You know what they say.
Sometimes its better to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.
Wouldn't it have been funny if a lunatic walked in after that and started murdering people?
But good thing they made it a 'gun-free' zone (like the theatre in Auburn)
Carrying to protect ones self and other is responsible - but also liable. I have a lifetime CC permit - and I carry everywhere! But it’s concealed. That’s the purpose - no one knows. The guy who walked in and everyone saw it - open carry - is just going to alarm everyone that doesn’t know this guy - or have any knowledge that he is competent in shooting a shooter during a gun fight without hitting others. That’s the liable part of it. If it’s prohibited, it would be hard to argue that the one “protecting” ended up shooting others while defending himself or family or others - but the stress of the situation wouldn’t be omitted and actually be used against the self-appointed protector. At the end, each person is going to have to weigh the consequences of going out into public venues at this point to carry concealed and take the chance of liability - or not to carry and become a victim of a shooting. Then again, nothing may happen.
Business are going to loose customers like MarkTwain said - and in this economy - that’s not good. Maybe the Med Student wanted to hasten the bad economy to even worst — and started his own little revolution in a movie theater - or was just evil!
A suprisingly calm ending to this story with no botched raid or dead dog.
I know many FReepers know this, but this always reminds me of the Luby’s massacre, when a Texas woman and her parents went into a gunfree Luby’s cafeteria in TX. They had to leave their guns in the car because of the rules.
Unfortunately, for some reason that was the place a mass murderer decided to have a killing spree. Probably one of the few places in TX where it was a target range for that. And the woman lost both her parents. Susannah Hupp was the reason many of us have CC today.
I guess the signs being too small in the theater in Colorado was the REAL problem. (Smacks forehead.) Yep; that’s all it was.
Why not carry concealed and nobody is the wiser? They still had to secure their weapons in their car, and there are at least some in that theater who are now less supporting of carrying firearms.
The idea is to protect yourself and loved ones, not cause a scene.
I suspect that the officers did not leave their wepons in their cars while informing the citizens they must disarm.
My respectful, quiet response would be “Sir, you’re carrying yours.”
(Of course, my assumption could be wrong...in some alternate universe where government agencies follow the rules they set for the rest of us.)
This happaned while I lived on Long Island, and sounded the death knell for my patronage of movie theaters:
http://www.nytimes.com/1990/12/31/nyregion/youth-charged-in-shootout-at-godfather-movie-on-li.html
Mind you, that was in 1990!
Open carry vs. concealed ... I would rather not have some idiot college mush brain wimpy kid, or an eating-greens manager, ruin my night out, because I choose to be prepared to defend my life, if that situation ever ( ‘do not tempt fate’), arose.
Jesse Stone books: “Whenever in a fight, front sight, front sight, front sight!”
For the more advanced of you ... Mozambique! Mozambique! Mozambique!
Long live the Republic!