To:\u00a0 Open Carry Activists
\nFrom: Mitch Berg, Longtime Second Amendment Trench-Fighter
\nRe:\u00a0 A Modest Request<\/p>\n
All,<\/p>\n
The Minnesota carry permit does, indeed, allow one to carry one’s firearm openly.\u00a0 But most people who have them don’t do it – partly because there’s no sense in letting potential criminals know who they need to take down first, and partly because we are, indeed, surrounded by hysterical ninnies.\u00a0<\/p>\n
So in a sense, you are to the gun movement what guys with waxed chests and buttless chaps cavorting about a Gay Pride parade are to the gay movement; the fringe\u00a0exception that confirms the stereotypes in the minds of the undecided.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But that’s the least of the things I’m writing to complain about.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Over the past month or so, your “protests” have given a bonanza of free chanting points to Michael Bloomberg, and backed a number of corporations up against a wall; while they’d always been “live and let live”, “don’t ask, don’t tell” about guns, and followed state laws, now they’re being pressured into taking individual (and sometimes illegal) action against gun owners.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In other words, you’re forcing people and businesses to take sides on the issue.\u00a0 And when people go from “no information or interest in an issue” to “being forced to take sides NOW”, what side do you think they’ll come out on?\u00a0 Think about who runs the media before you answer that.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now, I’m not talking about groups like the one in the Twin Cities that hosts open-carry events at businesses that agree to host them<\/em>.\u00a0 Those are good things.\u00a0<\/p>\n I’m talking about using businesses’ private property <\/em>to host your protests against their will.\u00a0 You’re no better than Occupyers when you do that.\u00a0<\/p>\n May I suggest you stop using unwilling private businesses for your protests.\u00a0 Maybe switch to City Hall,\u00a0 or the State Capitol?<\/p>\n They’re the ones you need to reach, anyway.<\/p>\n That is all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" To:\u00a0 Open Carry Activists From: Mitch Berg, Longtime Second Amendment Trench-Fighter Re:\u00a0 A Modest Request All, The Minnesota carry permit does, indeed, allow one to carry one’s firearm openly.\u00a0 But most people who have them don’t do it – partly because there’s no sense in letting potential criminals know who they need to take down […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[249],"class_list":["post-45674","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-victim-disarmament","tag-open-letters"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45674","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=45674"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45674\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45683,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45674\/revisions\/45683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=45674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=45674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=45674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}