Just skimming the thread quickly, but I think I've got it. Something about the rest of us being bigoted sheep and we're sitting in Rosa Parks seat...roughly?

lol

Well, there you have it folks. If each and every one of us are NOT out to make the world safer, in what ever way we can, nothing will change.

Thanks for all your help Goalie. My community appreciates it.



LOL!

Goalie,
Ive never used a gun in self defense but I'm not afraid to stick up for my self using force. Ive had to and I hope to never do it again but I wont hesitate. I dont take direct threats lightly. I just dont need a gun.

I'm not telling you to ignore your life's experiences. Not at all. It's how we learn and understand life. But I do think you'd probably be happier without that "need to be ready to defend" instinct in the front of your mind all the time. But what ever man, what ever helps you sleep at night.

Dont use Rosa Parks as an anecdote for gun rights. A gun owner living in Minnetonka has nothing to whine about. Try being enslaved, beaten, raped, taken from your family, and persecuted for 200 years, then treated like shit for another 100 after being "freed". Go vote Goalie, black people couldn't for a long time.
Life out side of Minnetonka for Rosa Parks:


So go vote for this guy!



Oh wait, hes dead. But wait, free gun! Sweet.


This has gotten way off topic. There are assaults on the GW at night. Its not good. I've certainly seen some shady characters down there and it puts me on high alert. The GW is a landmark of this great cycling community of ours and we need to keep it safe. What can we do? How can we stay strong and keep the riff-raff out of there? I, for one, am the FIRST person out my door if I hear any commotion in my neighborhood, phone in hand, ready to call the police and do something if needed long before they get here. Who's with me? Who is going to HELP? Christ, remember those neighborhood watch signs that say "if I dont call the police, my neighbor will"? There's a deeper underlying message there that says were all responsible for each others safety. We can make this world safer by looking out for each other with out being fearful or hostile or defensive.

Example? TRAIL WATCH. I commend you guys. You ride bikes, which is awesome. You alert authorities to riffraff on our GW. Extra awesome. No guns needed.

Look, if you're alone and see a group of potential thugs, good idea to turn around and head the other way. If you must proceed, either accelerate and if one of them attacks you, at least try to hit them straight on, or get off your bike and walk and keep your head up. Look ready. That alone is a deterrent.

Forgot to mention a few things.
First: Goalie, all that aside, thank you for biking. I mean it. It's one less car.

Second: leonnettoyeur, welcome to the forum, and your post was not terrible or hostile at all! I'll see if I can find some statistics about guns. I hear ya about "statistics that arent" being annoying.
That breakfast full of carriers scares me and I would avoid it at just about all costs, personally. The assumption that the other carrier is the "good guy" is something I just cant get my head around.
I gotta run to work, but I'll collect my thoughts on that over the course of the day.
Again, welcome to the forum.

People who carry legally are not a problem, these the law abiding citizens who for one reason or another want or need to carry. Going to the Gopher bar for the carry breakfast is probably the safest place to be. Now leave the bar and turn down an ally, your on your own.
Its the low life thug/criminal element that we all need to look out for. I often times see what I would call shady individuals while bike the Greenway. If there was more police presents and these people where moved along I believe the crime rate would drop.
YMMV

Al

Disclamier: Handgun owner (3) Glock 19, Kel Tek PF9, ISSC M-22

Do I carry? I'll never tell

Good try, but I am not the one who said, quite literally, that one should not exercise their rights legally because it may impact those who choose not to exercise those rights.

You can try and spin because you happen to not like the right in question, but it is nothing like a Hitler analogy.

Unlike the anti-2nd amendment people in this thread, I support ALL of our rights, and think the 2nd is just as important as the 1st.........

I was a Marine. I'm probably never going to sit around singing Kumbaya hoping that we can all just get along. Being shot at by everything from a rifle to a tank/artillery changes your perspective.

I saw trail watch come up the other day, and I still have it open in one of my tabs. I think it's something I want to do this summer. I'm an unemployed student, what else do I have going on? We have to watch out for each other.



Touche!



I can understand this, and I personally never went to this. It just wasn't a crowd with which I wanted to hang out with. Nothing against them, just not for me.

I feel like the two groups, gun owners and non gun owners, have become polarized and as a result there is a lack of understand of one from the other, whether it be gun owners quick to jump to "sheep" (goalie, that's not at you, it's all over carry forums) or non gun owners quick to condemn gun owners as paranoid. Neither may be the case.

But enough about guns from me! I am definitely going to put some saturday trail watches in this summer. Safety in numbers through presence, no guns needed.

I saw an interesting statistic yesterday. There are about 80,000 permit holders in Minnesota. They commit crimes like DWI, assault and rape/domestic abuse at a rate of between 2-5% per 10,000 people compared to the rest of Minnesota.

If you run into a permit holder, he's *twenty* times more likely to not hurt you or drunkenly run over you than your peers.

Did you know there's a separate BAC for people carrying with a permit? It's 0.04. You're not going to see a bunch of permit holders drunk at a bar. Well, they may be drunk at a bar, but they won't be carrying weapons when they do.

Don't let little things like logic and reason muddy up a perfectly emotional debate.........

The bottom line is a lot of people, while acknowledging that owning, carrying etc... is a right, don't LIKE guns. The project morality, in this case evil, onto an inanimate object that is just a tool. Guns make them FEEL bad.

Despite some poster's claims, the statistics don't back up the gloom-and-doom feelings. Someone who jumps through the hoops to legally carry is much, much less likely to be a violent criminal than a member of the general public. Heck, they are much less likely to be a criminal.

I would be interested to see the police records of the permit holders on MBL compared to the police records of non-permit holders. THAT would be interesting........

But you DID compare yourself to Rosa Parks. And I'm just saying that whatever valid points you have to make are pretty much immediately sunk once you, a man living in the 21st century, compare yourself to Rosa Parks. Which is a shame, because you probably have some pretty good points to make. But now it's really hard for me to take you seriously.

Um, no, I compared telling someone to refrain from exercising their rights to a past example, where people used the exact same faulty argument about how standing up for yourself could make things "worse" for those just willing to go along to get along. I was told that, by exercising my rights, I was making things "less safe" for others. It isn't about me, it's about an argument directed at me by other MPL members. It is about being told "you might have the right, BUT........., which is bullshit.

If you are not willing to exercise a right, you do not actually have that right.


But, hey, it must really suck to have to try and rationalize away someone telling me that, eh? I mean, gee, the mean gun-guy just wants to be left alone, and is not doing anything to anyone else, while the people who disagree with him are telling him to sit the fuck down because exercising his rights might make them less safe, and they would rather everyone just bow down to the thugs than defend themselves. After all, most of the injuries (so far) have not been too serious.......

Lead, follow, or get out of the way.

It's ok to compare yourself to Rosa Parks. While the impact isn't as great, standing up for what you believe in is universal. And besides, we're comparing them to something as well:

Oh man. I just laughed really hard at this.

Okay, you got it. I'm getting out of the way now.

If you laughed at it, you probably don't recognize the quote, and you surely have never served.

Fortunately, your right to be an ignorant ass was fought for and paid for by people who don't see much humor in that quote.