KY WalMart O/C Trespass Incident - More to the Story

https://www.facebook.com/ofcjduty/posts/10218534953899579?hc_location=ufi

"Logan Justis So you were there or just going off what someone who works there told you?"

"Jon Duty Logan Justis I heard from witnesses, and I watched the live stream Facebook video the guy posted prior to the one with the cops telling him he wasn’t allowed back in Walmart. I never like to go off what someone else says happened, but watching that video he streamed backed up the claims I had heard.

Even just watching his first video made me ask myself, if this guy walked into my store, and everyone was busy with other customers, and he acted like that, how would I handle it. Truthfully, I’d have bounced him out of my own business too. I hate it that I’m siding with Walmart on this one, but right is right and wrong is wrong."

Craig_VA said:

Recent news made it appear a Kentucky WalMart went beyond the corporate-wide request not to open carry, trespassing an o/c customer. Well, that is not exactly what happened.

As reported in the 9/17/19 VCDL Update:




p.s. Keeping up with news like this is why even gun owners who live outside of Virginia should subscribe to the free VCDL Update, and, even better, join the organization.

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I’ve been a member continuously for 14 years.

This is one of many, many problems with OC. When you OC, your actions - including actions wholly unrelated to guns - will be imputed to "gun culture" and to all gun owners. While this is unfair to all of us, it is totally predictable and largely inevitable.

If 20 people OC and one of them makes a jackass of himself, then that one jackass's actions not only become the only thing that enters the consciousness, the jackassery is imputed to everyone who owns or carries a gun, including lawful concealed carriers.

OC people are absolutely harming our interests and causes.

ATLDave said:

OC people are absolutely harming our interests and causes.

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Wow that is a strong statement. Of course you have documentation to back your claim.

As for me I regularly Open Carry. I believe the correct statement is I am harming your interests and causes since you oppose Open Carry.

It’s a burden that I willingly handle.

George: "I am pro-gun. I am worried that people OC'ing in retail spaces is going to create a backlash. OC'ers, please consider whether you really want to be doing this."

Steve: "I know my rights. I do what I want!"

George: "You may have the legal right to OC without violating a law. If you want to keep it that way, consider whether you want to OC in crowded public spaces in a time of heightened anxiety about guns."

Steve: "I know my rights. I do what I want!"

Wal-Mart, Kroger, Aldi, and a thousand other retailers who have historically had no policy whatsoever on guns: "OC is now not allowed in our stores. If we see a gun, you're going to be told to leave. If you stay after we tell you to leave, we'll call the cops on you and it's trespass."

Anti-gun forces; "YASSSS! We'Re WiNnInG! kEeP uP tHe PrEsSuRe!!!!"

George: "Dangit, Steve, I told you that precisely this would happen."

Steve: "Where's your documentation?!"

In-your-face open carry is like in-your-face everything else. Don’t be surprised if behaviors that were once tolerated (or at least ignored) are now opposed. Can anyone, anyone at all, make a claim that those clowns carrying ARs into Starbucks have advanced our cause at all? Pro-gun virtue signaling is just as counterproductive as it is from the other side.

People don’t like having their chains yanked regardless of the issue. I’m glad open carry is legal, but just because something is legal doesn’t mean you have to partake in it.

And in a completely random and unconnected thought: I’m 99% sure I was the 8th grade science teacher of Logan Justis who was mentioned in the Facebook conversation above.

ATLDave said:

This is one of many, many problems with OC. When you OC, your actions - including actions wholly unrelated to guns - will be imputed to "gun culture" and to all gun owners. While this is unfair to all of us, it is totally predictable and largely inevitable.

If 20 people OC and one of them makes a jackass of himself, then that one jackass's actions not only become the only thing that enters the consciousness, the jackassery is imputed to everyone who owns or carries a gun, including lawful concealed carriers.

OC people are absolutely harming our interests and causes.

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That is the same if 20 people all wore red shirts to walmart.

The REAL problem in gun culture is one of their own making. People weren't happy associating and befriending other people who enjoyed the same things and believed in the same things ENOUGH TO MAKE AN EFFORT TO PRESERVE THEM. Things like the 2nd amendment, the constitution, hunting, and shooting sports. Noooo, they had to go out of their way to beg people who could really half give a crap and were little more than fringe watchers to "come be a part of this. You may not like this or that BUT WE CAN CHANGE! Just join us." So you wind up with a pack of whining RIGHTS advocate PRETENDERS who are really no different from the whole pack of Democrat candidates today. They FEEL this or that, they THINK maybe a little here and that doesn't really look right to me. I THINK you are just asking for trouble if you honestly exercise that RIGHT. They are WORSE than useless. It is like they poured in to the gun culture straight out of California and just like invading rural Idaho, they bring all their ignorant hippie crap with them.

Now they are NRA members attacking the NRA, they are "gun owners" attacking gun owners and gun RIGHTS ADVOCATES. They are on gun boards finding "a problem" with about every other thread they read INVOLVING GUNS.

Jack Ryan said:

That is the same if 20 people all wore red shirts to walmart.

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No, because there's not much of an idea that there's such a thing as "red shirt culture." People who wear red shirts are not presently considered a group by the general public.

But attribution of a single individual's act to all members of a minority group is a very well established proposition. It's basically the core dynamic of racism, for instance. "Gun owners" or "gun people" are definitely a discrete minority group in the minds of many. And thus the actions of one are imputed to others.

This is a little similar to the older african-american gentleman who wants a younger man to pull up his pants. It's legal in most places to walk around with the entirety of your underwear showing, but it's not only ill-received by most members of the public, if the person doing it is a member of a minority group, some of the public will (illogically-but-predictably) hold that against other members of that same group.

"OC people are absolutely harming our interests and causes."

That may be true in your part of our great country.

Open carry is legal almost anywhere in this stare and I see someone doing so once in a while. What I don't see is anyone paying the least bit of attention to them.

doubleh said:

"OC people are absolutely harming our interests and causes."

That may be true in your part of our great country.

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It's true nationally, because of the reaction it is getting from national retailers.

OC is legal where I am. It's also about to be pointless. You can OC right up until you want to go into a store, which is going to ask you to leave. In other words, you can walk around aimlessly while OC'ing... but if you left the house to actually do something, you really cannot.

ATLDave,

Well my name isn’t Steve but I will accept your emotional response.

Open Carry is circular argument on THR. Most of the arguments against it like yours is based on emotion. You state that by Open Carrying I am hurting “our cause” without saying what your position on gun ownership is.

As for Walmart and other companies banning guns my response is they don’t give a dang about the life and safety of myself and my family otherwise they would have armed guards and security screening of customers when they enter the store.

I respect your right to do whatever is legal. Why can’t you do the same for me?

It isn’t really emotional, more like simply observing cause and effect.

Some open carriers who liked the negative attention went around creating scenes in businesses with the video cameras rolling ... what was the effect?

BSA1 said:

Well my name isn’t Steve but I will accept your emotional response.

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Calling something "emotional" doesn't make it emotional.

BSA1 said:

Open Carry is circular argument on THR. Most of the arguments against it like yours is based on emotion.

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Let's take all emotion out of this and look at this as a scientific experiment. Several years ago, as people began OC'ing as either a tactical choice or a political statement, there was a hypothesis put forward by OC proponents.

OC Hypothesis: More open carry in retail/non-rural conditions will desensitize the general public and will lead to greater and broader acceptance of gun rights generally, and carry rights specifically.

This hypothesis was a factual assertion about what would happen in the real world. Like all such assertions, it's subject to testing. And we did test it. People have been OC'ing in retail/non-rural conditions.

Unfortunately, the test results are now in and the hypothesis has proven untrue. Many major retail chains that resisted calls from anti-gun activists to ban all gun carriage in their stores have begun caving, in huge numbers. Thus, in mainstream chains like Kroger or Wal-Mart, someone who is CC'ing a gun must worry that, if their gun is recognized or inadvertently exposed, they will be directed to leave the store as a matter of policy (not a request that can be lawfully refused in most circumstances).

So we have tested the OC-will-help-gun-rights hypothesis. It's not true. The converse is true. This is not a matter of principle or morality or philosophy. There's a factual proposition, it has been tested, and it turned out to be wrong.

BSA1 said:

You state that by Open Carrying I am hurting “our cause” without saying what your position on gun ownership is.

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My position on "gun ownership" is that the 2nd amendment is a constitutional right worthy of the same level of respect and protection as any other constitutional right. I am deeply skeptical of "gun control." I am very much in favor of people being allowed to carry anywhere they want with the exception of places that truly provide their own real security. I am not in favor of "gun free zones." I am not in favor of "assault weapons bans." I am not in favor of "universal background checks" that serve as de facto registries. Indeed, I am not in favor of laws against OC.

I am just against people doing stupid stuff that will harm our rights, and most OC in retail environments is precisely that... which we now know for a fact thanks to the testing we have been doing.

BSA1 said:

I respect your right to do whatever is legal. Why can’t you do the same for me?

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Oh, I respect your right to do all kinds of silly things. You can tattoo a swastika made of guns on your face, even though that's both stupid and will falsely tie guns and nazism/fascism/white supremacy (all horrible things) with guns in the minds of observers.* So I would urge you not to do that. That would be dumb, and potentially harmful to my rights via the political realities of people's reactions. .

It is now very evident to anyone viewing things objectively that OC - especially of long guns, but handguns too - in most non-rural/retail environments is harmful to the general public perception of gun owners, gun carriers, and "gun culture." I can't stop you from doing this. I can only ask you whether your views on OC are testable, factual views, or articles of religious faith. If they're the latter, there's literally nothing to talk about. If they're the former, though, please look at what is happening and consider whether the OC-is-good-for-gun-rights hypothesis can possibly be squared with the evidence.


*No, I am not saying that OC is nazism or anything like that.

I absolutely support your and my right to open carry without being hassled...just as I support the right of Beto to stop hiding and state openly that he's coming for our AR's.

But, if you think for just a minute about how counterproductive Beto's recent proclamation was to the anti's hidden agenda....that is why the WISEST choice likely is not to open carry.

Right or not, enough "in-your-face" open carry will only result in laws being passed to restrict that right.

BSA1 said:

I respect your right to do whatever is legal. Why can’t you do the same for me?

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I do respect your right to do whatever is legal.

That includes Open Carry, burning crosses in your front yard, and wearing obscene tshirts in public. That you have a right to do so doesn't mean the indecisive among us will form a positive impression of you, or the cause that you and I share.

In this case (Open Carry where it's not broadly culturally acceptable), the impression they form of you gets applied to me too, as a small effect at the ballot box. Given that, I think it's reasonable for me to call your attention to the sort of attention you attract.

So, go and do, but please be mindful of the attention you attract; very few people have ever been motivated to support a cause by fear of the other people supporting the cause.

My approach to this same question is slightly different: I am completely open and enthusiastic about my hobby (reloading and target shooting) and my political philosophy. As a result my coworkers know that I enjoy this stuff, and increasingly they think of me when they think of the subject.

I have a growing number of conversations with folks about the Constitution, regulation, training, internal ballistics, weapon selection, church security, etc. Most of them would never talk about this except with me; none of them would ever go shooting. . . but I introduce a couple people a year to Handgun 101. I just last week took a non-shooting coworker to the LGS and helped him pick out an M&P9, because he shot mine and liked it.

I'm the Gun Guy, but no one's scared of me! Perfect.

This is one of many, many problems with OC. When you OC, your actions - including actions wholly unrelated to guns - will be imputed to "gun culture" and to all gun owners.

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I wonder why that doesn’t roll over to the other side? I have never personally seen a OC’er acting like a jerk but I have seen lots of jerks where I had no idea if they were armed or not.

ATLDave said:

But attribution of a single individual's act to all members of a minority group is a very well established proposition. It's basically the core dynamic of racism, for instance. "Gun owners" or "gun people" are definitely a discrete minority group in the minds of many. And thus the actions of one are imputed to others.

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The fact is many of the people who are opposed to firearms rights attribute criminal and murderous acts committed with a gun to all members of the "gun community." They see mass shootings as a problem internal to the "gun culture." As far as they're concerned, when there is a mass shooting it was one of "us" gun people that did it. Certainly, it wasn't one of "them." And the gun people's refusal to do something about it is tacit complicity.

You are simply hoping that by throwing all the people who OC under the bus, they will serve as the scapegoats. But people who don't own guns or who don't carry them will still not distinguish elitest concealed carriers with their government permission cards and their rigorous, tactical, elitist training from the shooters that blast crowds. I fully support my brothers whose pants sag and who OC a full-fro.

ATLDave said:

It's true nationally, because of the reaction it is getting from national retailers.

OC is legal where I am. It's also about to be pointless. You can OC right up until you want to go into a store, which is going to ask you to leave. In other words, you can walk around aimlessly while OC'ing... but if you left the house to actually do something, you really cannot.

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Like I said, maybe in your part of the country. Not so here but I guess Walmart will throw you out their door for doing it now. I really haven't seen any other businesses with that policy. Actually I've never seen anyone open carrying in Walmart, ever.

Whatever happened to that old phrase “out of sight, out of mind?” Or “discretion is the better part of valor?”

What good is it to win a battle if we end up losing the war?

OC antics in TX increased the number of concealed carry bans in the state and sunk Constitutional carry in the legislature.

jmorris said:

I wonder why that doesn’t roll over to the other side? I have never personally seen a OC’er acting like a jerk but I have seen lots of jerks where I had no idea if they were armed or not.

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It happens to minority groups. Non-gun-carriers are the majority. No group imputation.

This is, of course, terribly unfair, but it is the way human brains work. The reality cannot be ignored. Or, it can, it just won't care.

doubleh said:

Like I said, maybe in your part of the country. Not so here but I guess Walmart will throw you out their door for doing it now.

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All the major grocery store chains where I live now have that policy. None of them had that policy 2 years ago.

It’s not necessarily the act of OC that causes issues... I’m sure 99.5% of OC people are respectful and understanding. Its those who go “ In your face” or are acting like an ass while OC that causes issues. The media has an awfully wide paintbrush, and as we just saw in the NYT re:Kavanaugh; there is no stuffing the journalistic genie back in the bottle when they print patently false, hyperbolic or feeble unsubstantiated crap about people, guns, gun owners, etc.

And open carry bans are certainly one part of the results equation when people do this kind of stuff, we see these kinds of knee-jerk firearm restrictions enacted all the time when anti-folks start beating this drum....especially when some pathetic buffoon goes berserk with a firearm in a mall, school, etc.

The phrase “We are our own worst enemy” certainly can apply. I prefer to remain an anonymous gun carrier, and hopefully I’ll remain as such until I can’t physically carry one anymore.

Stay safe.

I've always thought that open carry attracts the kind of attention that no adult should want.