Now, While I do agree that everyone has the right to defend themselves and we all should have the right to carry, I also believe that EVERYONE has the right to CHOOSE if they want someone armed on THEIR property. If you do not like THEIR rules on THEIR property, then YOU have the right to CHOOSE not to enter. That my friend is what is called FREEDOM.
The premise is valid on its own, but it is not freedom in a larger context.
The feudal period when most people were nothing but a serf was in many regards quite similar to private property laws.
Nobility owned all property, property was not for sale, but was for rent. The acceptable payment of rent was not in currency, but in a percentage of grown crops.
Since the land belonged to the barons it was their private property and the peasants had the freedoms the baron allowed on his property.
Within modern context it is entirely conceivable something similar could happen, that most of the land in the nation will be private property held by those which do not allow such freedoms. This is especially true of large corporations, businesses and companies, and often goes even above their decision making to insurance policies. Many businesses have to have insurance to legally operate, it is not even an option under the law. Should insurance companies and their policies eventually dictate the freedoms everyone has in most locations?
Should teams of lawyers working in administration buildings hundreds of miles away be number crunching and determining the lowest liability is if they deny every employee and customer the right to arms?
We also have modern technology that is allowing quite advanced screening methods, methods that may become more and more routine and less challenged as time goes on. They already have cameras some places that can see through typical clothing and detect weapons, primarily in other parts of the world near wealthy financial areas. Most people they are used on are unaware they are even being searched while walking down the street.
As happens with all technology these things become less expensive every year and it is entirely foreseeable such things will become as routine as surveillance cameras currently are in retail stores and other private property.
Even the government has been anticipating this for some time.
Here is an article from 2007:
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij/journals/258/detecting-concealed-weapons.html
We discussed it here on THR a couple years ago, before the controversy with the TSA made the news this year:
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=346425
Then it was rare, now airports around the nation use back scatter scanning routinely.
People know they are being searched there however, with passive cameras it is less noticed.
There was a time when just being on video camera was considered intrusive, a violation of privacy, and made people uncomfortable. Now they are standard security in most places.
There was a time when cameras were also really expensive and only high end places even considered having them for security, now everyone has even higher quality ones.
The same will happen with those that can passively detect things like concealed firearms.
Eventually every corporate building and later mom and pop store will be able to afford to install them to monitor customers and employees.
So there will be a time in the not so distant future when most on private property will readily know who is and is not armed, and a legal concealed firearm will not be concealed from view to those looking through the cameras.
If most such businesses have a no firearms policy, and most can see who has firearms, and both teams of lawyers and insurance providers mandate no guns policies for various reasons...
Eventually your freedom to carry won't mean anything, because you won't be able to go anywhere with a concealed firearm.
As the population increases the amount of undeveloped land and open space will also continue to decrease, and the density of development will increase.
If you spend time in most cities you know you cannot even drink some water or use the bathroom without entering private property, typically businesses with surveillance.
Eventually most of the population will live in such density, where developed private property with security is what surrounds you on all sides and going in and out of private property is a required part of doing anything.
Should your right to be armed cease to exist because the only places you can carry is on the sidewalk and street, and not actually stop or go inside anyplace armed? Right now it is not such a critical issue, and right now the technology that lets everyone see who is armed is not widespread, so concealed still means concealed, and most people carrying in violation of private policies are never known and so retain their freedom even in such businesses.
That will likely change.
)
