Watch a gang of heavily armed lunatics draped with big guns march into a restaurant, proudly. What the heck is wrong with these people? Do they think these stunts make them look rational?
Texas dumbasses seem to get away with this nonsense, but imagine if they were a different group of people. Imagine if they were black.
You don’t have to imagine very hard. California once had the most restrictive gun control laws in the country — in particular, the Mulford Act made it illegal for people to play the stupid games Open Carry Texas does. And it was prompted by the fact that black people were advocating carrying guns around to protect themselves from an abusive police. That was enough for St. Ronald.
Then Gov. Ronald Reagan, now lauded as the patron saint of modern conservatism, told reporters in California that he saw "no reason why on the street today a citizen should be carrying loaded weapons." Reagan claimed that the Mulford Act, as it became known, "would work no hardship on the honest citizen." The NRA actually helped craft similar legislation in states across the country.
We could probably reverse these stupidly permissive gun laws if our black and Latino citizens started flaunting more legally carried guns, but I wouldn’t recommend it — it’s not worth getting shot over, and you know there are white people — and white police officers — who would feel threatened, and there would be blood spilled.
A better strategy: if an idiot with a gun shows up at a place of business you are frequenting, go up to the management and say, “There’s an idiot with a gun over there: throw him out or you’ve lost my business.” Those bozos are dangerous.
The thing is, I’d be more forgiving if they were open carrying with a hand gun. But when you have assault rifles, it’s unforgivable really. I could conceive of circumstances where that should allowed with a hand gun. (Granted to get such a license you should be required to show reasonable need, like if someone often carried large sums of money with them for a job, such as dealing coins.)
It is of course the automatic perception that a heavily armed group of POC are violent and dangerous gang members (probably selling drugs), whereas white people armed heavily with the same guns are proud patriots protecting america and all that is good (freedom etc.).
Unfortunately, the Texas Obscene Device Law was overturned. That strict restriction on sex toys would have required these guys to keep their penis enlargers out of sight.
Sorry (not really), but they scared the shit out of me. If they showed up like that at a place I was eating, and just kinda stood in the doorway with all those giant guns, I’d be (a) freaked out and (b) looking for any and all possible exits, just in case.
It’s no better here in Georgia, our dip-shit governor helped push through a law that allows anyone to carry guns anywhere they want. Well, with the exception of the state capitol building. I hear what you saying PZ but if more minorities at least signed up for the conceal carry permit I think the white dip-shit governor would piss all over himself. And the law might be changed.
Lunatics? You think these men are lunatics?! Just wait. One day you’ll be waiting in line for your lactose-free soy-based vanilla latte and bam! Time traveling Nazi-soviet special forces show up. You’ll reach for your true American M16 to send those commie bastards back to gay hell, but you’re hand will only grasp empty air. Soon, those socialist will take over everything, and force socialized medicine on your grandparents to kill them and make you sons wear dresses. True story. Lunatics. Ha!
Even the NRA doesn’t like these guys:
http://freakoutnation.com/2014/06/01/the-nra-slams-open-carry-groups-in-texas-calls-them-weird/
I suppose it could be made legal for these guys to walk around with their genitals exposed but that wouldn’t matter as nobody would be impressed by them.
I wonder what it would have been like if the gay couple kicked out of the Texas restaurant were toting assault rifles.
It’s as if clever anti-gunners came up with an idea for how to troll the fuck out of the NRA. With friends like them, who needs parody?
It’s a strange land, when I can walk into a restaurant with a piece of equipment that could kill everyone in the building, and it is my constitutional right. However, if I walk into the same restaurant with a 18″ rubber cock, I’ll get arrested.
Matt Bors linked to a video some time ago of a couple of open carry loons in Oregon. Their videos of themselves are so revealing. So these guys are walking around with their assault rifle and a police officer pulls up to talk to them about it. Cop knows they’re within the law, but he wants to diffuse the situation, also maybe find out if they’re doing something illegal that he can’t plainly see I suppose. What follows is the most polite, nicest cop ever trying to have a polite conversation with two men with guns who are clearly trying to provoke him. But he never even touches his weapon. They’re all: “We have the right to do this!” and he’s all: “Yes, you do have the right, but we’re getting a lot of phone calls about you. People are scared and upset.” and they’re all: “We have the right to do this!” He even offers to let them look at his issue assault rifle in his trunk. He wants to examine their guns (maybe he’s looking for illegal ammo, maybe just trying to keep a dialog going, I don’t know). They refuse to let him touch their guns.
Maybe this cop is the best cop ever and it wouldn’t have gone any different had they been black, but decades of experience tell us that if a black man tries to pull out his wallet on his own door step he’ll be killed in a hail of police bullets. It’s hard to imagine that this would have happened this way if they’d been black men.
Texas politicians will tout their undying love of the 2nd amendment, but if these guys showed up at the state house they’d be blocked at the door. A bunch of yahoos with long arms is OK for your work environment, but not for theirs.
I think it’s funny that they all think Obama is trying to take away their guns. I’ve heard people claiming their gun rights have been restricted already under Obama, and this was even pre Newtown. As far as I know, there’s been no federal law restricting firearm access.
But since I moved to Ohio from Florida, the state that spends its time mostly trying to catch up to Texas in embarrassing America, Ohio has gone from not allowing concealed carry to allowing concealed carry, to expanding concealed carry to include bars, to Castle Doctrine, and last I heard was well on the way to Stand Your Ground.
This is not what I moved to the North for.
Here are the Oregon idiots: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rih1ogXCxAs
Living in a country with strict gun regulations, I have to admit that I cannot fathom how everyone in the restaurant isn’t screaming/hiding/calling the police… because that would surely be the reaction over here and SWAT teams would be quickly dispatched. (Well, obviously, as I said, this comes with the fact that these guys wouldn’t be allowed such weapons…)
What a bunch of idiots. I love the woman with the pink phone who flat out tells them they’re dumbasses. I also love how one of them tries to make them all feel better about it by saying “she’s just one in a million”. I’m not sure if he’s saying that he thinks her opinion is unusual, or that she actually represents a multitude, but for anyone like him, it’s almost everyone. As a percentage of the populations, I’d be we willing to bet virtually no one thinks armed gangs ought to be roaming the streets and coming into restaurants waving their weapons around.
I was also amused by the guy at the end saying: “I guess this is no longer the safest Chili’s to eat at”. No, based on all the statistics we have about guns and every way we have of measuring risk, I’d say it just got a whole lot safer. I’m glad Chili’s has the guts to have that policy, even in Texas. Unfortunately, just as I never seem to be able to participate in a boycott of say, Chik-Fil_a because I never ate there in the first place, it’s not going to be enough to get me to eat at a Chili’s.
If I were the manager I’d say “Raise your right hand. You are duly deputized by me to tell them to leave.”
Kevin Alexander @ 18
Why not just tell the complainer to fuck off? It’d be the same outcome and you’d save thirteen words.
davenash:
busterggi:
Shut the fuck up with the “lol dey have small penis” jokes. M’kay? Thanks.
Snoof @ 19 sez:
For an unusual definition of “same outcome” I’m sure it would be.
@anteprepro #20: Who said anything about them having small penises? Almost no one has genitalia that would impress anyone just walking around. And the anatomical part that’s deficient in people using penis enlargers is the brain (unless you just get off on the suction, then it’s just a toy).
anteprepro, feeling a little inadequate perhaps? Poor little thing.
busterggi, cut that shit out.
Adorable that busterggi immediately contradicts gussnarp’s attempt to apologize for the two other posters. Grand.
You can count on me to complain to management if I see people like this, even individually. When it’s a group, I think I can legitimately express worry it’ll turn into some combination of shootout, robbery, and/or hostage situation. It seems like they want a world where guns only become suspicious after someone declares this is a stick-up. Or if it’s a non-Caucasian carrying them.
I think if I actually encountered my inclination would be to immediately slip my family out the back and get the heck out of there. Whether I’d think to drop some cash on the table on the way out in my state of fear is up for grabs.
Where this whole idea flounders.
1. Person A is going on a shooting spree. Call him Elliot Rodgers (Isla Vista), Cross/Miller (Overland Park Kansas), or John Holmes (Aurora Batman).
2. Person B is a patriot taking his favorite friend, an AR 15, into Chikfila, just in case there are any Moslem terrorists there.
How do you tell person A from person B.
Well you can’t really. If some guy walks into McDonalds with an AR 15, he is either going to buy a happy meal. Or kill 20 people in a hail of semi-automatic fire.
If a restaurant I was eating at (possibly with family) were filling with people toting assault rifles, I would simply get up, walk out, end of story. The owner cannot ask me to stay long enough to pay in this environment. Maybe I’d drop off some cash later with a note.
Gun statistics being what they are, with the law of large numbers, it’s inevitable that eventually one of these demonstrations is going to end badly.
Guns are a means of intimidation, to control people even if you are not using it, to dominate, to shut up others. It amplifies the most dangerous and unpleasant qualities in all the wrong people.
Raven: it was James Holmes who perpetrated the Aurora terrorist attack.
It’s become in this country you can’t tell whether someone is going to just cart around his/her AR-17 and demonstrate their 2nd Amendment right, or go batshit and kill everyone. Guns make me nervous anyway. Idiots like this – who outright harass people who disagree with them – make me even more nervous.
Sometimes the guns’ rights activists will belittle those of use who believe in sane gun control laws by saying we are afraid of guns. This implies that they are brave, real men, and we are sissies. But they never look at the dual of the situation and see that they are so afraid of the world they feel the need to be armed, and those of us who are comfortable living with the small probability of something bad happening to us where a gun could be useful are not afraid.
In fact, even though I’m strongly in support of gun control, if for some reason I lived in a high crime area, I’d consider getting a gun. But the vast majority of people don’t live in such areas. The odds of an In Cold Blood style family killing in rural Kansas is probably less likely than dying of a lightning strike, yet “protecting the family” is one of the most cited reasons for carrying guns.
One of my brothers is a very affluent investment banker type and lives in a white bread gated community that has an epsilon crime rate. Yet he owns guns, loves the NRA, and thinks I’m an idiot for not seeing how essential it is that he needs a gun to protect his home. The far greater probability that his own gun will kill someone in his family than he will fend off a home invasion doesn’t register.
It’s to me the equivalent of going up to a stranger say in the grocery store or on the street and saying “you know, I could kill you and your family on the spot. Of course I would never do such a thing, I’m just saying, in principle *bam* and you’re gone in a split second. Not that I intend to, that would be illegal! But I could, so better watch out what you say. Not because I’d shoot you if you say something I don’t like, but be aware that I could“.
Sounds like an implicit admission that these people are scary, dangerous assholes who will possibly react violently to being told to leave.
Note, of course, the lack of policy suggestions from the NRA. Just whining about how the “weird” people are going to make restrictions on firearms more politically feasible.
Riiiight. You promote people like Wayne LaPierre, Ted Nugent and Alex Jones, then pretend to be shocked when the yahoos believe you mean what you say.
Also, presumably the people accidentally shot at Wal-Mart didn’t have guns, so that was just a regrettable and isolated accident, not “friendly fire”.
I do have a more serious question – do any of these open carry people have empathy?
I know some things I do might make people uncomfortable. I know I have a somewhat scathing sense of humor and can come across as very mean if I’m not careful with how I phrase things. So I try not to do it because I don’t want to make people upset.
These assholes don’t care if they’re making people uncomfortable. Fuck everyone I want to carry around my big ass rifle.
I enjoy occasionally fantasizing about winning a really big lottery. Not just a few million, but closer to one of those ~$1B prizes.
Part of the fantasy is getting asked what I was going to do with the money. I would say I’m thinking about two options:
– Use my newly acquired ability to speak loudly to give large contributions to every Democratic candidate in the country.
– Buy millions of guns, and sell them at pennies on the dollar to non-white American citizens who pass background checks.
It would be interesting to see how many heads explode.
I wouldn’t confront them, I wouldn’t ask the manager or hostess to confront them. Since I would feel endangered and they were standing near the entrance I would find the nearest emergency exit with an alarm and quickly exit that way.
Chris Kyle should be the poster boy for that movement.
Have I got this right? Some burro the other day said that he was sorry for the kids who lost their lives at Isla Vista but his kids would have been shooting back. So, if his kids had been in that restaurant wouldn’t they have had to start shooting the burros with the big guns? After all nobody could know what their intent was and it makes sense to start shooting first as the chances of survival would be greater.
Step 1: Get out of that restaurant
Step 2: Get out of the country
Kevin, Youhao Huo Mao wrote:
You misunderstand, Kevin. The point is to make people uncomfortable and to intimidate.
I rarely watch TV but Saturday I was at a restaurant which had a big TV blaring CNN. I don’t know who the players were, but the CNN host had some guest on and apparently the subject was how gun culture can change social dynamics, or something. The guest was saying that he was recently in some traffic situation and rather than blowing off steam at the other driver, he considered the odds that the other driver had a gun, and kept his thoughts to himself.
The CNN host said, “Gee, isn’t that a good thing? Rather than having an argument with someone, you kept things civil.” The guest chuckled and said, I guess so. I wanted to crawl into the TV and tell them they are both idiots. (1) If someone does something stupid, they should be told about it. Being silenced by the threat of getting shot isn’t a good thing (2) The flip side is how many people are emboldened to escalate a situation because they are carrying? Gaaah!
raven wrote:
Well, that’s easy: Person A will be wearing a black or dark hat, while person B will be wearing a white or light hat, just like in the old west movies.
“There’s children here, and you’re a dumbass”.
Yuhp.
Um, why does open carry apply to anything other than a handgun? I thought the intent of the legislation was so people could carry a weapon for self defence?
And did I hear a crack about having a “half black” kid when that guy brought the cradle in?
And just what in the fuck is wrong with these people?
One thing I miss about the ’50s when I grew up is the attitudes on gun safety. Transporting any weapon was, unless one was a policeman on duty, to be done with gun unloaded, preferably open breach, and the ammo in a separate bag. That was the NRA method. Bringing loaded weapons into a restaurant? Simply unheard of.
Am I allowed to be glad that that didn’t happen? One group of macho gun nuts is much better than two antagonistic groups of macho gun nuts.
If I entered a restaurant bent on committing a massacre (with my own probably legally bought gun*) and saw a bunch of people with firearms slung over their backs, I’d simply shoot them first. There’s no way they’re going to get their guns into position in time to shoot me, especially not while I’m actively shooting. Guns are terrible defensive weapons.
*Which is and, I sincerely hope, will always remain, imaginary.
I will be impressed when a groups of these weirdo gun toters enters a bank or the national NRA convention.
the whole reason we make cops wear badges and uniforms is to tell the “good guys” with guns from the bad guys.
@51
If they’re really serious, how about The Capitol Building?
@corwyn, #49
Well, you may be right but as I said, here a group of armed people in a restaurant would definitely be handled by the police as it is illegal, so the first group of macho gun nuts wouldn’t just be here to show off their guns but to use them.
I certainly would be glad to see SWAT teams (well, GIGN for me) in this situation if I were there.
@51: The NRA does not allow guests to bring guns into their headquarters and enforces this ban with metal detectors. You’d think they’d WANT to have all their guests armed to provide optimal protection against the muslimnazicommunist terrorist they’re afraid of. If they believed their own propaganda, anyway.
@38:
It’s not a lack of empathy. They lack the self-awareness of how it looks when you walk around with a big ass assualt rifle strapped to your back. To me, it makes them look exactly like the stereotypical unhinged gun nut that people point to when they want to severely restrict or outright ban gun ownership.
I am at a loss for words. “Idiots” does not cut it. “Dumbasses” is too mild. “Hee-haws” or “rednecks” seems stereotyping. “Jerks” does not relieve the steam…
Hm. Sometimes it is hard to try and purge your language of sexist, ableist language (which is a good thing, not complaining here) and still find swearwords that would correctly describe the emotions I feel right now and that would convey the immense ammount of contempt I feel for these unemphatic, asocial, primitive ammo-sexuals with their gun-fondling fetish and bizzare and absurd macho-ism.
Just ban guns, Uncle Sam. Join the civilised worls, for fuck’s sake, the evidence is clear – less guns is better.
caesar:
These fools {the gunholes} fail to understand why people might be fearful of a group of gun toting assholes-i.e. their empathy is in short supply.
Yep! Did that multiple decades ago, and keep returns / visits to a minimum.
dianne @ 55: I stole the punchline to that joke and put it on my Facebook status because I have gun-nut friends on there. Thanks. :)
Nope, but it is prima facie evidence of irresponsible gun ownership, unnecessarily putting innocent bystanders in danger due to their inability to understand the only safe gun in public is the unloaded one….
Dianne @55 – I wanted to double check the “no guns at NRA HQ” story. Although it would be delicious if true, it seems that the story comes from here:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/12/21/1172739/-I-Called-the-NRA-Today-Oh-Boy
There is a footnote saying someone else also called up NRA HQ and got a different answer. Is there a different source for this story?
It’s time we stopped, children; what’s that sound..
Well, here’s another one for the gun nuts are idiots pile: A man in MN pulls a gun on a man teaching his daughter to ride a bike and threatens to kill him.
The “he’s obviously crazy/mentally ill” crowd is out in full force on that story, too.
I hate these clowns, “protesting”/provoking their point through such asinine stunts. It’s why no matter how much fun it may be to go to a range and fire a gun, it will always be attached to a culture that can get this stupid and selfish. It’s an elaborate, expensive hobby posing as a constitutionally protected fantasy to stop imaginary tyrants from taking away their right to hate swarthy presidents and listen to Rush Limbaugh. To be the “good guy” who’s going to stop all those “bad guys” from, what, occupying a Chili’s? Terrorize a Chipotle? Wear a hoodie while carrying concealed Skittles?
You really want to open carry a long gun and not be totally out of your element, then enlist in the military (preferably Marines or Army) and try to deploy to Afghanistan before we pull the empire out of there. Because to me that is open carry; a fucking combat zone. And where the majority of people being armed to the teeth at all times is not something sane, rational people actually strive for; it is just the requirement of a unique environment where the dangers are real. And when we get back home we are happily relieved to be able to put away our weapons because it is not a war zone, no matter what some 2nd Amendment YouTuber believes.
And my own experience being in such a heavily armed situation was that it comes with a lot of baggage on even the best days. Properly clearing and safing, accountability, and dealing with the inevitable negligent discharges. Yes, despite all the training and experience, it was all too often that I either saw or heard a weapon being fired when it should not have been. And not just pistols or rifles, but machine guns and even up to a Bradley’s 25mm main gun. If a veteran gunner could even fire off a round from an armored vehicle in a motor pool–and it’s a hell of a round to be accidentally firing–why should I think some fast food customer with a video camera is going to always be more responsible?
I need a laugh every time I see these open carry buffoons in the news, and Wyatt Cynac parodied them hilariously a few years back in a segment for the Daily Show.
The only time I ever saw this many nuts with guns in Australia I was driving home and two truckloads of bikers armed to the teeth drove past. A few minutes later this was the result.
Some years ago, at a national park in Pennsylvania, an open carry group applied for a permit to hold an “Open Carry Picnic” at the site. When they got the permit no questions asked, they cancelled.
Apparently the federal government saying “yes” was not what they wanted.
Which says a lot.
Ogvorbis, @67:
When you are hoping for the apocalypse, “Sure thing! Campground 1 is all yours!” is not what they were hoping for.
ck @64:
What the ever loving FUCK??!
What causes someone to think “this guy is teaching his daughter to ride a bicycle…I should threaten to shoot him”????
gussnarp:
Exactly so. These guys are toting around rifles against threats that only exist in their minds.
Here’s another gunloving asshole:
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/06/02/texas-woman-shoots-and-abandons-caged-mother-dog-as-puppies-still-try-to-suckle/
best comment on the linked thread:
Stand Your Groundskeeping.
heh.
internal escalations happen fast when ur drunk.
imagine:
guy with 7 year old daughter on bike with training wheels.
drunk old dude, sitting on his porch:
“She ain’t gunna lurn nuthin’ ‘less you remove the trainin’ wheels!”
guy with daughter:
“Uh, sure… I got this, m’kay?”
drunk old dude feels dissed. gets angry.
“Well, if you can’t take friendly advice, maybe you should go somewhere where I can’t see ya!”
guy with daughter:
“?? wtf you on about?”
drunk old dude is even more insulted, goes to grab gun so as to threaten those pesky kids to get off his lawn (no, it doesn’t matter that they aren’t on his lawn).
I can totally picture this, having seen it in action when I was a kid, though back then, the drunk assholes typically took the trouble to fill their shotshells with rocksalt… just in case.
@Tony! The Fucking Queer Shoop!,
Good thing owning firearms is a right, or these people with anger management problems might just harmlessly explode into a burst of vulgarity instead of violence. And if there’s one thing that we all know, it’s that vulgar language and nudity is far, far worse than violence.
@Ichthyic,
But the guy said that the alcohol had nothing to do with it, so I’ll take him at his word. He must just always be this mean and cruel.
Gotta feel bad for the kid for having to witness her father being threatened like that, though.
yes, I’m sure in his mind he concludes that since he acts that way every day, alcohol has nothing to do with it, forgetting (because of the alchohol) that he also drinks every day (i’d bet money on it).
@ichthyic, #75:
and in what universe is it **better** that the alcohol had nothing to do with it?
I know that some legal systems enhance penalties (rather than reduce them, as in the English common law-derived systems) for doing a crime while intoxicated/drugged/etc.
But the US is an English common law-derived legal system, and even if it weren’t, it certainly doesn’t make it MORALLY better. Ugh. That’s some serious entitlement there, to think that the problem was recklessness (lack of intentionality) and not the fact that **you don’t get to threaten people with guns, even when you think you’re right**.
@Charly #57
I think you’ve managed to convey that very well, and without swearing once. And probably described your issues with their behaviour far more accurately than any amount of swearing, sexism or ableism would have accomplished.
Even the NRA think these people are “strange,” “scary,” and “downright weird”.
a universe where I wasn’t even trying to reason which was “better” because it’s irrelevant?
To tangent this thread [not derail, just tangent, I hope…] Okay, the 2nd amendment gives everyone the Right to own Guns, but what about ammunition? How about the simple compromise of: you can own all the guns you can buy, but it is illegal to own ammunition; only the gov can issue ammo to police and military, etc. etc. Put all kinds of restrictions on ammo; like who can buy it, where it can be used. Like, give away guns for free but charge astronomically for every single bullet?
I’d bet that would get the NRA really P.O’d while simultaneously Yielding to them. Something like, Take the NRA LITERALLY; precisely Literally. They say “Guns don’t kill, bullets kill.” so don’t make guns illegal, make bullets illegal. Bullets aren’t mentioned in the 2nd, only guns. What’s the prob? [smirk]