Posted on 08/21/2005 6:02:36 AM PDT by CholeraJoe
"Never, ever leave home without it." No, not your American Express card, your sidearm.
This morning, I woke up about 4:15 and was hungry, so I decided to drive to the local 24-hour beanery. The only other customers were a table of 10, intoxicated 20-somethings making alot of noise.
There were 7 muscular young men and three loud-mouthed young women. After listening to their raucous laughter for 10 minutes, I politely asked the waitress to ask them to hold down the noise. All I wanted to do was eat my breakfast in relative peace.
Her request for quiet lasted about 45 seconds, then the noise and laughter resumed. At that point, I decided to do something.
Bear in mind that I am not an imposing figure. I'm 5'9", mid 50's, and slim. I walked over to the table, and walked completely around it twice. I said, "I'd like y'all to hold down the noise for a while, please." One of the young men started to give me trash-talk but within seconds was elbowed by the guy next to him, who whispered something in his ear. Then everyone at the table said, "Yes, sir, or OK."
What made the difference? Open carry. I was wearing a 9mm semi-auto on my right hip. I never touched it and I made no threats, but it was nevertheless visible.
Keep it up and someday you will meet someone who is more stupid than you are, and you can spend the rest of your life either justifying how you shot that stupid punk, or wondering at how fast he was able to pin your arm so you could not get it out, and then marvelling at how he beat the living sh!t out of you.
The funny thing about gasoline, is that it often lights up with just a spark, when you don't want it to. It's not the bullet that lights it up, but if that bullet has a metal jacket, like a hornady 45 xtp hollow point, the spark it makes bouncing off the concrete will.
If this were a CCW situation I would agree with you. We should never show a firearm to impose our will on another. However, this was not a CCW. It was open carry, a permissible act in many states.
What happened here was simply a person asking for civil behavior from another. Perfectly legal and needed far more today IMO.
Choosing to carry openly is not a reason to give up standards or the ability to ask for civil behavior.
But you weren't looking for trouble...yeah...right. And that circling the table twice, that wasn't so that they could all get a glimpse of your bad-assed little piece right? Uh-huh...sure. The more comments I read, and the more I think about it, the more I realize that it's a pity you weren't arrested for menacing.
Only in your unique way of thinking.
Face it, you initiated a potentially deadly confrontation over nothing. Nothing but some conduct you perceived as impolite. I tried to be polite to you the first time, but honestly the fact that you confronted these people over something as low-stakes as some drunken loudness makes you look like a small person.
I'm gonna step out of this conversation because at this point I don't want to be seen talking to you. Go ahead and have the last word...
"What you did was wrong."
Affirmative.
Cholera Joe,
I live in Massachustts, a traditionally anti-gun state, so perhaps I treat my concealed carry permit with some delicacy, since it was so touchy to get it.
When I applied, my instructor suggested I request a concealed carry permit. My town requires that I have to write a letter to the Chief of Police explaining why I need it.
I know that rankles people who don't live here, and I understand why, but that is the rule in my town.
My instructor explained: The Chief of Police doesn't want to have to explain later on why he approved a concealed carry permit for a murderer.
So, I disagree with what you did. Doesn't make me right, but just my opinion. If they had been harassing other diners, throwing food around, and perhaps telling the owner to shove it, maybe it might have been appropriate.
In this case, noisy, intoxicated post-adolecents...I don' t really think so.
what state has open carry?
The Switzerland argument is total crap. The Swiss do not carry their Swiss Army Weapons around town and brandish them openly -- that would be a crime! The guns are kept at home as part of the Swiss defense strategery.
People like you are the best argument against allowing weapons in public. Your actions were beyond irresponsible. What gave YOU the right to decide the noise policy inside a restaurant and then threaten other customers with your obvious intimidation tactic backed up with a gun? Were you the owner, manager, or a cop? No, you were just another customer making a complete fool of yourself -- and for what? Noise?
The fact that you are so proud of yourself for scaring a bunch of kids is the most pathetic part of this disgraceful tale.
Agreed,it is the fumes that ignite, not the liquid.
By my figuring, I've had about 17,000 breakfasts so far. Shame I didn't know in advance I was entitled for every last one of them to be exactly the way I wanted. Guess I'm a pussy.
Surprising. Not only is open carry legal in Montana, concealed carry without a permit is legal while engaged in, travelling to or returning from any outdoor activity in which self-defense might be necessary, such as hiking, hunting, fishing, skiing, snowmobiling, etc, as long as one is outside city limits.
Thanks for the code. My humble cusory reading doesn't see any violation, that should involve the police.
There were no fighting words, exposures, unreasonable noises (disrupting the business in question).
If that table refused to be quiet, at the request of one patron, and the restaurant staff chose not to call the police, what is the violation?
DK
Did it occur to you that one of those muscular young men could have jumped you & grabbed your gun?
And pointed it at you?
Right. I must comment that since being LTC, I find I no longer get angry in traffic, and have become more passive. I just keep out of the way of @ssholes.
I hate paperwork, and courts, and things like that. Even if someone does a vehicular assault that I can prove, and I (rightly) plug him between the eyes, I am probably going to lose my house paying for legal fees, and possibly my freedom.
Things can escalate too fast. This is not a rehearsal, it's for all the chips.
Neither the Federalist nor the Anti-Federalist papers address the Bill of Rights--they only address the text of the un-amended Constitution. If you want to understand the Federal Constitution's Bill of Rights, the place to look is at the pre-Constitution Bills of Rights of the various states. The best statement is from the Connecticut state constitution (paraphrasing, as I don't have the exact quote handy) "that the people have the right to keep and bear arms for defense of themselves and their own state, and the taking of game". Self defense, militia duty, and hunting were ALL reasons for codifying the RKBA.
See a couple of my prior posts. The raucous laughter was punctuated by four letter words and racial slurs.
Arizona is one state I know of.
NC theoretically has open carry, but it would be insane to try it here in Chapel Hill.
If anything, carrying openly demands that you show MORE courtesy, restraint, and civility. Having a lethal weapon on your person demands that you take more crap off people than you normally would.
This comes from a 5.9" guy who got into constant fights in HS while weighing less than 160 lbs. Carrying that kind of chip on your shoulder when sporting a weapon is a recipe for trouble. A firearm is the LAST resort for settling problems, not a flashing billboard to announce that you can't be ****ed around with.
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