Idea to turn public opinion in favor of firearms

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Open carry is leagle here in Oregon. I choose to O.C. all the time. It doesn't cause problems with the public. But will get LE to have a Terry stop! Which they need to stop! We have a guy walking around with an AR15 & handgun. He rates the P.D.s in Oregon along I-5. Check him out on YouTube
Seems to be getting alot of positive feedback! Yes on open carry!
 
Vector said:
....Ergo, if more law abiding citizens were to OC in everyday life and routine activities, the anti's would become desensitized, and less vocal in their opposition. The regular people would also not be "freaked out by evil guns" because their exposure would by much greater. ....

So I am curious about what others think of this. While I have no issue with others bringing up different examples of where social engineering has occurred to desensitize the populace,...
I think there is far too little evidence that wide spread openly carrying guns would necessarily have that effect.

Certainly in the late 1960s in California, the Black Panthers openly carrying guns resulted in the open carry of loaded guns being made illegal. And a few years ago, demonstrations involving the open carrying or unloaded guns resulted in that being made illegal.

If enough people do something that's legal but they do it in a way that enough other people find obnoxious, the activity might not stay legal for long.

[1] See this post 6 regarding the history of the loss in Florida of the right to openly carry in this thread on another forum.

[2] There are plenty of examples of rights being lost because enough folks didn't like the ways in which they were being exercised. Over the years, in many communities, we have seen many zoning and other laws adopted restricting how you can use your own property. In some places you may not work on your car in your own driveway in view of the public street. In some places you must get design approval of remodeling or landscaping visible to the public. In some communities, you may not park or store large vehicles like boats on trailers or RVs on your property so as to be visible to the public. These sorts of restrictions have in large part been the result of strong enough public sentiment that some things previously lawfully done by private parties on their own land were unseemly or unattractive.

If a lot of people start legally open carrying their guns hoping to achieve a particular political result, we can reasonably expect a range of responses from, "Cool" to "Yawn" to "A nut with a gun; there ought to be a law." What the distribution is will decide whether openly carrying is politically helpful or politically harmful. But we can't know whether open carrying is doing any political good without having a better idea of that distribution. And the distribution will probably be different in different places at different times.

Some tools like properly conducted surveys or focus groups can be useful in measuring public opinion and predicting likely effect. But the flip side is that without that sort of evidence, we really can't know whether open carry, from a political perspective, is good or bad.
 
If the pro-2A side were able to determine, agree upon, and implement effective solutions for current issues, it would go a long way toward shutting down anti-2A momentum. In the absence of solutions, it leaves the door open for emotional appeal, grabbing at straws, any nearly any agenda the anti-2A wishes to pursue as a ruse in lieu of a solution.

The prevailing direction is the latter, rather than the former.
 
When raw, emotional nerves are exposed by mainstream (bought-off) media and anti gun political insanity every day of the week, impressionable people become hyper-sensitized to the lies spread about gun ownership.

It would be great if they were to get off the couch and research what they are being force-fed, but they are too lazy, and believe what they see or read as gospel. Desensitizing these potatoes is unlikely. Maybe gain a few converts with words, but a trip to an outdoor range for some fun would likely gain more. I say outdoor range as there is less noise than indoors.

OC, no problem with it, but wouldn't do it if it were legal here, because it does intimidate some people, to the point they might call the cops about a crazy person with a gun.

Look at all the youtube videos of kids OC'ing to look menacing, with the intent of having John Q. Citizen call the cops so they may record the stop. These cops could be dispatched elsewhere where they might be needed, instead of having to stop teeny-boppers, or young adults, and wasting time for the kids' amusement, to try to catch a cop in a bad light, as sometimes happens.

Anyway, going to the range with my dad, first time ever, as he just got his CHCL. That's what I call desensitizing.
 
Sorry, isn't going to happen. Nice in theory, impossible in reality. You can't lock up everyone who "might" one day be a danger to society.

People would be far better off learning to protect themselves, and to be prepared than to worry about the "wrong people" getting guns.

Of course you can't, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't try. What, exactly, is wrong with background checks?? This seems like a no-brainer to me. I don't want violent felons to own guns! I don't give a hoot about their 2A rights. With half the gun purchases in this country not subject to any form of background check, and most of the pro-gun crowd fighting UBC every step of the way, can we even SAY we're trying to prevent bad apples from buying guns?

You know what's the biggest threat to our 2A rights? Its not our "evil, tyrannical gov't", its when guns get into the wrong hands. If Lanza didn't shoot up a school, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now. Fighting for the 2A is cute, but figuring out how to prevent dangerous people from easy access to guns will go a LOT further in protecting our gun rights.
 
What, exactly, is wrong with background checks?? This seems like a no-brainer to me. I don't want violent felons to own guns!
Criminals don't buy legitimately. Background checks will not affect them.
 
Criminals don't buy legitimately. Background checks will not affect them.

Without some form of background checking, violent criminals CAN buy guns legitimately. Sure, someone can always circumvent the law. Does this mean we shouldn't have laws? Murder is illegal, but it happens anyway. Should we just get rid of the law because its "not working"? Why make it easy for a violent criminal to buy a gun?

UBC is a commonsense measure that will affect NO decent, law abiding gun enthusiast. Being against stuff like that makes us look completely unreasonable and delusional. I say let's not give the anti's any easy arguments to use against us. Its in our own best interests to keep guns out of the hands of violent criminals, and UBC would be a big part of doing that.
 
Without some form of background checking, violent criminals CAN buy guns legitimately. Sure, someone can always circumvent the law. Does this mean we shouldn't have laws? Murder is illegal, but it happens anyway. Should we just get rid of the law because its "not working"? Why make it easy for a violent criminal to buy a gun?

UBC is a commonsense measure that will affect NO decent, law abiding gun enthusiast. Being against stuff like that makes us look completely unreasonable and delusional. I say let's not give the anti's any easy arguments to use against us. Its in our own best interests to keep guns out of the hands of violent criminals, and UBC would be a big part of doing that.
Uh-oh, there's that word "commonsense" creeping into the fray once again. How about using the thousands of laws already on the books? How about scrutinizing a bill to see what's actually in and attached to it, have it go through due process, and then bring it to a vote.

I'm confused by your question, "should we just get rid of the law because its not working"?

Should we flood our judicial system with even more laws that won't work, because others aren't working (read ignored)?

Accepting the hangman's noose with no reason to be at the gallows is what this administration is pushing, and I for one will not stand for it.

Finally, once again, violent criminals will always be able to buy, steal, and procure guns, no matter the laws on the books. What part of that don't you understand?
 
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Vector said:
Heck one day on the forum I was reading where a gun owner said he would call the police if he saw someone doing OC even though it was legal, though not a common site. When I asked him why, he replied that "it seemed strange to him, and why not have the guy checked out, just to be safe".

The writer is mistaken in his assumption. The police do not have the authority to 'check me out just to be safe', unless I allow them to. In other words, the police cannot detain me for behaving lawfully. Yes, they can stop and talk to me about open carry, BUT, if open carry is a lawful activity (like it is here), then the I need only ask if I'm free to leave. Unless the officer can articulate a crime the OCer is committing, has just committed, or is likely to commit, the officer cannot demand that I stop and chat or provide identification.

I have done this several times. The officer stops me because he saw my OC, or it was reported to him, and I politely asked if I was being detained. When he said no, I politely wished him a good day and I walked away.

AlexanderA said:
I disagree completely. The result of extensive open carrying would be the opposite -- hyper-sensitizing.
You are wrong. When open carry started in Washington (always legal but never practiced) it was started in Seattle, easily the most liberal city in the Northwest. It raised some eyebrows, caused a few MWAG calls, but the end result is that people aren't as disturbed by it as they were in the beginning. If you do a trend analysis, you'd notice a desensitizing. There are now very few police encounters for open carry folks to write about- the cops simply don't come.
 
Uh-oh, there's that word "commonsense" creeping into the fray once again. How about using the thousands of laws already on the books? How about scrutinizing a bill to see what's actually in and attached to it, have it go through due process, and then bring it to a vote.

...

Should we flood our judicial system with even more laws that won't work, because others aren't working (read ignored)?

Would you change your mind about UBC if the existing laws were enforced more strictly?
 
Would you change your mind about UBC if the existing laws were enforced more strictly?
At this point, I demand the laws on the books be enforced, period.

Anything this administration is pushing in its "gun control" farce would be meaningless (it is already), if the above was actually done.
 
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The writer is mistaken in his assumption. The police do not have the authority to 'check me out just to be safe', unless I allow them to. In other words, the police cannot detain me for behaving lawfully. Yes, they can stop and talk to me about open carry, BUT, if open carry is a lawful activity (like it is here), then the I need only ask if I'm free to leave. Unless the officer can articulate a crime the OCer is committing, has just committed, or is likely to commit, the officer cannot demand that I stop and chat or provide identification.

I have done this several times. The officer stops me because he saw my OC, or it was reported to him, and I politely asked if I was being detained. When he said no, I politely wished him a good day and I walked away.

My comment was not referring to the LEO stopping you to be safe, rather it was the pro 2A poster who said he would call the police "just to be safe".

So while your encounter with a LEO could go well or poorly, it would matter little to the 2A supporter who is so unused to seeing OC, he would react like a typical anti-gunner by calling the police.

To me, as long as we don't get a bunch of yahoo's acting the fool, more OC will help to get John Q. to find it less disturbing.

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Vector said:
...To me, as long as we don't get a bunch of yahoo's acting the fool, more OC will help to get John Q. to find it less disturbing....
But what evidence do you have to support that contention? In post 27 I outlined a number of reasons to in fact seriously doubt that widespread open carry is likely to have a positive effect on pubic attitudes and perceptions and thus further the RKBA.

If it's legal and someone finds open carry a convenient or personally desirable way to go about armed, that's fine. But we should not necessarily believe that doing so will change public opinion in a way the benefits the RKBA without solid evidence.
 
Idea to turn public opinion in favor of firearms.

All we need is a color.
We will wear colored bracelets and get magnetic ribbons for our cars.

Then all will be OK.
 
My suggestion to break the ice in areas where OC is legal but rare--Muskets. OC with flintlock and caplock smoke poles. They're big, easy to notice but they don't typically make people too scared. They're a gateway drug. And they can open the way to discussions of history and the Second Amendment without being too "aggressive." For example you could carry a Hall Rifle around and if people ask you can tell them how it gave rise to their cars, laptops and every other piece of modern technology. Those interchangeable parts were the sine quo non of the industrial revolution. Quirky, perhaps, but nothing they're going to call a SWAT team on. And if they do you can educate the SWAT team.

Of course you will have to grow long chin whiskers and take to using phrases like "tarnations" and "foofarah"
 
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I'd like to see us become more proactive instead of reactive.We need to pressure our congress to introduce legislation to loosen or eliminate restrictive gun laws in states that have them. This sitting around and waiting for the left's next attack on our 2nd amendment is poor form.
 
I live in an open carry state, but I think if everyone OC'd the public would just plain freak out.
I quit OC a long time ago. No need to advertise.
Nothing will flip you out more than a kid in walmart pointing at you and yelling "MOM!!!! THAT MAN HAS A GUN!!!!!!!"
 
But what evidence do you have to support that contention? In post 27 I outlined a number of reasons to in fact seriously doubt that widespread open carry is likely to have a positive effect on pubic attitudes and perceptions and thus further the RKBA.

If it's legal and someone finds open carry a convenient or personally desirable way to go about armed, that's fine. But we should not necessarily believe that doing so will change public opinion in a way the benefits the RKBA without solid evidence.

While I might not have articulated it as well as I could, I addressed this in my opening post about how desensitization has worked in this country. This is true in far more controversial social issues like mixed marriage and homosexuality.
In very short periods of time, the deliberate and constant exposure in movies, on TV, in books and other media has had the effect of people who are even opposed, throwing up their hands in despair. Others begin to see it as just another lifestyle choice, and still others get on the bandwagon to stand up for it even if they themselves do not personally care for it.

There is no doubt in my mind that if every 30th or 40th person was open carrying in public where it is legal, even anti-gunners would be less likely to call the police on them. Yet today we have states where it is legal, but so few people do it, even pro-2A people call the police just to have them checked out for safety's sake. :rolleyes:


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Vector said:
But what evidence do you have to support that contention? In post 27 I outlined a number of reasons to in fact seriously doubt that widespread open carry is likely to have a positive effect on pubic attitudes and perceptions and thus further the RKBA.

If it's legal and someone finds open carry a convenient or personally desirable way to go about armed, that's fine. But we should not necessarily believe that doing so will change public opinion in a way the benefits the RKBA without solid evidence.

While I might not have articulated it as well as I could, I addressed this in my opening post about how desensitization has worked in this country. This is true in far more controversial social issues like mixed marriage and homosexuality....
But what evidence do you have that public attitudes with regard to mixed marriages and and homosexuality are sufficiently similar to public attitude toward citizens carrying guns in public to be relevant? Indeed there are reasons to believe that they are not.

  1. Grudging public acceptance of mixed marriages rode the coattails and was inexorably intertwined with the Civil Rights Movement (of the 1950s and 1960s) and has taken many years.

  2. Several things in particular that argue against that notion with regard to homosexuality:

    • There has been and is considerable sympathy in the straight community for gay rights. Many people actively participating in gay rights demonstrations and active in the struggle for gay rights were straight. On the other hand, how many non-gun owners actively support the RKBA?

    • There has been significant support for gay rights from mainstream media, academia and even some influential religious organizations.

    • The gay rights movement was tremendously helped by the fact that it turns out that many gays were well liked, well regarded, prominent and influential public figures (especially in the arts), all of whom had well established public personae independent of their sexual orientation prior to the revelation that they are gay.

    • Many of those gay public figures are also extremely affluent and have been able to pour considerable money into support of politicians who support gay rights. (And many of those public figures are also using their money and influence to promote gun control.)

    • Various public demonstrations promoting gay rights did not include showing up with and displaying loaded guns.


Vector said:
...In very short periods of time, the deliberate and constant exposure in movies, on TV, in books and other media has had the effect of people who are even opposed,...
How things are portrayed in the media has the potential to have a tremendous effect on public opinion. Many people that their cues about what is good or bad, acceptable or unacceptable, from the "opinion makers" of the media. What the media says about something can be more significant to many people than what those people see looking out their windows.

If television, movies and books started to portray in a positive way private citizens carrying guns in public, that might well benefit the RKBA. But that's very different from a bunch of ordinary folks wandering around downtown with loaded guns on their hips.

Vector said:
...There is no doubt in my mind that if every 30th or 40th person was open carrying in public where it is legal, even anti-gunners would be less likely to call the police on them....
  1. Yet you really have no good evidence to support that notion.

  2. People might not be calling the police. But they might be writing their legislators urging the banning of open carry. That's pretty much what happened in Florida and California.
 
I don't have a PM :(

I think there is no evidence because it hasn't been tried as a "desensatizing experiment". And at this point I'm not sure it would help. The people who don't care, wouldn't care. But those that do, will scream and call the police.
 
Yes, you sent me a PM. But it does not answer my question, nor is it at all relevant to this thread.

First I'd expect that common courtesy would dictate a private response, rather than a public one. However it is presumably now ok to publicly have discourse with a mod without fear of the thread getting locked or retribution.

My concern as I told you via PM was that I do not want to re-experience what happened in another thread. A moderator got into a debate in a thread I created, then essentially derailed it, only to wind up locking it because it was deemed by them to be circular. So while I am happy to discuss this with you, I do not want the same thing to happen here. Also I am reluctant to get into specifics about the homosexuality aspect as you did for fear it would be considered a lock worthy subject not to be debated here at THR.

Now as to this threads topic, the irony of your premise is that by people exercising their OC rights, "it might backfire" to where those rights are taken away.
To me that is counter intuitive. You want to keep a right, but not exercise it? What good is it then, especially when if done so rarely, the day you attempt to use it, you are going to be stopped by the police all in the name of safety?

There are many examples of how desensitization works aside from the controversial ones I mentioned in the OP. I'm sure we can discuss different examples, as well as the merits of whether responisble OC will have the effect I believe it will.

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Vector said:
..Now as to this threads topic, the irony of your premise is that by people exercising their OC rights, "it might backfire" to where those rights are taken away.
To me that is counter intuitive...
It might seem ironic and counter intuitive, but I've given a number of example of when that has, in fact, been the result.

Vector said:
...There are many examples of how desensitization works aside from the controversial ones I mentioned in the OP. I'm sure we can discuss different examples, as well as the merits of whether responisble OC will have the effect I believe it will.
Nonetheless, unless you have some solid evidence (1) that other examples of desensitization working in other contexts are relevant to gun rights; and (2) to support your beliefs about open carry, there really isn't much to discuss.
 
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It might seem ironic and counter intuitive, but I've given a number of example of when that has, in fact, been the result..

:rolleyes:

Taking that attitude would mean that any time the anti's were successful in suppression of our 2A rights, we should be hesitant in standing up for them in the future.

Nonetheless, unless you have some solid evidence (1) that other examples of desensitization working in other contexts are relevant to gun rights; and (2) to support your beliefs about open carry, there really isn't much to discuss.

On this we could not be in further disagreement. I do not need studies or examples "relevant to gun rights" to know desensitization works in many aspects of our lives. Heck even if it were just a notion or belief that a 2A supporter had without proof, should not preclude it's discussion.

The way to deal with the anti-2A types is not to just sit back and wait to play defense. Rather a lawful exercise of our OC rights in a calm and routine manner is a pro-active way to educate the general public that they do not have anything to fear from lawful gun ownership.



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