DMN on Open Carry 11/25/12

[ajwakeboarder]

Ok, i'm getting a lot of different ideas of what we're talking about. Can we clarify Constitutional Carry vs. Licensed Open Carry? If its constitutional carry, I don't blame some store owners for not wanting people carrying in their stores. I do believe in the right to keep and bear arms, but I know a lot of people who qualify to own a firearm that don't have the mental maturity to carry them. These same people won't spend the time or money getting a CHL so the only way they would is if constitutional carry passes.

[jmra]

If I'm reading most of these threads correctly, I don't see many people on this forum opposed to OC. The only opposition I see is an OC bill that ties OC in any way to the same signage as CC.
I am not opposed to OC and would probably OC on some occasions but I see no reason to tie it to the current CHL law in any way. Let it be a bill that stands on its own and if it passes, great.
The fact as I see it is simple, an OC bill tied to current CHL law signage is DOA. Anyone who wants OC to pass should get behind a bill that stands on its own (signage included). Of course I believe that bill would also be DOA in this session but at least it would be something to build on. Stacking OC onto current CHL laws has no future in the State of Texas.

[JKTex]

A point I want to make is something that always seems to come up, usually takes front stage, that isn't or shouldn't be part of an OC legislation discussion.

Each person's personal opinion about OC and whether they think it's a good idea for them or not, or whether they would or would not, has nothing to do with any legislation. We all have personal opinions and those are unrestricted. Many of our choices are restricted by law and should not be.

You may not think OC is a good idea, great. I don't either in some cases, but each of us should be able to make choices, otherwise our opinion means nothing.

I may have shared this before too, but as for Oklahoma, from some lifelong Oklahomans I know, they expected to see guns and trouble all over the place, even though they knew carrying could only be done by license holders. They didn't put 2 and 2 together, that someone that carried openly, had already been carrying concealed. That was lesson #1. Lesson #2 they learned on their own, there are no guns or trouble all over the place. In fact, out of 2 major cities and one smaller town and everywhere they all travel in between, not one of 5 has seen even 1 person carrying.

As it turns out, there was only 1 place that any of them could say they'd seen a "NO GUNS" sign go up and that is a grocery store on a main drag that gets a lot of interstate traffic.

Once again, it wasn't a big deal after all. I wish the anti-gun rights legislators that threw a fit would be interviewed again to see how they feel now that heck didn't erupt onto the streets.

[VMI77]

Essentially all the SC did was rule that the 2nd Amendment applies to individuals and not a collective "militia." Our RIGHT to keep and bear arms is not recognized by the Federal Government --only by a handful of state governments, and even then, on a limited basis. Fully exercising our right to either keep or bear arms means being killed or imprisoned (depending on how passionately one attempts to exercise this right). Our privilege to "keep" is limited and regulated and our privilege to "bear" is even more severely limited. Just try walking into Wally World or Starbucks with an AR-15 slung over your back. Teenage girls can do it in Israel, but we can't do it here (which isn't to say that firearms laws are better in Israel, they're not, but some things are more socially acceptable than they are here).

While I think CC is a great privilege I'm not so sure it actually represents any true advance in the recognition of our Constitutional right to keep and bear arms. You used to be able to own machine guns (without registration and a tax and paying many thousands of dollars). Without jumping through hoops and paying exorbitant prices we can't own silencers in this country when you can buy them for something like $30 over the counter even in Socialist Utopias like the UK and NZ. People had rifles and shotguns openly displayed in their pickups when I was in high school. When I was 14 I used to walk down the street in my residential neighborhood carrying rifles and shotguns without raising an eyebrow. At sixteen my friends and I drove around with an assortment of rifles and shotguns displayed on the car seat. As a society we're a very long way from the society that had citizens in Austin pulling rifles from their vehicles and shooting back at the UT Tower sniper. Here in Texas we've gained with CC but we've lost on a broader scale in that to bear arms, we have to hide them. This is a social development due largely to the media demonization of guns.

I'm for restoring our Constitutional rights; I'm not so willing to arbitrage privileges. I'm opposed to any kind of OC that infringes on my current ability to carry concealed. When you have to get permission from the government to do something, it's a privilege, not a right. I don't want to take a step backwards for a "privilege" I will rarely use.

[Ameer]

Ok, i'm getting a lot of different ideas of what we're talking about. Can we clarify Constitutional Carry vs. Licensed Open Carry?

Constitutional carry would have the same requirements for second amendment rights as for first, third, fourth and fifth amendment rights.