Washington Post: Interesting story of open carry

[larryh1108]

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/in...ire-an-ar-15/ar-BBwhlj0?li=BBnbcA1&ocid=wispr

I saw this story and read it. It's about a guy in Atlanta who open carries to Walmart for a grocery run. It wasn't anything more than a write up of a guy with an AR but since it is the Washington Post I can't get a handle on why the story was written and if it was meant to make fun of a (theoretical) paranoid gun owner or to show how common open carry is becoming. I didn't really sense a slant but my instincts tell me it was not a pro-gun story but it was pretty generic.

Anyone else have a spin on it?

Excerpt:

“I’m not going to sit there and have the police called on you. I mean, I don’t want to see that crap,” Maria says, knowing what a trip to Walmart means. She knows her 51-year-old husband has two guns inside the house, and this afternoon it won’t be the 9mm, which he straps on with a round in the chamber when grabbing lunch at his favorite fast-food restaurant or visiting a friend’s auto shop. It’ll be the AR-15 semiautomatic rifle, which he brings when going somewhere he thinks is dangerous, like the Atlanta airport, where he’s taken it loaded with a 100-bullet drum, or Walmart, where he thinks crowds could pose an easy targets for terrorists.

In a country of relaxing gun laws where it’s now legal to open-carry in 45 states and there are 14.5 million people with carry permits, every day seems to bring a new version of what open carry can mean. In Kentucky, it’s now legal to open-carry in city buildings. In downtown Cleveland, people carried military-style rifles during the Republican National Convention. In Howell, Mich., last month, a father went openly armed to his child’s middle-school orientation. In Mississippi, it’s now legal to open-carry without a permit at all. And in Georgia, which has passed a “guns everywhere” bill and has issued nearly 1 million carry permits,,,,

 

[General Geoff]

The 100 round drum at the airport seems a bit excessive just from a weight and bulkiness perspective. Was it a BETA mag?

 

[Jeff White]

This was one of the biggest hit pieces on the gun culture that's been published in years. The slant is that Jim Cooley is representative of the American gun culture. His life has unraveled, he's lost his job and his health, is about to lose his house and he is trying to regain his self respect and sense of purpose by carrying guns everywhere. Jim Cooley as portrayed in that article is a living example of Obama's bitter clingers and Hillary's deplorables.

They describe Cooley as 51 years old, disabled, drowning in debt, living off of disability and his wife's 3d shift job. He's portrayed as paranoid, Unsafe;

He is leaning forward. The muzzle of the loaded gun is pressing against his shoe. Now it’s sliding under his shoelaces.

They even show him smoking a cigarette after saying he has had three stents put in his heart.

Think for a minute about what someone who has no experience with guns and shooting and who might surf onto THR after reading that article might think.

I don't know Mr. Cooley, he may even be a member here and there is a good chance, he's not at all like the article portrays him. But they are using this portrayal of him to make the uneducated public (and I mean uneducated into guns and shooting, not necessarily completely uneducated) think that we are all Jim Cooley.

One of the reasons that THR is so heavily moderated is that we don't want to reinforce the antis preconcieved notions of who we are. Trust me this article is meant to do exactly that, to make the public who for the most part knows nothing about the gun culture think that we are all Jim Cooley, only worthy of contempt and maybe pity.

 

[X-Rap]

Looks like a typical NPR story to me. The post is using their playbook.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

 

[Shaq]

We don't have to know Mr. Cooley personally to know that he is an attention-whoring, passive-aggressive idiot.

 

[larryh1108]

I know that I've never heard of him before this since I don't frequent the Washington Post. Passive-aggressive is a good phrase for his article.

 

[200Apples]

.
I echo Jeff White's sentiments, exactly. Very well said, sir.

What is needed to counter that article is another carry (preferably concealed) story, but centered around a gun owner who is a happily-married working man with a family who finds balance with his responsibilities and his hobbies. Perhaps the author of this linked Post story might contact any member of the USCCA.

 

[ACP]

What Jeff said. This article is journalistic shorthand for "open carry is bad... carrying guns is bad... guns are bad."

Unfortunately, though, this guy exists... and he is a buffoon.

I'm not an open carry fan; but to make up for this the Post should do a story on a day in the life of come CCW from northern Virginia... working dad, family man, starched shirt and khakis, coaches Little League, puts gun in safe when at home, etc.

 

[RX-79G]

I think we do ourselves a disservice defending this sort of irrationality.


The ACLU will occasionally go to court on behalf of neo-Nazis, but they don't release press statements about how awesome it is that the Nazis are expressing their rights.


Pro-gun people are constantly pushing themselves into extremist positions under the weight of our own rhetoric. I hope some of that rhetoric didn't contribute to Mr. Cooley losing his marbles.

 

[hso]

They're making all of us appear to be like this sad sad man. So if the public thinks we're all unstable loosers then we're "other" and not to be trusted.

 

[roscoe]

I think we do ourselves a disservice defending this sort of irrationality.


The ACLU will occasionally go to court on behalf of neo-Nazis, but they don't release press statements about how awesome it is that the Nazis are expressing their rights.


Pro-gun people are constantly pushing themselves into extremist positions under the weight of our own rhetoric. I hope some of that rhetoric didn't contribute to Mr. Cooley losing his marbles.

Well said. I agree completely.

 

[Old Dog]

What is needed to counter that article is another carry (preferably concealed) story, but centered around a gun owner who is a happily-married working man with a family who finds balance with his responsibilities and his hobbies.

I'm not an open carry fan; but to make up for this the Post should do a story on a day in the life of come CCW from northern Virginia... working dad, family man, starched shirt and khakis, coaches Little League, puts gun in safe when at home, etc.

Gosh, guys, and do you think you'll EVER see a story like that in the national mainstream media?

Perhaps the author of this linked Post story might contact any member of the USCCA.

Um, sure, he'll get right on that ... because clearly he is the only member of the press not interested in propagating a liberal anti-gun agenda and one who is certainly dedicated to fairness, accuracy and unbiased reporting.

Probably not lost on you guys that the subject of the article sported his best "Trump" tee-shirt for the photo op? Obviously purely coincidental timing of an open-carry, firearms-related article depicting someone we definitely don't want as the national face of the RKBA movement.

 

[TRX]

> I think we do ourselves a disservice
> defending this sort of irrationality.

Who's this "we"?

It's his civil right and he doesn't need your approval.

 

[larryh1108]

I got the same impression that it was meant to paint a typical gun owner. It was done very subtly but my instincts said the same thing others say. I guess I'm just used to the 'in your face' anti-gun articles.

 

[Warp]

I'm not sure how a person could read that story and not see a slant or bias

 

[yokel]

It is hardly a secret that The Washington Post is a sleazy progressive rag that gleefully supports any policy that smacks of domestic disarmament.

A prime example of enemies of liberty that are incorrigible and not redeemable.

 

[Tirod]

The slant is that it's a MSM article about a person who shops at a big box discount retailer who is held in little regard in metro areas.

Having visited said locations when on orders during service in the USAR I can say they are light years different in their management than the ones locally. The inference is that only the great unwashed would shop there. Someone with no credible education and certainly what the "average" reader of the newspaper would regard as a loser.

Of course, when you get right down to it, the papers only write to their subscribers, and the vast majority of the readers of newsprint consider themselves literate, educated, and responsible. So the article is trying to drive a wedge between groups who can be depicted in socially ranked classes - the loser gun owner who's life is spinning out of control, and the successful ones who are smart enough to read the article.

They have a winning piece of propaganda and the results are right here in the thread - comments are already divided by posters characterizing the gun owner with extreme negativity, vs those who look at this thru the lens of Constitutional Rights.

The danger in accepting ANY of the articles premises - like the carefully crafted description of the gun owner - is that you accept THEIR definition of who qualifies or doesn't. Be very careful of that. Accepting the media's "line in the sand" of who can carry where is accepting a shifting standard. We have already seen that in CA, NY, MA. As the anti gunners ramp up their agenda they have taken away the right to carry and impose legal sanction on the very same kind of people who would look down their nose at the gun owner in the article, and lumped YOU into that group, too.

That is the reality, and clucking your tongue at his behavior described by an anti gun source means you bought it hook, line and sinker.

It's either an inalienable right, or not.

Each citizen either has a right to vote, or not. If you don't like how someone exercises their 2A right and think his should be curtailed, in ANY way, then why not limit his right to vote, too?

Which is exactly how we got racist gun laws, voting laws, and even employment practices. You don't like "them," then you start supporting laws to restrict how they act or even look out in public.

And then when the sliding pointer moves just a little, you find out YOU are that guy. Maybe a few less knocks in life to trash talk in a propaganda piece by an admitted enemy of your rights, nonetheless, there it is.

Can you CCW in NYC? No, you aren't qualified because you aren't good enough. Not good enough means your rights are restricted and you will be subject to extremely negative social repercussions if you attempt to exercise them. Not good enough means you aren't reliable enough by THEIR standards to carry. You aren't trusted. You aren't safe. You display negative characteristics and they are the ones to determine what those are, you have NO say in that process.

Which is exactly what some of you are doing here.

Thanks for supporting OUR inalienable right. No wonder it's not working for millions of Americans - it's pick and choose and you determine who is qualified and who is not. Just like voting in racially segregated communities - you're judging someone by a measuring stick that is elastic and already stretched to give you a pass.

 

[RX-79G]

Tirod,

It is a right, and it will remain a right for anyone that wants it.


That said, every time someone uses a right they have, we don't have to applaud their use of it just because we like having that right, too. I am not sanctioning giving up my ability to drive a car just because I am critical of bad drivers.

Your post is typical of that siege mentality that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. But Cooley is not your friend. He's a crazy person who erodes the rights of all Americans by not acting like a trustworthy adult and citizen.

As someone who promotes the Second Amendment to those not already on board, I don't want to be associated in anyway with someone who's irrationally preoccupied with guns.


Fanatics - gun, religious, taxation, whatever - are great for SCOTUS test cases, but that's about it. We should be shunning this kind of display, not promoting the Cooley's of the world as poster boy for the cause. (Nor Ted Nugent, for that matter.)


Our rights as gun owners are best protected when the majority of Americans see us as regular citizens who are using our civil rights just like everyone else. Gun ownership does not have a majority of our own, so it is important to remain part of the American mainstream, and not allow articles about people like Cooley to force us into defending him or any other extremist.

Extremism is not in fashion.

 

[Warp]

Tirod,

It is a right, and it will remain a right for anyone that wants it.


That said, every time someone uses a right they have, we don't have to applaud their use of it just because we like having that right, too. I am not sanctioning giving up my ability to drive a car just because I am critical of bad drivers.

Your post is typical of that siege mentality that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. But Cooley is not your friend. He's a crazy person who erodes the rights of all Americans by not acting like a trustworthy adult and citizen.

As someone who promotes the Second Amendment to those not already on board, I don't want to be associated in anyway with someone who's irrationally preoccupied with guns.


Fanatics - gun, religious, taxation, whatever - are great for SCOTUS test cases, but that's about it. We should be shunning this kind of display, not promoting the Cooley's of the world as poster boy for the cause. (Nor Ted Nugent, for that matter.)


Our rights as gun owners are best protected when the majority of Americans see us as regular citizens who are using our civil rights just like everyone else. Gun ownership does not have a majority of our own, so it is important to remain part of the American mainstream, and not allow articles about people like Cooley to force us into defending him or any other extremist.

Extremism is not in fashion.

Your "right" to drive a car (on public roads) is not specifically or explicitly protected by the Constitution or the Bill of Rights. Not a good comparison.


What is the subject of that article doing that is not trustworthy?


You don't seem to understand that to some people, particularly the types writing and reading and supporting this source and this article, EVERY firearms owner is an extremist. They just pick at the softest targets. When they go away, they move on the next-softest. One step at a time. Eventually, you will be the extremist that is shunned, even by your "fellow" firearms owners and supposed 2A supporters.

 

[yokel]

RX,

The unfortunate truth of the matter is that the Second Amendment is under siege and in jeopardy these days — dangerously so.

Judging from Mother Jones, The Huffington Post, and The Washington Post I find it rather insulting to suggest we need be concerned about being viewed as extremist. Those concerns never cross the minds of our adversaries. You are fighting the fight as it comes, as I hope we all are. One bad legislative bill at a time, one anti Second Amendment politician at a time. I applaud that. These efforts are doing a fine job of decelerating our defeat, however, they can never bring about victory. Ultimately, the only way to prevail is to educate the people about the Constitution, its heritage and background, its ultimate dependence on the principles of the Declaration of Independence, and the relation of arms to liberty. You suggest we must appear "mainstream" to prevail, but I contend that these efforts simply yield to the opposition that the right to keep and bear arms is merely the government's prerogative to dispense; giving up precious ground that forfeits the entire base of our collective opposition. This is at its essence an argument of principle. Shall we stop quoting our Founding Father's intentions? Our very founding documents are viewed as extremist propaganda by the leftists in this country! At some point we need to understand and accept that the progressive left are profoundly offended by our existence and our politics, and they want us degraded and destroyed. Conceding sacred ground simply hands them victory without an argument based in principle ever being employed.

 

[Shaq]

Your "right" to drive a car (on public roads) is not specifically or explicitly protected by the Constitution or the Bill of Rights. Not a good comparison.


What is the subject of that article doing that is not trustworthy?


You don't seem to understand that to some people, particularly the types writing and reading and supporting this source and this article, EVERY firearms owner is an extremist. They just pick at the softest targets. When they go away, they move on the next-softest. One step at a time. Eventually, you will be the extremist that is shunned, even by your "fellow" firearms owners and supposed 2A supporters.

Couldn't'a said it better!

 

[tipoc]

This piece in the WP is similar to the one that appeared earlier this month in Mother Jones, "Confessions of a Gun Range Worker"...

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/confessions-gun-range-worker

It's a hit piece. Jeff White described it pretty well above.

I would not count on the article describing Jeff or Maria Cooley accurately, or their life accurately. I don't know them and because of that I have no opinion on them. I will not judge their opinions or their lives. I do know, as a working class man, that I have a good deal in common with them. I'd rather sit down and talk with them for a couple of hours than sit down with either candidate of the major parties. I have more in common with the Cooley's than those candidates.

The article wants me to judge them. It wants me to see them as people troubled in their lives and minds, and so "they cling to their guns and religion". They go into the "basket of deplorables".

The article is written to convince people that the prejudice of the anti-gunners is true...we are all miserable, uneducated, troubled, racist, losers. The article reinforces that line of political thought.

The rhetoric of liberalism today (of the ruling class as a whole) is anti-working class. Hillary claims to have a problem with the "white working class". There is no such creature. There is a working class, it's multi-national and multi-racial, and much of that is Caucasian. But their problem is with the working class as a whole. So is Trump's.

I disagree with the open carry movement as practiced by Mr. Cooley and others. I think it's more a provocation than a discussion and defense of rights.

I don't think Jim or Maria Cooley make us look bad. It's the article that tries to make us all look bad.

tipoc

 

[RX-79G]

We are not going to ultimately "win" anything on the strength of court cases and Constitutional challenges. As demonstrated in the recent Felon thread, most gun owners don't even think the Second Amendment is beyond infringing, but just want to be able to pick and choose what arm and who's rights can't be taken away.

For the entire history of the US, 2A rights have been subject to restrictions that SCOTUS were aware of and endorsed. That isn't changing - the only thing that can change is the current political climate and its effect on the general voting populace's tolerance of all sorts of guns. The current ISIS situation has instilled enough general paranoia that more people like people being armed, but that will swing back the other way when the middle east calms down.


I know some of you think that this is some sort of situation like the Divine Right of Kings, but even kings lost their heads to the will of the people. So this is ultimately an issue that needs general public support, not just behind the scenes deals and the right judges. There is nothing wrong with gun owners saying "Yeah, that's his right, but he looks like an idiot. We don't generally support that sort of lifestyle."

The Second Amendment might never go away, but it could be legislated down to bolt actions in the right political climate. Or it could be Amended away. Acting like we're entitled to something is not the way to guarantee that the general public won't change its mind about that.

We are a minority. Take a page from other minorities and note when they were most effective in achieving their goals. It wasn't by pissing everyone off.

 

[yokel]

Our foes are well aware that to attempt to repeal the Second Amendment to the Constitution is a non-starter. Accordingly, their usual modus operandi is to whittle down the right to keep and bear arms gradually as if by cutting off bits with a knife.

Don't forget that pure democracy is a form of collectivism -- it readily sacrifices individual rights to majority wishes. Since it involves no Constitutional Bill of Rights, or at least, no working and effective one, the majority-of-the-moment can and does vote away the rights of the minority-of-the-moment, even of a single individual. This has been called 'mob rule,' the 'tyranny of the majority' and many other pejorative names. It is one of the greatest threats to liberty, the reason why America's Founding Fathers wrote so much so disparagingly of pure democracy.

Collectivism demands that the group be more important than the individual. It requires the individual to sacrifice himself for the alleged good of the group.

It sounds humane because it stresses the importance of human needs. In reality, it is little more than a rationalization for sacrificing you and me to the desires of others.

We should remember U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson's opinion in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943)

The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities and officials and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. One's right to life, liberty, and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections.

 

[RX-79G]

It is subject to a vote because the NFA, GCA and Crime Bill don't substantively remove the right. And it has ALWAYS been that way.

We don't have a democracy, so no grandstanding about collectivism is necessary.