An interesting tidbit in the story — which may serve as a metaphor for the absurdity of American gun culture — is that under-age students at a neighboring school had been charged with misdemeanors for bringing guns to schools. I’ll guess there’s more legal nuance, but according to the reporter, those kids could not be charged with felonies because the guns were not misused. The kid who used her fingers instead of a real gun was charged with a felony.
(Should this be in the Positive Guns thread? Possession of guns, even though illegal, led to reduced charges compared with the wielder of a finger gun.)
While I get that this is a joke - and while this may be antithetical to this thread’s ethos - actively advertising that a driver is unarmed would be a bad idea.
Not that I think Uber drivers should be armed as a matter of course, but there’s a difference between being unarmed and going out of one’s way to announce it.
Is America really that dangerous and lawless that the only way to be safe is to let people believe you are carrying a gun?
If that’s truely the case, then fuck me, I’d better shelve any idea of ever travelling there.
For certain professions - and taxi driving is one of them - yes, being armed (or making people think you are) is an unfortunate necessity. You’re in a one-on-one situation with potentially no witnesses and no knowledge of the person who just got into your car, if you’re a regular cab driver you’re likely carrying (or can be assumed to be carrying) a reasonable amount of cash, and you’re going to be asking the stranger for cash at the end of the journey. There are a lot of risk factors there.
In a country where crazy people don’t have easy access to guns this would not be an issue (or as much of one), but this is America we’re talking about.
Of course, their only enforcement option is to block the driver or rider from using the service once they are made aware that someone was carrying. They have no real authority to regulate anything but their bowel movements.
“…an off-duty Dallas officer who mistook his son for an intruder and accidentally shot him,…”
No, this was not an “accident”. Everything went exactly as planned. The off duty officer pointed a gun at someone without identifying him. He then shot a person, without knowing who this person was, or what this person’s intent was.
Not an accident. This is a deliberate shooting, with negligence.
I suspect it was an accident. I think he was doing something stupid and ‘accidentally shooting his son’ did not sound quite as stupid and irresponsible as the truth.
Nah, I’ve spent decades in different parts of the US with no need to carry even at 2am in Baltimore.
However, as mentioned, some people may feel their circumstances make it prudent e.g. traditional cabbies (a putative advantage of Uber is the no cash model). Of course it behooves any armed person to keep and use it safely.
I notice the “applicable law” provision, which is their way to acknowledge that in some jurisdictions the Law says you may/can carry freely and in others not so. As a driver you’re an independent contractor in your own vehicle, so if the law allows it and you carry and handle in such a manner that you DON’T have mishaps (or if as a user you take your ride and move along with no mishaps and do not leave the gun behind) then there would be no way for Uber to know.