Open Carry

[Firedemon]

So, let me preface this with the fact that I live in Texas, the state most proud of its guns, and open carry of handguns will become legal on January 1st here. Because of this, I've been hearing a lot of people talking about it, for and against. What are your opinions?

Mine boils down to: If you open carry you're making yourself a target. If you open carry a rifle (which is actually legal without any licensing or training in Texas), you're an idiot and a target. Not just from the logic of "He has a gun, shoot him first" but also because a gun is valuable. How much do you think an AR-15 is worth? Before or after someone shoots you in the back, lifts it off your corpse, and files the serial number off? And speaking of shooting, bringing a knife to a gun fight is surprisingly effective. Aside from the casually walking up to someone with a gun and stabbing them repeatedly and unexpectedly tactic, you can outright charge someone head on with a knife and cover a surprising amount of distance before they have time to draw a pistol from a holster and shoot you. Police are taught in training that an attacker can cover 21 feet in that time, often called the Tueller Rule.

 

[coolpool2]

Well I don't think carrying a gun around is all that effective. Like you said a person who is trained with a knife and wants to attack you will injure you before you even realize they are hostile. Also guns make people nervous. If you pull a gun on someone in a tense situation they might act rashly. Plus if for some reason violence must be used to resolve a situation there might be better ways then to put bullets into a person.

 

[Null Hypothesis]

I am a bit surprised this wasn't already legal in Texas. Honestly if you, for whatever reason, want to carry a handgun around in public there's really no reason not to go the extra step and get a concealed carry permit.

 

[Firedemon]

Oh, and for the specific case of Texas anyways, once this law goes into effect concealed carry licenses will all be "handgun licenses" and any handgun license will allow you to open or concealed carry a handgun. So, there is indeed no reason not to go the extra step and get a concealed carry permit like you say, because there isn't actually an extra step.

 

[Chickenspleen]

I can't even reason why people would want to just carry guns around in public, unless maybe they want to clear a line or something.

 

[Null Hypothesis]

Clearing a line with a gun is a good way to get yourself shot instead of an express ticket to the front. Most people will tell you they carry for self defense.

Now that changes things. What's involved with getting the handgun licence? Do you still need to take a safety course and get signed off? The laws are different for every state, but the your wording is giving the impression that they are making it easier to carry in public.

 

[Firedemon]

To the best of my knowledge there is no change in requirements for this license. As it is, you must pass a typical background check, and you need only a 4-6 hour training course. There is also a multiple choice test that is hilariously easy.

 

[coolpool2]

Now I've never fired a gun before so what I'm saying might just be rubbish. But wouldn't you need a lot of practice to use a gun for self defense? If someone attacks you, you would have to reach for your gun which may or may not be concealed, turn off the safety, and then fire at them before they can subdue you. Also you would have to be able to aim correctly hit the person with your bullets. A person with the initiative can take another person down in a second or two, especially if they're preoccupied with something like taking out a gun. And I assume that a person would not have practice pulling out their gun quickly under pressure. Although I suppose just pointing it at someone is a good enough threat in many situations.

 

[Firedemon]

If you carry a firearm responsibly, it should have the safety on and nothing in the chamber. So if you do need to draw on someone, you will have to perceive a threat, draw the weapon, turn off the safety, chamber a round, and point it at their center of mass to have a good chance of stopping them. For a police officer, this is believed to take about 1.5 seconds on average. However, in Texas, you are allowed to keep the safety off and I believe also a round in the chamber. This is completely irresponsible, but people do it. Without proper training and practice though, I doubt that will significantly help your reaction time enough to make much of a difference in many cases, especially if you're open carrying.

 

[Null Hypothesis]

Normally drawing a gun is deterrent enough for most people to leave you alone. However this isn't a excuse to be unprepared to use your gun if you carry one. Drawing your gun should also be a very last ditch effort after all other options to diffuse the situation have been exhausted.

Also some handguns incorporate the safety into the trigger. The act of pulling disengages the safety. Arguments can be made whether or not that makes the gun less safe or not. The point I'm getting at is that it does remove one step in readying to gun to be fired.

 

[coolpool2]

If you carry a firearm responsibly, it should have the safety on and nothing in the chamber. So if you do need to draw on someone, you will have to perceive a threat, draw the weapon, turn off the safety, chamber a round, and point it at their center of mass to have a good chance of stopping them. For a police officer, this is believed to take about 1.5 seconds on average. However, in Texas, you are allowed to keep the safety off and I believe also a round in the chamber. This is completely irresponsible, but people do it. Without proper training and practice though, I doubt that will significantly help your reaction time enough to make much of a difference in many cases, especially if you're open carrying.

Oh ok, I don't know that much about carrying around firearms other than your standard firearm safety guidelines.

Normally drawing a gun is deterrent enough for most people to leave you alone. However this isn't a excuse to be unprepared to use your gun if you carry one. Drawing your gun should also be a very last ditch effort after all other options to diffuse the situation have been exhausted.

Also some handguns incorporate the safety into the trigger. The act of pulling disengages the safety. Arguments can be made whether or not that makes the gun less safe or not. The point I'm getting at is that it does remove one step in readying to gun to be fired.

Ok I really don't know a lot about how exactly the safety works but wouldn't that kind of defeat the purpose of the safety? If the purpose of the safety is so that it does not fire unless it is off it seems kind of redundant.

 

[Null Hypothesis]

Ok I really don't know a lot about how exactly the safety works but wouldn't that kind of defeat the purpose of the safety? If the purpose of the safety is so that it does not fire unless it is off it seems kind of redundant.

The safety in most cases make the gun mechanically impossible to fire. The idea behind putting the safety in the trigger would prevent the gun from from ever going off accidentally ie. by getting dropped of something. The only time the gun would fire would be if the trigger is pulled. Going by one of the most basic rules of gun safety, one's finger should never be on the trigger unless one intends to fire the gun. Meaning the gun should never fire unless it was the intent of the user to do so, while also removing the step of having to disengage and reengage the safety manually.

 

[RECONmaster]

Well, here is what I think. Personally I think open carry and concealed carry are okay. However, there are nowhere near enough restrictions in place in most states to do so. Here are some prerequisites I can name off the top of my head that I think you should fulfill before you can carry a weapon into public.

Prerequisites:

• Background Check
• Vision Test
• Psych Test
• Safety Test
• Basic stress test

Basically you shouldn't be a person with a past of anger issues, especially if you've ended up in jail because of it. You should be able to see what the hell your aiming at. You should be able to operate a firearm safely to prevent injury to yourself and any others around you that you aren't shooting at.. Basically I feel that a person should undergo some training to be able to be able to make quick decisions effectively when under stress. A lot of cops go through this sort of training and if you're carrying a weapon, self-defense or not, you are making a quick decision to injure or kill somebody or something. However, I don't think any states have this sort of restriction.

This all doesn't apply to assault rifles. Why do you need that thing? Last I checked deer and quail don't shoot back. If you're a gun enthusiast then that shit needs to stay in your trunk, with a trigger lock and never needs to be carried around on your back except on the trip from the home to the range.

You all have made very valid points however, any weapon can be extremely effective in the right situation. Any person who carries a weapon needs to understand that there are some situations in which to use their weapon and others in which you shouldn't. This kind of judgement is beyond what a few hours of training can get you.

In the end, I feel that a lot of us aren't qualified to carry firearms into public. I feel that qualification for such should take a long time and frankly, I think it's better that way. I love guns as much as the next guy but in a lot of situations they can escalate things and can be more of an issue than they're worth.

P.S From what Firedemon has said, Texas has terrible gun laws.
P.P.S I just dumped my thoughts into this post. Hopefully you can decode them alright.

 

[Firedemon]

Yeah, we do have terrible gun laws. Our handgun licenses are also valid in most other states. Technically they should be valid in every state with concealed or open carry, due to full faith and credit, but I think that issue just hasn't made it to the Supreme Court yet. I do completely approve of concealed carry (not in its current form, there needs to be more training involved in all states, much along the lines of what was just suggested above) but I stand by open carry being bad for everyone involved. You become a target, criminals have increased access to weapons through theft, and you cause unneeded alarm among people not comfortable with guns. Never mind the issues with carrying a firearm at all.

 

[Null Hypothesis]

It's unfortunate that our culture is so polarized on the topic that no one is considering training and nurturing the understanding when it is and isn't okay to use a weapon. Instead we've devolved into two camps: one where guns are "the evil that shall not be named" and you will be pressed with criminal charges for your gun shaped pop-tart, and the other where it is you born right as a biological organism to own a gun, therefore you must so that you may overthrow the government when they come to take it away from you.

 

[RECONmaster]

Personally I take no issue with open carry except that it can escalate an issue rapidly. If somebody is doing something bad and notice that a person has a firearm, they're going to act more aggressive. It also makes it easy for people to swipe a weapon from you as they can easily see and grab it. I'm sure there are plenty of cases where police officers have experienced people trying to take their holstered weapons.

If you open carry, it's probably to remove restrictions and lessen the time required for the first shot. Ironically, I believe that if you open carry, your weapon shouldn't be loaded at all and the safety (rather redundantly) should be on.

The point is moot as I, like firedemon, see no reason for open carry in public. Concealed carry allows a person to prevent an emergency from escalating as long as he doesn't reveal that he has a firearm which could be a lifesaver in some situations where a firearm could cause escalation.

On a side note, this lady walked into the store I work at a month or two ago and she was open carrying. Our state allows open carry for pistols as long as you own the firearm and you're above the age of 18. On one hip she had a 9MM, from what I could tell it looked like a Beretta and on the other was a .44 Magnum. While I'm no gun nut, I was pretty impressed with the weapons but completely bewildered by her choice to carry both. The .44 had a barrel that run probably half the length of her leg.

 

[Null Hypothesis]

In most places I'm aware of it is only legal to open carry if the gun is completely unloaded.

 

[Colonel Thunder]

Good idea Firedemon!

I should totally get a gun!

 

[Firedemon]

Stop trying to give me nightmares. First a drone, now you want to get a gun.

 

[RECONmaster]

In most places I'm aware of it is only legal to open carry if the gun is completely unloaded.

If that's so then I see no point in open carry. Except to impress your gun buddies.