When James Holmes opened fire in the theater that night in Aurora, CO, he knew he would face no armed resistance. The theater was a declared \u201cgun free zone\u201d. Firearms were not permitted. Now before anyone goes all \u201cwhat part of shall not be infringed\u201d don\u2019t they get, the theater is privately owned. They can establish any rules they want to, and they did. They made the business\/economic decision to not allow firearms onto the premises. They even had little stickers on the sliding glass doors, I\u2019m told, signifying to the viewing and paying public of this decision. People still went to the theater, many of them unaware that they were just so many moving arcade targets.<\/p>\n
Most of the time, it is only after an incident we find out the place of commerce was really a live-fire shooting range. No one pays that much attention to a 2-inch square sticker on the bottom corner of a sliding door. In that case, we\u2019re busy making sure the idiot in the kiosk sold us the right tickets, and bitching about the extortion prices at the concession stand.<\/p>\n
You can bet, though, that Holmes saw those stickers\u2014and he planned accordingly.<\/p>\n
Then, last week, two pro-gun \u201centhusiasts\u201d (in this case, read: morons) decided to exercise their right to bear arms and patronized a Texas Chipotle. (http:\/\/eatocracy.cnn.com\/2014\/05\/20\/chipotle-gun-open-carry\/<\/a>)<\/p>\n This Denver based chain is often franchised, which gives the owner great latitude in determining store rules in their retail world. The gun toting fools made other patrons uncomfortable with their scary black rifles. Some complained and now chain-wide, Chipotle is asking patrons to leave the gun home. They do not want you to go there carrying\u2014open or concealed. Starbucks did the same thing last September, banning guns inside the store and even outside in the open air seats. (http:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/money\/business\/2013\/09\/18\/starbucks-coffee-guns-ceo-schultz\/2829937\/<\/a>)<\/p>\n Whether one agrees with these \u201cgood ole\u2019 Texas boys\u201d bringing their guns into the restaurant or not is a side argument. Personally I think a gun carrier is FAR better served by not letting others know he is carrying until the shit hits the fan. Hence the term \u201cconcealed carry permit\u201d. These boys were within their right to carry openly as they did, but they probably also did it exactly for the reaction they got\u2014scared and unsettled other civilians.<\/p>\n I mean, if I am a bad guy, going into a Chipotle to rob it and see someone there with a gun on his hip, I\u2019m going to do one of two things\u2014leave and rob something else, or shoot the guy with the gun to kick off my robbery. (See how a concealed carry is a better idea yet?)<\/p>\n Chipotle\u2019s reaction was just as knee-jerk and stupid. Rather than address these two cretins, they made a company-wide determination to not allow firearms into their stores. They just announced to all of the James Holmes\u2019 of the world that Chipotle is just the same as the Aurora theater. They will face no armed opposition to rob the place if they are money motivated, or just shoot the place up if a body count is what they seek. I never often ate there but let them know that I won\u2019t in the future. They had other solutions on the menu and selected the least palatable\u2014as far as I\u2019m concerned.<\/p>\n Need proof? A Durham, North Carolina restaurant was recently robbed at gun point. It had been declared a gun free zone, letting patrons know they will have no protection while eating there while also telling all bad guys of a \u201clow hanging fruit\u201d target. http:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/Big-Government\/2014\/05\/22\/Restaurant-With-No-Weapons-No-Concealed-Firearms-Sign-Robbed-At-Gunpoint<\/a><\/p>\n It has been trumpeted every time a shooting incident happens: The best way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. A person with a gun stopped both Fort Hood shootings from getting worse. A person with a gun stopped the shooter at the church in Colorado Springs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" When James Holmes opened fire in the theater that night in Aurora, CO, he knew he would face no armed resistance. The theater was a declared \u201cgun free zone\u201d. Firearms were not permitted. Now before anyone goes all \u201cwhat part of shall not be infringed\u201d don\u2019t they get, the theater is privately owned. They can […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/writeofcenter.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/writeofcenter.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/writeofcenter.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/writeofcenter.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/writeofcenter.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=72"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/writeofcenter.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75,"href":"https:\/\/writeofcenter.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72\/revisions\/75"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/writeofcenter.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=72"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/writeofcenter.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=72"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/writeofcenter.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=72"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}