Posted on 08/21/2005 6:02:36 AM PDT by CholeraJoe
"Never, ever leave home without it." No, not your American Express card, your sidearm.
This morning, I woke up about 4:15 and was hungry, so I decided to drive to the local 24-hour beanery. The only other customers were a table of 10, intoxicated 20-somethings making alot of noise.
There were 7 muscular young men and three loud-mouthed young women. After listening to their raucous laughter for 10 minutes, I politely asked the waitress to ask them to hold down the noise. All I wanted to do was eat my breakfast in relative peace.
Her request for quiet lasted about 45 seconds, then the noise and laughter resumed. At that point, I decided to do something.
Bear in mind that I am not an imposing figure. I'm 5'9", mid 50's, and slim. I walked over to the table, and walked completely around it twice. I said, "I'd like y'all to hold down the noise for a while, please." One of the young men started to give me trash-talk but within seconds was elbowed by the guy next to him, who whispered something in his ear. Then everyone at the table said, "Yes, sir, or OK."
What made the difference? Open carry. I was wearing a 9mm semi-auto on my right hip. I never touched it and I made no threats, but it was nevertheless visible.
>What if CJ was a cop, or an ex-cop, or the group was planning for the right moment to kill the owner, beat the waitress to death, steal the money, and burn the joint down?<
You can "what if" all you want. A weapon in a civilized society is for self defense. If they were molesting the staff, don't show the weapon, use the weapon.
They were not robbing the place. They were not hurting anybody. We don't even know if they were even being that loud.
If you are packing, it is your responsiblity to have a thick skin and demonstrate better than average judgement.
If you didn't like the noise level you could have had your breakfast to go. I don't see why 4:15 AM is an inappropriate time for a group of kids to be noisy in a diner. I hope that they accommodated you out of courtesy and not out of fear that you would go Columbine on them.
UNDER current? Looks more it's an ALL current.
Your CCW is not about making other people mind their manners; it's about something else.
You were well within your rights to ask the punks to pipe down.
The fact that you were wearing your sidearm, which clearly had an effect on these kids, does not make you a "bully" or wrong for doing what you did.
Just a thought for some of the other Freepers on this post: Do you think England would be having such a problem w/ their youth if law abiding citizens were permitted to carry? I would really hate to have the kids in the US morph into the kids (punks) in the UK who seem to have the run of the place (no offense to the UK Freeper crowd).
Regards,
CP
hahaha...!
Very liberal definition of self-defense.
Not only was I out of eggs, I was out of milk as well.
I stand by my assertation that a gun should never be a factor (no matter how "passive") in any situation unless you are willing to pull it out and shoot it. You were bluffing.
I don't know whether or not that's the case, but logistically it's good sense to not let guff get to you if you are packing. Consider, why does the Federal Government strictly, for lifetime, forbid the purchase and ownership of a firearm to a person who has EVER been committed to a mental institution?
No, it isn't. the "Self defence" excuse is when you have no other choice. In this case you did. you could have walked away, left the building. nobody was threatening you. In fact, you threatened them. You were looking for trouble, and you'd be facing life in prison if you'd have found it.
1) If you can avoid a confrontation without loss, do so and
2) One can win and still get hurt.
It might have been better to get the meal to go, but,like I said, I wasn't there.
You know they'd all have the same story. The result could've been brandishing. It's happened before.
Sorry, poor judgement, you should've just packed up and left telling the manager, waitress whoever you'd take your business elswhere. I've had a CPL most of my adult life, now approaching 60, I've never had a reason to even think about it. And I'm in the 'burbs of Detroit. your situation could've escalated very fast and you'd have been in the wrong. Chalk it up to one of lifes lessons.
hey , #65 is also good
The party of 10 were friends out having a good time, you my friend intruded on them, not the other way round.
If I was there I would have called the police on you, and let you explained why a group in a public place needed to keep the noise down because you were bothered.
My parents expected more out of me....
Being loud and having a great time is fine....take the party to the appropriate venue.
Those kids are the restaraunt's customer base - the manager would probably rather see CJ leave.
Never commit the main body of your breakfast force without:
(a) Adequate artillery preparation
(b)Having arranged for air support
(c)Making sure you have a clear plan and route for withdrawal.
Of course, it would have been good to know whether or not the "seven muscular drunks" and their debutante dates were themselves armed.
So, next time you're a-hankering for some breakfast at 4:30AM, send out a patrol first, mark the location with a white phosophorus rocket, call in some 105, pin down the kitchen staff with SAW and outflank their main body with the rest of your squad.
So you want home fries or grits with that?
First we need to bring a little politeness to this discussion. I hope the people using insults are lefty lurkers and not real freepers. You may disagree with Joe (I do) but no need to insult or threaten here among friends.
I think what's really bothering everyone is the fact you circled the table. No, it's not technically illegal but we all know it's threatening w/o a gun, much less open carry.
I'd respect it if you did this without a gun, but with one it makes you into the bully.
OK there are 24 hour diners in your area but no 24 hour grocery?
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