As it should be. Not Government agency should be allowed to lobby in respect to laws. It should be left to the citizens.
Michael
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Michael
Yeah but show u have to pay every 5-10 years for a permit for a god givin right to bare arms I think the license should be for life
I agree but I will take anything that allows me to keep my guns with me.
x2 on that. I'm sure they'll be some Rogers County deputies that will hate it IF open carry passes.
That's fodder for a different thread. Or has been, multiple times. Either way, not relevant to this discussion.
My thanks to the LEO that truly support our american way of life and can see past just their difficult part in the scheme of things.
I believe you care and that you get it.
I believe you care and that you get it.
Let me start by saying, yes I am a LEO and I support the 2nd Amendment 110%.
Do I support open carry? No. Let me tell you why.
It has absolutely nothing to do about the wild, wild west. It has to do with basically two things. Public safety and the element of surprise.
There are many gun owners who read all the gun rags and hang out at gun shops and fondle every gun out there before they buy one. Which is good. Research is vital.
However. Simply owning a gun doesn't mean you know how to use it properly. Just like owning a guitar does NOT make you a musician.
A lot of people don't use good judgement when picking out the proper gear for their CC package. They may buy the very best pistol on the market, but they will skimp on a proper holster, belt and mag pouch.
You DO carry a spare mag...don't you?
Anyway...back to my point(s).
Open carry invites more crime. When a properly licensed, CCW holder, with his gun on his hip is standing in line at the local grocery store, Wal-Mart, wherever, he/she poses a potential threat to those around them simply because they aren't focused on their weapon but rather everything having to do with their transaction at the register. This gives a bad guy a perfect opportunity to disarm the citizen and perform illegal activities.
And don't think I'm just picking on the citizens out there. Hell, I've seen other cops that forget all about their pistola on their hip and practically hand it to a bad guy. I laugh at dispatchers that give us a call of a domestic in progress followed by a "no weapons involved" statement. The minute I arrive there WILL be a weapon involved - mine! There is a gun at every call I go to - mine!
The next point I want to share is the element of surprise.
The bad guys out there have plenty of information about you. Thanks to Google and the internet, if a bad guy wants to study you and learn about you, he'll know you better than you know yourself. And while you're standing in line at the grocery store, Wal-Mart, wherever, do you really want him to know that you are armed? Guess who his first target is gonna be?
If you keep your iron hidden then you have a shred of hope against an attack. The element of surprise. If you say to him, "here's my gun" he's gonna do everything in his power to take it away from you, giving him complete control of the situation. Then, you are no longer a citizen, but a statistic.
As a cop, I hate going to Wal-Mart or someplace while I am in uniform because I'm as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs. Because even though I've been thru more firearms training than the average Joe, I too am not immune from an attempted gun grab and I have the same limited view as everybody else.
Bad guys thrive on bad things. That's who/what they are. Nobody can check their six constantly. When a bad guy sees your gun, he knows that he has to take you out first so he can have the upper hand. He can (and will) attack you and disarm you because he has already set his sights on you without your knowledge of him doing so.
Now I can ramble on and on and I know I'm gonna catch hell for what I've just said, but...that's just my take on open carry.
And for the record...you see all these off duty cops with their gun on their hip and a shild clipped next to it? That's just as bad IMO as the citizen carrying openly. When I'm off duty, you won't see ANYTHING on or about my person that says "cop."
But yeah, if'n I'm vertical, I'm armed.
Do I support open carry? No. Let me tell you why.
It has absolutely nothing to do about the wild, wild west. It has to do with basically two things. Public safety and the element of surprise.
There are many gun owners who read all the gun rags and hang out at gun shops and fondle every gun out there before they buy one. Which is good. Research is vital.
However. Simply owning a gun doesn't mean you know how to use it properly. Just like owning a guitar does NOT make you a musician.
A lot of people don't use good judgement when picking out the proper gear for their CC package. They may buy the very best pistol on the market, but they will skimp on a proper holster, belt and mag pouch.
You DO carry a spare mag...don't you?
Anyway...back to my point(s).
Open carry invites more crime. When a properly licensed, CCW holder, with his gun on his hip is standing in line at the local grocery store, Wal-Mart, wherever, he/she poses a potential threat to those around them simply because they aren't focused on their weapon but rather everything having to do with their transaction at the register. This gives a bad guy a perfect opportunity to disarm the citizen and perform illegal activities.
And don't think I'm just picking on the citizens out there. Hell, I've seen other cops that forget all about their pistola on their hip and practically hand it to a bad guy. I laugh at dispatchers that give us a call of a domestic in progress followed by a "no weapons involved" statement. The minute I arrive there WILL be a weapon involved - mine! There is a gun at every call I go to - mine!
The next point I want to share is the element of surprise.
The bad guys out there have plenty of information about you. Thanks to Google and the internet, if a bad guy wants to study you and learn about you, he'll know you better than you know yourself. And while you're standing in line at the grocery store, Wal-Mart, wherever, do you really want him to know that you are armed? Guess who his first target is gonna be?
If you keep your iron hidden then you have a shred of hope against an attack. The element of surprise. If you say to him, "here's my gun" he's gonna do everything in his power to take it away from you, giving him complete control of the situation. Then, you are no longer a citizen, but a statistic.
As a cop, I hate going to Wal-Mart or someplace while I am in uniform because I'm as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs. Because even though I've been thru more firearms training than the average Joe, I too am not immune from an attempted gun grab and I have the same limited view as everybody else.
Bad guys thrive on bad things. That's who/what they are. Nobody can check their six constantly. When a bad guy sees your gun, he knows that he has to take you out first so he can have the upper hand. He can (and will) attack you and disarm you because he has already set his sights on you without your knowledge of him doing so.
Now I can ramble on and on and I know I'm gonna catch hell for what I've just said, but...that's just my take on open carry.
And for the record...you see all these off duty cops with their gun on their hip and a shild clipped next to it? That's just as bad IMO as the citizen carrying openly. When I'm off duty, you won't see ANYTHING on or about my person that says "cop."
But yeah, if'n I'm vertical, I'm armed.
GED
While I respect your opinion and observations, and I agree with much of what you wrote (especially concerning the element of surprise!), I wonder if the evidence supports your theories???
Have these things proven true in areas where open carry is legal??
Do we have specific examples where the bad guys shoot the guy carrying openly at the beginning of their crime??
Do we have specific examples of the bad guy snatching an openly carried weapon from a person who is NOT a LEO??
Or, do we just assume that this is what will happen??
Like I said, I agree with most of what you posted, and I won't be one of the open carriers (at least in public), but I don't really have any real life statistics to support the idea that this is what will happen.
I don't want to be like those who claimed that passing concealed carry would result in blood running in the streets, so I have to honestly ask myself the questions. Is this just a gut reaction to what *might* happen, or can it be substantiated with facts??
Even if we think open carry is a bad idea, does that mean others shouldn't have the right to choose??
Your thoughts would be appreciated.
While I respect your opinion and observations, and I agree with much of what you wrote (especially concerning the element of surprise!), I wonder if the evidence supports your theories???
Have these things proven true in areas where open carry is legal??
Do we have specific examples where the bad guys shoot the guy carrying openly at the beginning of their crime??
Do we have specific examples of the bad guy snatching an openly carried weapon from a person who is NOT a LEO??
Or, do we just assume that this is what will happen??
Like I said, I agree with most of what you posted, and I won't be one of the open carriers (at least in public), but I don't really have any real life statistics to support the idea that this is what will happen.
I don't want to be like those who claimed that passing concealed carry would result in blood running in the streets, so I have to honestly ask myself the questions. Is this just a gut reaction to what *might* happen, or can it be substantiated with facts??
Even if we think open carry is a bad idea, does that mean others shouldn't have the right to choose??
Your thoughts would be appreciated.
No, I don't have any statistics either. Nor have I ever been involved in an armed encounter.
But that doesn't keep me from training for the day that I could possibly be involved in one.
Hope for the best but prepare for the worst, I always say.
People can put their heads in the sand all day long and say "it won't happen to me" but they are just fooling themselves.
Chances are I won't ever be struck by lightning, but I don't stand out in an open field in the middle of a storm.
When I'm off duty, you'll never see my weapon(s). But you can bet yer ass, they're there!
Always and as usual, YMMV...
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