nitrogen wrote:Coming a little late to this, but heck, here goes.
Personally, I doubt i'd open carry.
Open carry IS important. Let me explain why:
Let's look at the issue from the perspective of the 1st amendment instead of the 2nd. I'm going to make a simple argument, full of logical fallacies and holes, but please follow me to the end.
Imagine if it was perfectly legal to be a Christian, you just couldn't wear artifacts of Christianity openly, or speak about it openly. "as we all know, Ideas are dangerous, and we wouldn't want the wrong ones openly discussed where our children could have access to them."
In effect, THIS is why open carry is important. It's the gun owners equivalent of the gays at pride parades saying, "We're here, we're queer, get used to it."
Right now, with the status quo, we can be 2nd amendment supporters, but we have to keep it to ourselves in public. Nobody knows (or should know) that we're carrying, so it gets to be an out of sight, out of mind issue for the public.
For practical reasons, that's great; because it allows the "sheeple" to stay ignorant, but allows us the maximum use of our rights today.
This is where I think a lot of OC advocates and people like Charles diverge, and start talking AT each other instead of to. Charles, and the TSRA is being pragmatic about our rights. They want the maximum use of what we can get with as few restrictions, and as few repercussions as possible from the "sheeple" This isn't a bad thing, in fact, it works up to a point. Like in business, if you never take risks, you never get rewards.
People in the OC movement (at least me) see fighting for OC as our version of "Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed" or "We're here, we're queer, get used to it." Bringing the issue out into the open, and forcing more people to talk and discuss it is very risky, but can have great rewards, too.
I think Charles and the TSRA are adverse to this risk. They see what we have now as "good enough" and I think many of the members of the TSRA would agree. I don't know Charles all that well, but from his posts on here, he strikes me as your normal conservative Conservative. This kind of position is a very conservative one, and one I'd expect.
I'm more of a liberal/progressive type. I like pushing the envelope, and I think many of the open carry advocates have some liberal tendencies, even if their beliefs fall into the typically "conservative" range. They want to push the envelope, too. Pushing the envelope causes change and progression. Many conservatives I know are more of a "regressive" (meaning, "things were better back then, we should go back to that") kind of thinking.
I don't see the TSRA's position as "bad" or "wrong" like many OC advocates seem to. I think they are being pragmatic and conservative. I also don't see the OC advocates as wrong, either.
Part of the problem is that political discourse in this country is so poor, that people are quick to demonize and lambaste people they do not agree with. This is a great example of that, I think.
Stated very well.
