Personally i think the notion that "a gun gives one false courage and is more likely to get you into trouble than keep you out of it" may have some validity right up to the point of an incident, and at that moment the situation will change and go one of several different ways; the gun holder may freeze and become unable to do anything, the gun holder may exercise very cautious consideration about next steps, the gun holder may panic and do something rash, the gun holder may take positive aggressive steps to end the confrontation, the gun holder may get cocky and cause more problems. I'm sure there are even more ways this could unfold, but thats enough for the moment.

As for you prohibiting open carry in a store you own, why would that end up in court? Unless you did somethings stupid like only allowing white men to carry openly, then you might get hit with a discrimination complaint. Otherwise organizations have all kinds of rules they can implement. Long ago many restaurants would not let you in if you didnt have on a jacket and tie. Bars frequently will not let in customers who have dog chain necklaces or motorcycle chain belts, some places prohibit gang-wear including public schools! So far as I know open carry is not a 100% universal everywhere standard, for all things there are limitations, and hopefully they are reasonable.

It would go a long way toward meeting all parties interests for a company that does not want open carry in their store were to say something like "please conceal all firearms to ensure our environment is welcoming and meets the expectations of our our customers regarding their safety" or anything rather than the old heavy handed approach of "open carry is not permitted in our store"

The choice is theirs, but one might satisfy most customers while the other will surely alienate some and infuriate others.

So many choices, and we still make so many bad ones. Or, just more drama,,,

Shopping at Market Basket, Plymouth
 

Based on all this discourse I decided to go shopping at the Plymouth Market Basket today. I thought it would be interesting to see all the low life’s that think they need a gun , primarily a exposed gun to feel totally free.
I was terribly disappointed and dident see a single NRA card carrier in the crowd that felt he or she had to walk around with a exposed weapon to prove he they were more American then the Fox News group. I did see more tattoos then is normal but sadly no guns. Perhaps this has been overdon by our friend FLl

I took this video entering MB today, might be safer to just stay away .....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4CizzE-zZo

Everyone wants to presume that what they are doing is socially acceptable - then a restriction on what they are doing comes about and they complain rather than realize they never should have been doing it.

If these four different men wearing guns inside the Plymouth Market Basket, all individually by themself, over the last month or so, were not in fact REAL, then why has Walmart felt the need for a no open carry rule? Because it scares the other customers inside the store seeing these different guys walking around with a semi-auto hand gun in a holster on their hip.

In Plymouth NH, the Court House, Post Office, Speare Hospital. Mid-State Health, Pemi Baker Community Health, CVS-Pharmacy, and Rite Aid all have 'no weapons' signs posted at their entry which indicates this has been happening and these locations decided to post a no weapon notice.

It's up to Market Basket if they think a 'no open carry sign' is needed similar to these other places in Plymouth.

In a post up above, someone says the Mount Washington cruise ship has a 'no weapons' sign posted at its entry way, so if it is good for the Mount then it is probably a good thing for Market Basket to do, as well.

I guess I don't see why open carry bothers people more than that fact that some carry concealed??? The only difference is you know and are reminded if you can see it vs. wondering if someone has one?

I think you are correct. Even many folks made uncomfortable by seeing the guns recognize this seeming irrationality. Although there is also the idea that, true or not, people who open carry are more dangerous.

Unfortunately, instilling fear, willful misinterpretation, and misinformation has played a daily role in many areas of our lives.

Why should the subject of open carry be any different?

Making a statement
 

Same thing could be said about your genitals. :laugh:

Interesting how very quickly the conversation changes from a concern about open carry to having a gun at all. Re; "'no weapons' sign" as opposed to no open carry.

Again this is why we can rarely have reasonable discussions about such matters. The parties too often go to opposite corners, and then revel their true feelings on the matter.

So in the end it is not sufficient to hide your gun, we are back to the you cannot have a gun at all or someone else will "feel" uncomfortable.

Lets think about all the things we have been uncomfortable about over the last 100 years that have all been remedied by sensible people saying we need not fear this. For example; hippies, bikers, people of color, people with physical deformities, people from other countries, people of other religions, ETC Etc etc,,, Its our fear and ignorance that shows brightest when we judge based on appearance alone.

So again,,, what have we learned from all this;

1. First and foremost your concern about open carry has not inhibited you from actually continuing to shop at the offending location(s) in any way. Almost like bad TV, you seem to be drawn back to the show.

2. Your concern for this matter (or interesting in telling us about it) continues to remain very high.

3. You have been able to control your impulses to make a public scene about such matters that would likely have brought even more attention to these individuals than they bring to themselves. But then you probably realized that "they" might actually like that, so your self-control is appreciated.

4. And finally and again possibly the most important lesson, NOTHING happened because of the open carry you observed. No one was harmed. No public riot occurred. No children were trampled because you didn't cause a commotion. We learned that open carry worked and worked well without any incident of any kind. you simply felt uncomfortable for a couple of moments and you got over it.

Well done.

I feel certain if you can keep watching the life coach commercials on TV about how we call best conduct ourselves in public, your progress will continue.

In the end, like it was fully accepted 100 years ago, open carry will soon be of little bother to anyone who doesn't live in fear of spooks or demons or shadows, as we have seen it clearly causes no harm. Not a single case of harm coming to our ~350 million Americans has been posted here as a direct result of open carry. Few things in fact seem safer. Isn't that truly outstanding, that we have discovered such a safe activity. Hard to believe open carry is safer than swimming with a noodle,,,

I feel certain that in time you will overcome your fear of open carry, unless the real reason for the post is to eliminate everyones ability to keep and bear firearms Re: "no weapons' sign" as opposed to a no open carry sign,,,

DRAMA, Drama, drama,,, Makes for interesting reading is nothing else.

It’s not as if the sign is saying you can’t have a gun at all, just not while you’re in that establishment. It’s every business’s right to determine what they will and will not allow in their establishment, just as it is your right to own a gun.

I grew up in suburban Boston having never seen a gun. When I moved to a semi-rural area and saw some hunters caring their shotguns out of the woods, I was startled initially, but then realized it was perfectly normal there. When I saw my first open carry, I remembered I was in Florida…perfectly normal there. Sometimes it just takes people time to adjust.

As for drama, don’t you think your long posts add to it?


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With all due respect, the length of your numerous posts highlights your passion on the topic and is adding more "drama" without really getting at the heart of FLL's point.

There is no good reason for a civilian to wear a gun in the supermarket, and several good reasons--safety, manners, neighborliness--why a person should just keep his gun in his car.

Open Carry-Plymouth NH; send Market Basket your comment!
 

The Market Basket in Plymouth, NH is an excellent store, especially all the prepared food like the sub sandwiches, salads, and tv-dinner style meals for about 4.99. The new store is a great welcome addition to the area and it opened in May, 2020.

www.shopmarketbasket.com/about-us/contact-us

Under Inquiry ..... click on Store Experience

After filling in my name, email, and phone number, here's a way for me to send them a message about my store experience sharing the store inside space with four different men with semi-automatic handguns in holsters on four different days.

This is like a crazy impossible situation, doing the Market Basket shopping with guys with guns casually walking around the store.

If you feel the same as me, then go ahead and let them know what you think about open carry allowed inside the Plymouth NH, Market Basket.

Re; stores rights, I 100% agree with you. But the store(s) are not making such decisions in a vacuum. And also likely they are not making such decisions based on a pole of their customers. In America we react to the loudest voice in the crowd, so people who are currently enjoying carrying openly and not perceiving any problem are going to store managers to say I want you to make sure you hear my preference to continue to do so. What store owners usually hear is the few who complain and then they react to that vocal group without gathering input from the masses. And once you put any restriction in place, this X times harder to get it overturned unless there is a massive uprising of concern.

As for you comments about it taking people time to adjust, I totally agree. This will fizzle. NH will not become the wild west of old, and people will get used to the very few who insist in showing off their hardware.

And finally we get to drama, and again you are 100% correct, and thats my goal in those long posts. As I have found over the years that the only way you tamp down utter nonsense is to totally ignore it, or drown it out with an even higher level of drama. Personally I prefer to ignore it and eventually I tire of the nonsense, but some matters hit a nerve as being total BS and I feel some sense to speak up and try to crush the madness.

And so in this case the only two valid points anyone should be interested in is that some people are uncomfortable seeing open carry, much like they were uncomfortable my bikers in Laconia many years ago or seeing people from foreign countries or monks chanting in a public place. But ultimately we got over all of those fears.

And the other point is that open carry has resulted in no actual harm coming to anyone. Virtually no other activity at this time has such a near perfect record of not impacting the public. Even growing flowers has produced more problems with people getting stung by bees!

So there we have it in a nutshell, open carry is an activity that an infinitesimally small percent of our population practice and it makes some portion of our population uncomfortable. AND so far, it has resulted in no actual harm being suffered by anyone. I only wish the discussion could stop here.

I guess it bears reminding you all that "gun-free zones" are invitations to persons intent on doing others harm. You never know when a former employee or customer of any kind of establishment has a grudge and is about to shoot up a place. Has happened before and odds are it will happen again.

If an establishment prohibits people like me from carrying (concealed, of course) where I want, I lose the right to protect myself, possibly my family and maybe others who are in harms way.

I was taught at a young age to be self-reliant and I believe that "it is better to have it and not need it then to need it and not have it." Those of you who disagree can wait 10 minutes for the police to arrive...

Re: Drama, you are 100% correct that is the goal as nothing meaningful can come from this thread or needs to come from it as there is no problem! This thread was created as drama, it is about feelings not an actual danger. If your were speaking about handling a gun in a public place such as loading it, or some other such activity it would be a totally different matter. But its not, for all you or anyone knows the guns are not loaded, or functional or even real. It is all speculative. No actual incident has occurred, no harm has been done, this is simply drama about someone feeling uncomfortable. Well I feel uncomfortable about all kinds of things, and I dont seek outright bans on them. I personally feel more threatened by a very large and mean looking dog than anyone with a gun in a holster. You may feel differently and as such I respect your desire to walk any big mean looking dog you choose, but I dont have to like it, just as you dont have to like someone carrying a gun, but should you be attempting to prohibit it,,,

As for "no good reason for a civilian to wear a gun in the supermarket" Sorry but I thought this was America where we dont need to justify every action we take and most things should not be prohibited or restricted unless there was a credible risk to others, which in this case we have clearly established there is virtually ZERO history of incident.

I fully respect your right to opinions and to your concerns, but unless backed up by legitimate data your concerns and opinions should not result in an imposed restriction on others.

Now please understand this is coming from someone who has never carried a weapon openly, will never carry an weapon openly, very rarely has every carried a concealed weapon, and personally does not like seeing open carry. But I will not ever raise my voice against it, as I perceive no legitimate risk from it, and I do not believe I should be able to step on someone else preference to carry openly.

Once you step on any preference for no valid reason, you open the flood gates. That is a proven fact.

Your opinion is clearly different, I only hope you can attempt to see the other side of this matter such as I do, again as someone not thrilled by open carry.

ATB

"There is no good reason for a civilian to wear a gun in the supermarket, and several good reasons--safety, manners, neighborliness--why a person should just keep his gun in his car."

And the response to this just as said above:

"it is better to have it and not need it then to need it and not have it."

I don't tote a gun around with me all time but this quote randalnh is spot on and pops into my head from time to time. Hopefully a time never comes when its needed and not onboard but for anyone that does have one with them all the time I say good job, just keep it discreet.

Thanks for the tip, I just thanked them for not bowing down to extremest and fear mongers among us who would raise concern about non-issues. That by standing up to the few who would impact the many over nonsense and not banning firearms, they have proven why they were a successful organization and would continue to do well as people recognized the respect they had for their customers and their customers preferences.

One can only imagine what would be the next thing banned after firearms were prohibited. Pocket knives, oxygen generators/tanks (they could be weaponized) Tee shorts in offending colors, sandals/flip flops (god knows no one wants to look at ugly feet) Men in tank tops (you might be uncomfortable seeing back hair),,,

Its a scary world out there,,,

A gun left in the car is as useful as a condom left in a wrapper. It does you no good when you need protection.

I suggest folks who have an issue with open or concealed carry move to the nanny state to our south. They have a big problem with our Constitution and don't like people defending themselves either.

I'm not sure what's impossible about the situation. I think you may be fixating on it. As I've stated, it's not clear to me why someone needs a firearm on their hip to buy cheese and crackers. But I do believe in laws and rules, and in that MB they have the right to. I know you don't like it, and are voicing that to the management, and that is your right to do so.

But in terms of you going in and filling a shopping cart, checking out and heading home, if this is causing you stress and discomfort you simply need to shop somewhere else. I don't personally see it in any way as a "crazy impossible situation". You were 100% safe shopping there in the past, you still are now.

Don't misunderstand, I do respect your opinion and like that it prompted this discussion, which I'm finding interesting.

Well, I guess if they frighten ya'!!!:laugh::laugh:

It's interesting that in 2017 (the first year I saw after a quick Google search) Hawaii, NY, and MA - all with much stricter gun laws than NH - have per capita gun death rates of 3.7 or lower while NH has a per capita gun death rate of 10.4. Alaska, with one of the least restrictive set of gun laws in the country and the highest amount of guns per capita leads the nation in per capita gun deaths.

Now thats fully!

Higher death by gun rates is not a problem if its the right people who are on the receiving end of the barrel, so your post begs the question were these murders, or shootings by law enforcement of citizens defending against criminals???

Posts like that without all the information are grossly misleading and usually manipulated.

Details matter.

The most recent data I could quickly find for gun murder rates was from 2010, and showed that MA was at 1.8 per 100,000 people while it was 0.4 for NH.


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Was that filtered to exclude police shooting and self-defense deaths?

"Dezinformatsiya" Raises Its Ugly Head...
 

The announcement made today by the U.S. Surgeon General can be expected to result in U.S. Intelligence Agencies' monitoring of Americans' text messages. :(

It didn’t specify.


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Totally off topic.

Speaking of misinformation. I have read the complex 22 page advisory released by Dr. Murthy and I see no reasonable basis for your comment. I admit it’s a lot to digest. Have you read the report or just an interpretation of it?


Whatever your source, it is, at best a stretch or an exaggeration. But I would like to see your reference.

The Surgeon General doesn't run the NSA.
And the NSA has always monitored electronic communication.

We don't have to. We just choose not to service you as a customer.

You have no constitutional right to be on another person's property, and no constitutional right to be a customer based on a non-protected classification.

Even if you are under some false sense that you do...

And what did they say, getting stressed out over forum posts is much more harmful to your health than someone openly carrying a handgun in market basket ;-)

Agreed! But a person's chances of needing a condom in a supermarket are higher than the chances of needing a gun

Hahahaha!!!
Having spent the whole of my pubescent years at Purity Supreme, I assure you that that's true.

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Can somebody please go into the Plymouth MB sporting a hot pink Ruger LCP holstered on a noodle belt? I really want FLL "feel" better about this.

Now THATs funny!

There is a huge Google plant in The Dalles, OR that supposedly scans every text and email sent and received in the country. Thousands of high speed servers scan millions of texts/emails per second, looking for key words, which sends it to another scan. We all better assume that big brother is watching us all the time.

Open carry is pretty uncommon here in Portland and its nearby environs, but a lot, and I do mean a lot, of people legally carry concealed.

Easy to get a CWP.

Looks like this thread is getting off track, so I will try and steer this discussion back to open carry.

Remember where you are. This is the "Live Free or Die" state and some of us do not take that motto lightly. The "Live Free" part only works if we all respect each others rights and do not try to force your will on others because of your personal, irrational fears. If you think it is just a BS motto, do us all a favor and move to another state.

I call somewhat fake news on this claim.

Google does not have access to every text and email sent in and out of this country. They may be doing it on their own mail (gmail) and voice (google talk) platforms and if so shame on them.

Even if they did they would need to have the ability to break the encryption that is used - where it is used. Now for email many providers and companies do not bother encrypting email so it is possible to intercept and read in the clear messages that are sent. Many however do, some go so far as to use multi factor (multiple layers of encryption) and that makes it impossible to read the contents unless the key chain(s) used to encrypt it is available to them which is highly unlikely.

SMS text messages there could be some truth to this as SMS messages are NOT encrypted and thus could be intercepted and read by anyone. That said, anyone who has an Apple device and sends imessages to another Apple user, those messages are sent via encrypted data stream (NOT SMS). They route through the iCloud not your wireless provider. The only thing the wireless provider does is provide the LTE service the data flows over. There is no way Google would have visibility into this. Apple to non apple communications are done via SMS and thus not encrypted.

Here is my problem with “open carry”, “concealed carry”, or any carry at all: Most of the people who carry, not all but a significant portion, have gained their skill on a gun range. (Heck, I was pretty good at the range & at the fair’s air gun booth when I was young). They have no experience/training in high stress situations. They have never been in combat. They think they are going to respond like Clint Eastwood to a shooter situation but are more likely to respond like https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_6...b02df1ad873652.

There was a study released a number of years ago (sorry couldn’t find a reference to it now) that said a trained police officer would hit his target less than 20% of the time from 15 ft in a high stress situation. That scares the crap out of me. I don’t want to be one of the innocent bystanders that always seems to get shot.

I’m all for the 2nd Amendment but there needs to be some restraints.


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