NYT: Locked, Loaded, and Ready to Caffeinate

[RamboLiberal]

For years, being able to carry a concealed handgun has been a sacred right for many gun enthusiasts. In defending it, Charlton Heston, the actor and former president of the National Rifle Association, used to say that the flock is safer when the wolves cannot tell the difference between the lions and the lambs.

But a grass-roots effort among some gun rights advocates is shifting attention to a different goal: exercising the right to carry unconcealed weapons in the 38 or more states that have so-called open-carry laws allowing guns to be carried in public view with little or no restrictions. The movement is not only raising alarm among gun control proponents but also exposing rifts among gun rights advocates.

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The open-carry movement is a wild card in gun rights advocacy and in some ways is to the N.R.A. and other mainstream gun rights advocacy groups what the Tea Party movement is to the Republican Party.

Newer, more driven by grass-roots and the Internet than the N.R.A., open-carry groups are also less centralized, less predictable and often more confrontational in their push for gun rights. In the last year, there have been at least 140 formal and informal meet-ups at coffee shops and restaurants in California alone, organizers say.

Some gun rights advocates see risks in the approach.

“I’m all for open-carry laws,” said Alan Gottlieb, founder of the Second Amendment Foundation, a gun rights advocacy organization in Washington State. “But I don’t think flaunting it is very productive for our cause. It just scares people.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/08/us/08guns.html

[PavePusher]

1. While I think that they should have talked to more Open Carriers...

and gone further in depth into the laws, that may well have been one of the lesser-biased articles about open carry that I have seen. And in the NYT, no less. Who says miracles don't occur...?

[AtheistCrusader]

2. California open carry is a joke.

You might as well be wearing a boat anchor on your hip.

Come on up to Washington. Open carry is LEGAL.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

3. Actually many CA cop shops have been issuing bulletins on how to handle those who open carry

They are also acknowledging that the open carry crowd is quite litigious and that officers need to do things by the book.

I have had a few cops freak when they have seen me carrying on property, but even then they have not gone nuts on me.

Note: I live out in the Calif. desert hinterlands with a real snake problem and a private shooting range.

[onehandle]

4. That's my point. It scares people.

The more they flaunt their guns the quicker the backlash will come.

[Merchant Marine]

5. You guys couldn't even get Starbucks to pay attention...

[TPaine7]

6. That is a possibility,

However, if the movement people are polite, well trained and very safe, they could reverse the perceptions of all but the most obstinate anti-gun bigots.

People were once terrified of those infernal horseless carriages. Familiarity sometimes breeds acceptance.

[SteveM]

10. Before the Teabaggers got into it, this small movement was/is polite...

Demonstrations supporting OC were attended by polite, non-confrontational people, and they seemed to engender little fear. But some of the blowholes who wouldn't touch a cup of hot tea in their life are busy undoing this initial approach.

[SteveM]

11. Before the Teabaggers got into it, this small movement was/is polite...

Demonstrations supporting OC were attended by polite, non-confrontational people, and they seemed to engender little fear. But some of the blowholes who wouldn't touch a cup of hot tea in their life are busy undoing this initial approach.

[virginia mountainman]

7. So far, the backlash has been lashing the gun control advocates..

O, for almost two decades......Seems to be getting STRONGER and STRONGER...

[friendly_iconoclast]

8. It scares *some* people. Perhaps some bright spark will give us Mulford II

banning open carry of *any* gun. Like the first Mulford Act, signed into law by that well-know Democratic progressive
Ronald Reagan. Apparently, he didn't dig people openly carrying guns, either.

Great minds think alike, and all that...

[oneshooter]

9. I think that it REALLY scares you. n/t

[Statistical]

12. The more you keep flaunting your freedom of speech the quicker the backlash will come.

RIGHTS ARE RIGHTS!

Black people scares some people.
Homosexuals scares some people.
Freedom scares some people.

It is never justified to infringe upon rights in the name of avoiding "scariness".

If people keep open carrying eventually (years, decades, centuries) people will stop being scared.
You aren't scared of cops open carrying (well maybe you are but most people aren't).

[onehandle]

13. Guns are people too. nt

[Statistical]

14. No but PEOPLE have the right to keep and bear arms.

It is the PEOPLE not the Guns that have rights.

[cowman]

15. Yeah Onehandle

you just keep believing that, Fairy tales can come true, they can happen to you

[PavePusher]

16. I open carry...

and no-one ever had an attack of the vapors. Or even cared, that I could tell.

I guess Arizonans, Utahans, Vermonters and New Hampshirites are made of sterner stuff than you and yours.