This message thread started with a simple question, and it has devolved into comparing folks who want to carry OC with the OCT idiots. I hope we can all take a step back and realize that this is not a binary issue. It's not "OC is idiot, and CC is the only right thing". There has to be a shade of grey in there that slowly, gently, helps John Q. Public understand that the mere presence of a gun is not reason to panic.Moby wrote:Jan 1 2016 Texans will be able to openly carry sidearms.
However in some towns local LE will have a problem with this as change never comes easy.
Wearing a firearm can get you arrested for other charges (or have in some towns)
So I'm thinking of ways to "desensitize" the local community establishments so that a MWAG call isn't made every time a legal CHL holder follows the law.
Any thoughts?
To chastise folks for even considering the idea of OC, or to belittle them for asking each other on a (supposedly friendly) gun forum for ideas on how to best do that is destructive, at best, and subversive, at worst.
Remember what TAM wrote in the following posting. He clearly explained that there are different ways to drive behavioral change in society. Hopefully, those of us who choose to OC will endeavor to be the better of the examples below (MLK instead of Malcom X / James Obergfell instead of pride marchers / Heller & McDonald instead of Watkins & Grisham). The OP was just asking for ways to make this simpler. He's just asking how we think is the best way to do what TAM suggests below (which I've highlighted in red).
Why beat him up over it?:
The Annoyed Man wrote:
(snip)
I'm going to point out some things from current and past national events which parallel this situation.......
My point is that the face we put forward in defense of the 2A matters at least as much as the correctness of our argument. Watkins and Grisham are enjoying being at the center of their little personality cults because it keeps their narcissistic egos stroked. Outrage on the cheap is their stock in trade. If we want to sway the undecided, we need to present the face of a rational group of people, interested in the preservation of our individual liberties, of which the 2A is only one, and we need to do it by cajoling the undecided to want to be part of the age of enlightenment........ and not in scaring the crap out of them by strutting around with our "gender-enhancements" on display. And no, I am NOT saying don't OC. What I AM saying, is don't turn OC into a political demonstration that scares the bejabbers out of decent people.
- Civil Rights - Racial Equality: who was more effective, Martin Luther King, or Malcolm X? MLK never threatened violence, he never was disrespectful to white people (even to his persecutors), he appealed to reason and justice, he advocated calm non-violent protest, and he publicly beseeched Almighty God to pour out His blessings upon this endeavor and upon this nation. When he wrote his letter from the Birmingham jail, and gave his "promised land" speech, and spoke of the importance of content of character over color of skin, MLK appealed to ALL Americans, because those were words we could ALL believe in. With that kind of appeal to reason and decency, he could not fail even if someone killed him.
Malcolm X, on the other hand, did threaten violence, he was disrespectful to the white people he interacted with, he did appealed to violence of action if his demands were not met, and he called on Allah to curse the society to which he was opposed. He never spoke of a greater dream, of a greater vision, one which could be shared by all people of all colors. Eventually, MX came to realize that his way was the path to defeat, and he began to adopt MLK's kind of advocacy......and he was killed for it by his former supporters.- Civil Rights - Marriage Equality: Whatever anyone thinks about the recent SCOTUS decision on same-sex marriage, there is a distinct difference between the way James Obergfell, the gay plaintiff in this case, presents himself to the public, and the way men walking in gay pride parades present themselves. The former challenges society at large to explain why gays should be barred from marriage law, while the latter makes most of us glad that these folks aren't breeders.
- Civil Rights - 2nd Amendment protections: Compare Dick Heller (an active duty capitol policeman), the plaintiff in Heller v. DC, or Otis McDonald (a dignified elderly black retiree), the plaintiff in McDonald v. City of Chicago, to either Kory Watkins or CJ Grisham. Heller and McDonald should be considered as heroes of the gun rights movement. Conversely, Watkins and Grisham have done damage to the movement, and not just here in Texas. Because their stories have been picked up nationally, they have become the faces of pro-gun advocacy for a large part of the mainstream media. Why? Because A) those two fit the media's own prejudices and memes, and B) their self-aggrandizement knows no end. Neither Heller nor McDonald, on the other hand, craved the limelight the way these two self-promoting charlatans do, and so the gun-rights movement's face has defaulted to a couple of yahoos. (And sadly, McDonald passed from this world not too long after the decision named after him.)