Loathsome jackasses and the havoc in their wake

Last week I managed to snag a rare warm, sunny Friday off to go to the range with some friends…and when we arrived we found the range was a disaster area. We had barely gotten out of my buddy’s ancient Jeep when a couple of U.S. Forrest Service employees showed up to assess the damage to the place caused by cretinous jackasses of the lowest breeding and poorest intellect imaginable. This public range, you see, had been closed down at least once before due to wanton abuse by feckless nitwits who insist on tearing the place up.

If you do this kind of stuff, a pox on your house.
If you do this kind of stuff, a pox on your house.

We grabbed trash bags and helped the Forrest Service employees clean up what could be cleaned up on the range. Apart from the pictured TV there were door locks, chunks of some sort of ceramic items that had been smashed with gunfire, and more shattered beer and liquor bottles than could hope to clean up. Of course the shelter by the benches had a number of holes in it where some unforgivable twit had blasted at it with a shotgun and some rifles. Even the little bathroom hut had been shot up. The Forrest Service employee I was working with mentioned that last year they’d had to replace the doors on the bathrooms because some idiots had shotgunned them at point blank range.

While we were cleaning the place up they were discussing closing the range permanently due to the level of abuse that has gone on at that range over the years. And so an increasingly rare public place to shoot is endangered because of the behavior of obstreperous nitwits. If I ruled the world I’d have the bastards horse-whipped and then pilloried in the town square. As a fundraiser to repair the damage they’ve done to the range I’d charge the general public a dollar a pop to throw rotten fruit at their face.

This isn’t merely stupidity at work. It’s the product of people who derive pleasure from the act of screwing things up for everyone else. There’s a certain breed of individual who never moved past the angsty teenager stage of life and since they hate the world they’ve decided they’re going to inflict as much misery on the world as they can. This kind of person vexes me. Heaps me.

…which brings us to this:

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There’s no real difference between the jackasses who are trying their best to shut down an increasingly rare public shooting space and these geniuses waging their “LOOK AT ME!!!!” campaign. They’re both actively trying to tear ***CENSORED*** up.

Yes, I know they sell this sort of nonsense as a form of “activism” but I think that’s horsefeathers. To quote the wisest thing I’ve seen said on this ridiculous debacle “…if every time you open carry it results in a new gun free zone, you might want to try changing things up.” If they were actually trying to advance a particular legislative agenda they wouldn’t be pulling these sorts of shenanigans as it’s plainly obvious to anyone who hasn’t willingly taken leave of their senses that this fertilizer isn’t helping the situation

I belong to an organization called the Virginia Citizens Defense League. It’s one of the most effective state-level gun rights organizations in the country. The organization has a track record of accomplishing important things for gun owners in the Commonwealth. One of the reasons it is an effective organization is because it’s headed by sane human being, and everybody in the membership cares deeply about making progress in the state house in Richmond rather than posting idiotic facebook photos. Every year VCDL members gather in Richmond for “lobby day” where they show up in numbers. They’re polite, presentable, and maintain a professional demeanor. Some of them are even openly carrying a handgun. All of them are wearing the trademark “Guns Save Lives” stickers and buttons. State legislators cannot help but note the sea of orange stickers in their midst on lobby day, and when the VCDL gets coverage in the press it’s always a well-spoken, presentable advocate for gun rights that shows up on TV or in the paper. Motivated. Focused. Polite. Professional. Effective.

Everything the dudes in that ridiculous photo…and those of their ilk…aren’t. That photo isn’t about advancing gun rights. Nobody with a room temperature or better IQ is dense enough to believe that somehow what’s shown in that photo is going to actually advance any reasonable cause. To quote Tam, “there’s a difference between carrying a gun and carrying a gun at somebody.” This difference is easily discerned by the general public. That ridiculous stunt was a display of ego, as thoroughly inappropriate as loudly passing gas and laughing like a hyena during a moment of silence.

Attempting Westboro Baptist-worthy nonsense is not going to advance the second amendment cause any more than that gaggle of morons advances the Christian faith. It’s high time those of us who do care about advancing a worthy cause and preserving important resources start calling the loathsome jackasses who leave havoc in their wake out for the scoundrels that they are.

If you’re running around tearing up public spaces or deliberately being such an obnoxious twit that you succeed in curtailing the freedoms of other gun owners, knock it the hell off. You’re not a patriot or a sheepdog or whatever other pathetic label you want to try and paste on your feckless crap. You’re just an obnoxious twit. Sort your ***CENSORED*** out and act right, dammit.

 

48 Comments

  1. Just two days ago I had a run in with this kind of epic stupidity. I was just back from the dentist, hurting a good bit, and decided to take a trip to the beach about 3/4 mile from my house. It is a mile long public beach on the South Shore of Lake Superior, with awesome natural rock formations, owned by the state Department of Natural Resources. It is also one of the last public beaches around that is open 24/7.
    Some piece of work burned a radial tire in the parking lot, right in front of the walking trail. This leaves a bunch of steel wire on the ground in addition to nasty. Not being satisfied with that ungodly mess, they proceeded to smash at least a dozen beer bottles in the area. All of this, RIGHT WHERE LITTLE KIDS WALK OFF THE BEACH.
    I went home and grabbed my trailer, shovel, contractor bags and rubber gloves. Two hours later I think it is safe for kids to walk.
    I didn’t want the police called, and have them one step closer to closing the beach at night. I take a swim before bed almost every night in the summer.
    This is why we can’t have nice things.

  2. Are some second amendment people really this stupid? Or is this a Bloomberg operation?Think about it . A rouse , a set-up of support designed to not only fail but to help with the demise of your opponent and make the public think all gun owners are incestuous breeding Neanderthals dumber than an untrained chimpanzee that should not be allowed to possess as much as a water balloon.

  3. Absolutely spot on. Well stated sir, very well stated.

    I would also venture to guess that these nit wits have not dontaed a single dime to any gun rights organization, ever. That’s typically what I see from guys like this.

    1. Well then today is your lucky day, since I didn’t write this post, Tim did. I covered the Texas OC stuff yesterday.

      1. I was thinking the same thing and thought, “who wrote this?” and scrolled back up to see Tim’s name. FWIW, I don’t think everything you write is crap, just the click-bait stuff. (I realize that isn’t as complimentary as I intended)

  4. I wish I could agree that these guys intentionally did this to screw things up for everyone else…I just haven’t seen any evidence of it. It really would make me feel better.

    It’s entirely plausible/likely that these guys are just dumb. And shortsighted (incredibly so). I don’t think they were sitting at home in their mother’s basements thinking “ha, we screwed them over yet again!”….more likely it was “**** Chipotle, those anti-2A bastards!”

  5. “…Bloomberg operation…”

    Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

    1. The stupid are easily manipulated into doing stupid stuff, while maintaining plausible deniability. It’s herd mentality, get a bunch together, work them up with some rhetoric, and next thing is they are wearing guns while acting like goons. So some of our smart folks need to become friends with a bunch of these people and lead them way from such actions, while keeping an eye for those promoting these bozo antics.

  6. I don’t even blame Chipotle at this point. They were forced by these nitwits into a situation where they HAD to say enough is enough.

  7. For years I have been on the soap box against “in your face” weapon display. If these guys had simple pistols in decent looking holsters I bet the reaction would have been fractional, if any. And, like already stated, concealed is concealed. I am already seeing “we should protest them”, and “get Gun Rights groups to notify them they lost our money” chants on facebook.

    How about let’s not walk around with ar’s and ak’s and F it up for logical, truly Conservative people. I do not see anything Conservative about bringing a long gun on a sling to an eatery. I do, however, see stupidity. If Obama and his crew of Constitutional wrecking balls wanted to screw with gun owners all they have to do is get guys like these to do the same all over the country. Just keep scaring the sh*t out of people when they go out for a nice meal. That’ll help turn the tide against gun owners for sure.

    1. Not an option in Texas. Open carry of handguns is illegal, except for cap and ball black powder revolvers because they aren’t considered firearms.

      Open carry of long guns is perfectly legal however. Weird huh?

      Are these two guys probably overboard? Eh maybe. The media has been good in the past of turning gun owners against one another and other gun owners are quick to turn on their own sometimes.

      1. And soon open carry of long guns in Texas will be illegal too if these nitwits don’t wise up.

    2. Agreed, Joe. I’m in a group that has a open carry lunch about once a month. The restaurant is happy to have us, we spend money and are NOT like the idiots in the picture. The only requirements are keep it holstered and no round in the chamber. Even the police like it when we meet, always letting us know they appreciate our stance on Second Amendment rights.

  8. I love my local range. Missouri DNR runs the range and, for $3/hour, you get targets provided, or $5 per 25 clays at the trap range.
    These guys run a tight ship, though: no rapid fire (3 seconds between shots), cease fire every 15 minutes to change targets, and more. Plus, you’re out if you violate any of the rules.
    All are good rules, too, aside from the “no rapid fire.” If you want to do any training other than bullseye, you’re SOL.

    1. You can do immediate action drills (stoppages, stovepipe, etc) but no rapid fire. I like shooting at the MDC ranges and have shot at most of them. Try going when they have the “fun days”. They have different competitions for accuracy, distance, and speed. I always liked doing the falling plate competition. It’s also fun trying to shoot the egg on a string. Not as easy as you might think.

  9. The problem, for these oxygen thieves, is that their photo – much like a mug shot – is all over the Internet. If this turns out bad for 2A folk, someone of equal caliber will put a bull’s eye on their head.

  10. As for the open carry incidents:
    Here’s what I don’t get, if they are REALLY trying to advance a cause. The same thing could be accomplished by showing up with an open-carry handgun. Not a handcannon in an open shoulder holster, but a normal S&W, Sig, HK, Glock, etc… in a standard hip holster/paddle holster. By doing this blatant crap with long guns, you’re forcing this place to take a position when they just want to serve food/drinks/widgets.
    On the public range – Tragedy Of The Commons. When something isn’t owned by anyone and is open to everyone, no one takes responsibility for it and everyone feels they can use it in whatever way they want without a care. “Someone will take care of it. It’s not my responsibility.” Someone owns it and say charges $5 for use, it magically becomes respected.
    Simple way to live your life: Don’t be a d!ck.

      1. The problem is that a lot of the long gun OC-ers actually seem to think they can “normalize” long gun carry, they don’t seem to be going for pistol OC at this point. Which is stupid because long gun OC has *never* been “normal” in town in this country, it’s always only been temporarily tolerated in times of active existential threat.

        Texas OC-ers need to clearly state their goal is simply “to tuck our shirts in over our pistol without worrying about being arrested, like the citizens in 30 something other states can do with no problems.” That’s a message they can sell to the soccer moms whose neutrality, if not support, they need at the polls.

        To that end they’d be better served leaving private businesses alone and do their protests solely on public property, after notifying law enforcement, with signs explaining current law and their small requested change to allow OC. If they want to be a walking billboard better to carry an empty, not crap or thigh rig, OC holster along with their CCW for defense. The goal is (or should be) pistol OC, carrying rifles doesn’t illustrate that goal.

        Hell, if they applied a moments thought beyond, “let’s scare the straights”, they could use some humor by carrying grandpa’s old .22 slung over their shoulder and a shirt saying, “I’d rather just OC my pistol.”

        Even if they feel they must carry long guns, that doesn’t justify looking like they use Soldier of Fortune as a fashion magazine.

    1. Gabe, are you an economist? Haha widgets and the Tragedy of the Commons in the same post?! HAHAHA

  11. These guys in the picture are the right wing radicals that will not listen to you or a guy on the left. Not sure why you’re ranting at them they aren’t listening.

  12. Love the article and agree with the sentiment. However… What is the US FORREST Service?? 😀

    Thinking you meant the US FOREST service…. Unless you were referring to a certain Mr. Gump. 😛

  13. I completely agree with this article, however I have to play devil’s advocate for a minute.What good is a law if it doesn’t pertain to all of us including the obviously socially ignorant ones among us. Would the freedom of speech do us any good if it were constantly curtailed in places and at certain events? How good is the right of protest when I constantly see and hear of municipalities curtailing it with red tape restricting when and where and for how long it will be tolerated. I don’t agree with the method used here because the end result is I can’t bring lawful concealed protection for my family with me to these establishments. I have to say though that there should be better solutions to this problem. I am generally against any gun regulation as a gun enthusiast, however I suggest this. We might campaign to have a “NO OPEN CARRY” sign made and established as an alternative to business owners who want to maintain an atmosphere for non gun people. This would still maintain the freedom for lawful concealed carry people to have the protection that they deem necessary for them and their families with them and prevent these “look at me” types from ruining it for us. I would gladly continue to patronize establishments that go this route as it shows a want of the company to respect all citizens rights and concerns.

    1. I really like your idea about a sign that says “No Open Carry.” It makes sense as a compromise between OC and CC

  14. I see this at the private range I shoot at too often, though it has gotten less frequent. Nothing irritates me more than seeing a few ruin a nice thing for the many. Always try to leave a range better than I found it.

  15. I see that many people here think that it was absurd to openly carry a long gun into a place of business for no reason. However, what many of you don’t understand, and what the article failed to mention was why they were doing this. They were open carrying rifles simply because the open carry of a handgun was not permitted. Although I personally would not do such a thing, and they did make to big of a “show” about it, what they did was not only legal, but the best that they could do legally. If we, as gun owners start to pick and choose our own rights and turn against each other, that is when we will loose everything. whatever happened to “shall not be infringed?”

    1. Are they trying to lose the right to OC rifles too? Because that’s the easily foreseeable by anyone with half a brain most likely outcome of this nonsense.

      Look, if the point is *pistol* OC, then OC an empty holster along with your concealed weapon for defense, you make the same point, more effectively, with *zero* counter-productive scary black rifle optics.

  16. Let me carry my inconspicuous sidearm and I won’t have a need to carry my rifle. The laws in Texas are similar to New York, Connecticut, Road Island, Massachusetts, etc.
    This group is trying to bring attention to the broken laws so Texas can join the other 45 states that allow some form of open carry, AND I SUPPORT THEM.

    1. I support the *goal* they (claim to) have. I have a problem with their *methods* as those are proving, here in the real world, to be ill-thought-out (at best) exercises that are counter-productive in effect.

      Idiots need to be called out, nominally on “our side” or not, particularly if they are doing actual *harm* to “our side.”

    2. Their goal is semi-ridiculous. I have issues with OC that involve a lot (not all, I will respect intelligence where it is due) of OC advocates being argumentative fools with substandard gear, training, and legal understanding. It almost seems that the most important part of an OC set up is a camera to take videos of you harassing the cops and if that isn’t enough reason to give them all the kibosh then I don’t know what is.

  17. The fact that bearing arms is a RIGHT doesn’t mean it isn’t also a RESPONSIBILITY.

    Freedom is a right too. And when someone abuses it we take it away.

  18. It occurs to me that the best way to normalize firearms in general to the non-shooting public is to take a non-shooter shooting.

  19. Openly carrying a pistol is illegal in Texas, even with a permit. Hence the long guns. That does not, of course, excuse boorish behavior.

  20. Send their names to every range in the immediate area with a “Be On the Lookout” notice. Deny them their fantasy. If a range won’t comply, call them out as cheap whore-mongering sell-outs.

    Hard knocks, but these are hard games.

    You break wind in our party, you get ejected. Not sorry. They are not a member of our community. You are cast into the darkness, until you repent and promise to stop being a jackass forever more (not gonna happen with these dolts).

    If we let them onto our ranges and into our community, we OWN their antics. Deny their tactics, and keep them away from our clan.

    Ostracism: the only option that will work. Especially with drama queens like these.

    Peer pressure works. I speak from experience having taken down idiots like this in the past. This is evidence of weak management at the state level. Who runs the prime state-levels groups in Texas and why are they not dealing with these dolts at the local level?

    If you don’t know the name of every major range director in the state, you are not doing your job.

    SHUT THESE GUYS DOWN.

    NOW.

  21. For those commenting on open carry of pistols not being available in TX, can you please educate me. Other than the risk of accidently showing your concealed carry (and perhaps running afoul of the law, assuming this happens), why does this matter? Why would anyone ever want to open carry when concealed carry is available?

    1. I prefer open carry in non populated areas. When fishing, hunting, ect. it is nice to be able to have a jacket on or off without worrying about breaking the law. When I’m surrounded by strangers OC just seems to attract unwanted attention, and create possible weapon retention issues. For me there is a time and place for both.

    2. Remember, the default position in our society is peaceable free exercise of fundamental rights.

      “Why?” is never an appropriate question about such. Rather the burden is on those who propose restrictions to demonstrate, with logic and evidence, why any given particular (not broad general) restriction is justifiable (in law) or reasonable (in practice).

      So, OC of rifles in urban areas is a bad idea as it has *never* been normal in US society, particularly not carried in a ready position for defense, particularly not in the service of other gun rights goals, and thus far has only, and logically pretty much *can* have only, negative outcomes for gun rights writ large.

      OC of *pistols* however has been, and remains in large portions of the US, traditional and “normal”, if less common since the anti-gun era of the ’60s. Further, in places where people actually do it -as part of going about their day normally- the reactions of the general public, and even hostile media, *in actual practice* have been positive to neutral, with negative reactions limited and local and not having any notable effect on things like company policies or gun rights in general.

      So, I OC on occasion because sometimes it is hot, or I don’t want to bother with a cover garment, or it doesn’t fit my wardrobe of the day, or to be honest, because I want to *passively* thumb my nose at the odd panty-twister who might notice me.

  22. Why would anyone want to annoy and irritate anyone else? We are folks who appreciate firearms and embrace the right of self defense. There are others who do not. We have to get along with them in society. CC is a good compromise.

  23. The inconsiderate behavior at public outdoor shooting ranges/pits is a worthy issue to share amongst the shooting public. It is just another issue that anti’s could try to use against us. Please tell anyone and everyone you know, to clean up after themselves as best as possible. You want o blast a TV, then take the remains out with you. Bring a rake and a cardboard box. Don’t DUMP your junk at the shooting pit, or they’ll Dump Public Pits from the landscape.

  24. Josh May 22, 2014 at 09:38
    (And everyone else defending these idots by pointing out OC of handguns is illegal in TX):

    You can make your point easily enough WITHOUT looking like an actual imminent threat to public safety like The Tapco Kid here. (The Threepersaurus next to him is merely a slob with his Tacticool AR on it’s dangerously dangly “operator” single point sling.)

    1. Obviously wear an obviously empty holster for the rally, while dressing business causal (or at least jeans and a clean t-shirt). HEY! A good use for that shoebox of cheap-assed nylon holsters you’ve got in the closet!

    2. OC a longarm (frankly, preferrably a “Fudd” looking gun – this is a game of PERCEPTION here – you’re playing politics, not MinMax legal dancing), but don;t have the magazine inserted, and sling it over your damned back. You walk up to ME with your rifle in the low carry, and we AREN’T in a patrol setting (including training), and I’m going to flag you as a likely threat to be eliminated if you twitch wrong.

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