talking about; they carry around nun-chuks, fighting stars, switch blades, or axe handles in their car. I assume they are wacked out.
You obviously feel differently, but in much of America, and in virtually every other civilized country in the world, carrying around a weapon is seen as strange behavior.
Oregon is a Shall issue state, meaning anyone who wants one, and can pass a background check can get one. So I would guess that a lot more people carry than you might guess. Not only that but Oregon offers non resident permits to residents in border states. While it is great that life there is idyllic, it is not so in other places. To judge someone mentally incompetent who needs, or thinks they need to carry, based on the fact that it is safe where you reside isn’t quite fair or logical is it?
I may or may not feel differently about nun-chuk wielding wannabe ninjas and pitbull owners. If you think you know me or anyone else just because I carry, I consider that to be as mentally deficient as you think of me. In addition, is it logical to respect or admire one who trains in martial arts to defend them self yet criticize to the point of questioning mental capacity of others who take a different path to the same destination? Remember as mentioned earlier, CCW permit holders just aren’t out there committing crimes en masse.
Regarding the rest of the country, every state but two offer some sort of provision for carrying weapons so I am wondering just how strange that behavior really is. Hell, the state that you live in is one of the most liberal regarding the CCW rules and you consider it a safe place to be. Unless you think Wisconsin and Illinois are in some special place to judge the rest of the US as being strange, perhaps you need to consider yourself closer to the minority opinion than you originally thought.
Regarding the rest of the world, to be honest, I really don’t care. A good chunk of the rest of the world is a pretty dangerous place to be and is in no place to judge the US.
Way to (deliberately) miss the point. You’ll also note that I wasn’t responding to you and feel no need to justify my comment in any case.
No wonder children are terrified of clowns.
“the right reasons”, eh? Like protecting large sums of money?
What are the “right reasons” for a woman to take martial arts?
So you are fighting ignorance by promoting it. I get it now!
Do you possess some kind of magical ability that tells you in advance when you’re going to be approached by car jackers, or murderers? If so you have an incredible talent. If not, I don’t think you understand why people who choose to carry guns (and I’m fully acknowledging it’s a choice, but it’s not a choice that makes someone mentally unstable which is what it seems you’re implying). If you’re going to carry a gun, you’re doing so to defend your life. But because psychics don’t really exist, you have to play the odds. Do you carry your gun some of the time (and risk whenever not carrying) or carry all the time? I choose to carry all the time. Here’s a sad story of what can happen when only criminals are armed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xS0hKNuS8zU#t=2m25s
Why do the police carry a gun everyday? More so, why do people call the police when their life is in danger? Because cops have guns and can equalize the situation. Personally, I find it “odd” that people give their single biggest responsibility–their own life–to a third party and depend on the police for their protection.
On our drive back from Thanksgiving, we were listening to “Don’t take your guns to town.” It got me thinking about Stephen Pinker’s musings on violent communities like the old west or like inner-city Baltimore. In such communities, folks don’t think they can rely on a delegated law enforcement body to protect their safety, so they protect it themselves. In order to do so, they have to appear tough, and one way to do so is by ostentatiously overreacting: if somebody slights you, you shoot them, and then everybody else knows that you’re one crazy motherfucker who shouldn’t be messed with. In lawless cultures, this is a rational behavior that ends up with your own safety being threatened much less than it would be if you appeared weak or willing to put up with bullying. It’s a common human adaptation to such situations: you can look at the Scottish Highlands or at rural Appalachia for more examples.
If I saw someone open carrying, I’d worry that they believed not only that they were in a lawless society (i.e., that the police provided inadequate protection), but also that they needed to ostentatiously display their Crazy Motherfuckerness in order to protect themselves. I’d worry that they were carrying openly (as opposed to carrying concealed) in order to send that message. I’d worry about the other lengths to which they might go in order to send that message.
Nothing I’ve seen in this thread, or in any other, gives me reason to think such worries would be irrational.
Daniel
So you’d agree with the old saying “an armed society is a polite society”? You realize that the police serve as only a deterrent and not as a protector correct?
So you disregard the research provided UNA, and the various claims to the opposite by the other posters and instead readily cling to your own stereotypes and misgivings about people carrying guns. Is there anything you could read or hear that would allow you to put aside your worry about an armed society or is it too deeply ingrained?
Of course I wouldn’t agree with that absurd saying: if you read what I said, it’s exactly the opposite, unless you believe Ms. Manners suggests replying to a perceived insult with lethal violence. The second part of your statement is wholly irrelevant to my point, and after your last response to me, I’m beginning to wonder whether you’re reading my posts or someone else’s.
Nice excluded middle. I’ve stated repeatedly the stats that would apply, and if you read Una’s responses to me, she agreed that such stats probably don’t exist.
Go back and reread, and when you return, I’ll expect your sheepish apology.
Daniel
Well, don’t hold your breath for a sheepish apology, you wont get it. I will say this though, the second word in knee-jerk is jerk, of which I can be accused of in my reply. In reading your reply, I saw what I was looking for, rather than what you wrote. In looking back at your other posts I understand, but disagree with where you are coming from regarding carrying. Your focus, in line with the OP I may add, is on the open carry of firearms. Mine has been on both legal open carry and CCW. I have really tried to stay even handed in this discussion, but as it is impossible for you to see someone carrying and not think the worst thoughts, it is impossible for me to truly agree with those thoughts. That is an impasse that we will most likely never be able to move past.
I don’t fear guns or gun owners, and I do not imply that you do. So far in this thread, my mental capacity has been questioned directly, and as a “sports parent” I have been painted as one being unable to control my emotions such as anger. Both of these lead to the end that I, and others like me are too dangerous to be carrying any weapon, let alone one that goes bang. So I hope you can understand the knee jerk, and if I read you wrong, I regret doing so.
To be honest, I am not a big fan of open carry myself. It puts people like yourself on edge for no good reason. I could argue all day that you have nothing to fear from me or any other person legally carrying, but your stereotypes and biases will trump my best effort every time. As a result I’ll stop arguing with you.
People like LHOD are exactly whom I am showing courtesy by carrying concealed even though open carry is a legal option here. It’s only a minor hassle to conceal, and offers the advantage of surprise if I should actually have to use the weapon, but more importantly folks like LHOD can go about their day relatively free from fear. They are neither more nor less safe by my concealing the weapon, but they feel safer which is what really matters to them.
Ah, I see. Yes, I’m focusing clearly on open carry. As I understand it, statistically I’m pretty safe around folks with CCW permits. I don’t have any rational fear of them. (At least in general: my senile ex-boss who bragged about his S&W that he carried and, when confronted with an angry patron, would grouse about his willingness to defend his honor? him I was a little leery of).
I appreciate your softening of your position, and I apologize for getting my hackles up: I’ve really been trying to be clear about my focus on this question of open carry.
Understand that I’m not saying I’ll see the lady with a holstered gun and think, “OMG!!!1eleven!1! She’s gonna open fire!” That’s not remotely my position. My position is that, given what I know about the statistics of open-carry (zilch at this point), AND given what I know about human psychology (a tiny bit from a scientific perspective, a bit more from being one), AND given what I know about sociology and evolutionary psychology (a bit from being an amateur enthusiast), I’d be a little leerier of the person with the strap-on gun than I would be of the person without the strap-on gun.
Scumpup, your consideration is awful kind, but my point isn’t that I’m trembling in my boots and appreciate big scary gun owners not scaring me. My point is that a certain heightened wariness in certain situations is rational, and I’m trying to figure out whether the non-uniformed open-carrier in a modern US suburb creates such a situation. I believe it does; and if I’m correct, if you don’t have a state of heightened wariness around such an individual, you’re the one acting irrationally. (If I’m incorrect, of course, I am: that’s what I’m trying to figure out).
Daniel
You can take this gun when you pry it from my cold, dead, vagina.
Yep even back in the wild west days they knew that guns would cause more trouble and danger than they solve. Many westerns show the sheriff confiscating guns in the name of a civilized and safer town. We have a heritage of logic followed by the gun nutters sophistry of today.
You have those cites yet?