Earlier today, a friend emailed me the following, which I am sharing with her permission:
I just drove to town to get some groceries. On the way home, I drove past a white man with a big beard, wearing shorts, some kind of shiny jacket and cowboy hat, a backpack, and with a HUGE holster and some kind of pistol sticking out.So fucked.
I fucking hate open carry. No way should this be legal.
It's also so racist. If he were black, he'd be getting hassled on some pretense. We know this.
I really hope nothing bad happens and he's just walking around like a privileged asshole. Because if he does something bad I wish I'd called the police, but he's not doing anything illegal yet.
In short: this is fuuuuucked.
How is "if you see something, say something" even supposed to coexist with open carry?
How are we supposed to know if the guy casually walking down the street with a gun hanging out is someone fixing to harm someone, or someone who is just "exercising his Second Amendment rights"?
How are any of us from the no-gun culture supposed to feel safe, when our safety looks like No Guns, not More Guns?
This doesn't work. It's not working now, and it never will.
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