We shot ourselves in the foot over the Starbucks issue. There are many articles and blog posts about Starbucks and Open Carry popping up all over the place. Starbucks was never Pro-Gun. They wanted to remain politically neutral on the issue. The whole “We will follow the local law” policy was a smart one. It didn’t take a side. But so many people used their business as a political soapbox and forced them to take a side.
You guys don’t carry an AR-15 into the Gun Store to buy Ammo or a Cleaning Kit – Why the hell do you need to bring your AR-15 Rifle into a Coffee Shop for a cup of Caffeine? Seriously, Why? This is called Grandstanding. Among other less kinder terms. Because of this they had to, as politely as possible, ask you guys to stop. And now some of you are excessively butthurt. “Boycott Starbucks!” you’re yelling. Boycott them for what? For not wanting to be your Photo Op? Do you want people who you don’t know, bringing rifles and shotgun to your house or non-gun industry business?
I don’t see guys taking pictures like this in front of Sporting Goods Stores. I don’t see pictures like this in front of WalMart or Cabella’s. Why do you think it’s appropriate inside a Coffee Shop, who’s Corporate HQ is in the heart of the Liberal Holy Land of Seattle Washington? Honestly, what did you expect would come of this? Where is the Moderation? This morning I noticed driving past the Starbucks in town, the line was just as long today as it was the last couple of days. They will remain in business.
I’m all for the Right to Carry. I even advocate appropriate Open Carry on Armed American Radio when the Host and other guests are against Open Carry… I see their arguments against, and for the most part agree. But there are times and places you can open carry just fine, and other times and places that it’s just unwise. As a whole, we’ve been unwise when it came to Starbucks. It went too far. The whole “too much of a good thing” came into effect like a Triple Espresso with a side of Jolt Cola and a Rip It.
Moderation, people. Keep Calm, and Carry On… appropriately.
These pictures would be awesome in the right setting. Enthusiasm for the cause we all love… but in a Starbucks? GO TO THE RANGE! Where’s the LOCAL GUN DEALER APPRECIATION DAY?
Update: Some people have called my position cowardly. So those of us who say taking an AR-15 into a Coffee Shop, just because it’s technically not illegal to do so yet, is pushing the boundaries of acceptable behavior, are cowards?
Huh.
Gentlemen, there is the problem. To get people to accept guns in polite society as acceptable, by pushing unacceptable behavior with extremism, is not winning anyone to our side. And as this case shows – worked against our cause rather than for it. The fact that so many Patriot Brothers can not see that is the problem.
JUST ACT NORMAL.
Open carry to make a political statement is not Open Carrying. It’s political grandstanding. And it’s counter productive. Instead of showing people “See, no one got killed by my AR here today”… how about showing people that Gun Owners are normal people like everyone else? How about that for a change? Let’s see how that works.
*slow clap*
This is the product of two extremes of a political issue (open carry demonstrators and anti-gun protestors) using a business as the battle ground for their rhetoric. This proves we need police our own better.
Spot On, too damn right!
A bunch of blowhards and fake-assed gunfighters F-ed it up for the rest of the Pro 2A crowd that wants to spend $5 for a cup o’ joe.
I agree with you on most things and why I enjoy your blog. If there are disagreements (which is fine), they are in this area in the past. And I have to say you are dead right on this issue.
I’m all for OC and a right unexercised is a right lost, blah blah blah. These brothers of ours are Tone Deaf. More like your second cousins you meet at Thanksgiving. They will argue the Liberals are waging war and you have to fight fire with fire. Well, two wrongs don’t make a right. In fact, you just lost one and will have to cc that AR-15 now, Cousin Eddie.
Holy crap. I hadn’t realized that people were being that extreme as in those pictures. What absolute fucktards. Had that been at my place of business, someone like that would have been thrown at on their ear within seconds just on the principle of I don’t tolerate stupid.
Well said.
Tempest in a teapot. Or in this case perhaps an espresso machine. A few cherry picked photos of a few idiots in full retard mode. Happens every day somewhere. The only reason this is news is because its Starbucks and the – wait for it – the internet. 99% of us don’t give a rat’s patoot about this one way or the other. If we concealed carried into Starbucks in the past we will likely continue and if we never frequented Starbucks in the past we didn’t stop in just because Starbucks didn’t come down on the side of the anti’s a few weeks ago.
Look at the Tag on the corner of the lower photograph. The ANTI’s are using those photos against us, pointing and saying “See?”
Who in the hell asked these knuckleheads to be a poster child for protest? I mean really, what right minded person would use this for a photo-op for a cause? One part of my brain says this is BS and staged. Then again, the other part of my brain says this is possible just to prove a point. The point they clearly got wrong was to wander into a joint whom is adamantly against CC or for that matter OC for a stupid photo-op. Like minded souls, such as ourselves, DO NOT advertise we’re carrying or even imply anything of the sort, that is until you’re 3 steps into a SHTF situation. Personally I would boycott any place that boldly advertises no guns allowed, notable exceptions are gov. offices and the like. Look down at your nose at me if you want, but any place that discourages personal protection practices deserves to be robbed, shot up, and left dumbfounded for their liberal, utopian mindset.
Why should government offices be an exception?
Totally agree. We are our own worst enemies. These types of actions do more harm to our rights than all the Mom’s demanding action, or Emperor Bloomberg and his buddies.
All they have to do is sit back and watch us cut our own throats. Can anyone else hear their shouts of glee??
Dude is carrying his rifle unslung with a magazine in it. We weren’t even allowed to walk around like that in Iraq for shit’s sake.
That saddens me. Why not?
Inside the wire, it was deemed uncouth to carry condition 3, unslung, or slung with the muzzle up by the same people who deemed it uncouth to wear white socks or be outside after dark without a glowbelt.
It’s a tactical mistake. It’s like riding out of the castle thinking the enemy is on the run when they are just pulling back, hoping the defenders will do exactly that.
“Do you want people who you don’t know, bringing rifles and shotgun to your house or non-gun industry business?”
Yes. I’m glad to see customers, subcontractors who are working for me, and just about anyone else carrying guns at my place of business, or any jobsite I’m running.
I’m glad to see people carrying guns in stores, restaurants, offices, at sporting events and polling places, while walking down the street and while relaxing on the beach with their kids. I’m glad to see guns just about everywhere.
Flint, I think we are all for the same thing but I think you’re missing the point on how to get there. The only way society will become desensitized and comfortable with MWAG is to see many people OC’ing or “casual concealing” and going about their business with no attention being drawn to themselves. Just being normal like you and I do every day. People will realize nothing is happening and go back to their normal lives.
You don’t walk around NH or wherever you live carrying an AR-15 taking selfies with your new iPhone acting like a clown. These guys forced Starbucks to make the wrong call which happens to be the right call for their business. Our crowd gave them no choice in the end.
There was a guy with an FN-FAL in Subway in Manchester a while back, ordering a sandwich. No one paid any attention.
Would anyone worry if folks folks were smiling and taking pictures there while holding hockey sticks, with t-shirts supporting their favorite team? Then it should be no different with an AR-15 and a pro-gun shirt. More murders are committed with hockey sticks and such, each year, than with AR-15’s. Heck, more murders are committed with hands and feet than with AR-15’s.
Folks who are “taking selfies” are obviously /not/ in the middle of perpetrating a terrorist attack, or somesuch. They are being pretty darn non-threatening.
There was no need for Starbucks to “make a call.” The call they’d previously made – to stay out of it – was already sufficient.
Flint I don’t think you are getting it. They tried to stay out of it but instead became a political football.
When the anti side made a push a small fraction of our side pushed back a little harder and so on and so on. It started out with walking in and paying with a two dollar bill and saying thanks for supporting our rights and progressed to people getting arrested for disorderly conduct because of an open carry sit in with their rifles. Some people were going too far. We win together and we lose together. Now we know that we need to police our own a little better and not let some of our side be so overly in-your-face that it causes a negative reaction like this again.
Starbucks just wants to sell overpriced coffee. They don’t want to be involved in this debate and they did what they had to do to remove themselves from a position they never wanted to be in to begin with.
Starbucks was never involved. That was their position. And there was no need for them to change it. Do you imagine that the antis would have carried out a successful boycott? They tried a one-day boycott, because that’s as long as they could go without their overpriced coffee, and they still couldn’t get enough participants to make a blip in corporate profits. Starbucks could have done nothing, and continued to do nothing, and after that, they could still have done nothing, and they would have suffered not at all.
They /chose/ to get involved. And in one of the worst possible ways – if the issue were open carry, they could have just put up “no open carry” signs, but they chose to go much further.
you hit the nail right on the head, and here I thought I was the only one that felt like this. on the other hand I kind like people that do this. you see I pocket carry a lcr and it makes a bulge I sometimes worry people will notice, but hell with people like this around not only will no one make my carry they wont even notice me or remember me being there.
Your comments here are spot on. The arrogance of some (a small minority of gun owners) is going to damn them. How absurd… ignorant… and immature are these bozo’s who walk into a coffee shop carrying military rifles (that yes, frighten many folk who see them and don’t own guns) is beyond preposterous.
I was sickened to see these clowns posting photos and the incredible thing is they are too dumb to even understand how they hurt their very own cause. Actions like these will come back to bite all gun owners… even the smart, responsible ones.
“Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world.” ― Arthur Schopenhauer
Yep. Folks being jackasses forced an otherwise neutral entities hand into picking a side. Did anyone with a brain really think Starbucks would pat them on the back for walking into their store with a rifle and acting like an idiot? Something that every gun store I’ve been in that can think of would have told them to GTFO? If it had just been opting to open carry a pistol instead of cc, it might be a different story. But it wasn’t. It was a bunch of (supposedly) grown folks going to an extreme and “LOOKY AT ME LOOKY AT ME I GOT A GUN!!!”
Seriously, the number of folks acting like a five year old by that just discovered his penis is downright embarrassing.
We used-to have *unloaded* open carry here in CA, until the butthurt got the bagbalm and then the Stupidslature acted with unprecedented urgency to squash it – and they did. Now there is no more OC of ANY kind, unloaded or not. So thanks dorks.
Not a big loss. Unloaded open carry is ridiculously bad from a tactical standpoint. It’s practically an invitation for a mugging.
So, CA decided to join Texas in banning open carry. Not a big deal, considering how horrific the gun laws in those sorts of places already are. It’s like getting a papercut after being shot.
Best bet is to leave the hell-holes and go someplace decent. We got droves of folks moving from CT to NH this year, once CT passed all their extra-stupid gun laws. Since those who care about gun rights tend to average higher intelligence and greater earning potential (how many gun-rights-supporters are on welfare?), “voting with their feet” has a big impact.