Long Shot

Not that it's very important, but for some reason I was tickled by the notion that people can "protest" or "make a political statement" by carrying an unloaded gun around on their hip.

While reading this SF Gate article on the so called "Open Carry Movement":

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/scavenger/detail?entry_id=51902

a few of potentially disparaging thoughts whirled like a vortex in my highly amused mind.

1. The only "statement" you dudes are making is that there are only two types of people who can walk around with a gun on their hip and not get shot at by the cops: other cops and white people.

Seriously. Everyone else is shot and killed for lying on their belly at a BART station or pulling out a cell phone at dusk, yet these "Open Carry Movement" guys are able to saunter unchallenged through the clearance section at Barnes and Noble with a .45 on their hip. Hmmmmm...

Wait... I get it! That is your statement! Wow! Suburban white guys drawing attention to our society's disparate treatment of people of color by walking around with weapons and acting oppressed...

Satire at its best folks. Man, you guys sure are clever!

2. It also occurred to me that political "movements" are a means of catalyzing or signifying the arrival into the political mainstream of a given, previously unheralded cause of the downtrodden and disenfranchised people. Gay Rights is a movement. Fighting for "Civil Rights" for people of color, labor groups and women was/is a movement. Ending wars that kill untold numbers of innocent people is a movement. Large shifts in mainstream ideals that hold potential benefits for disenfranchised portions of society are political movements.

So let’s take a look at your "movement": You want to carry firearms, and you feel disenfranchised because people disagree with you about that. Well, we’ve been able to carry firearms as a common right since before we abolished slavery, and those who object to it are not worried about your political “preferences” so much as your ability to, hmmm… kill people?

Sorry folks. A bunch of fat suburban car salesmen walking from their condo to Starbucks with a BlackBerry and an unloaded gun on their hip is less a "movement" in the political sense, more so in terms of passing stool.

But what the heck, you guys can have it. Enjoy walking around with your manhood on the outside of our pants.

Hell, you want to carry a gun to "protect yourself"?

Go right ahead! It's clear that the police who stopped you to ask you about the firearm you're brandishing in front of children in a quiet suburban neighborhood aren't doing their job, right? Crime is rampant in Walnut Creek, right? You think you could do it better, right?

Well, by all means.

Go ahead Captain J. Wayne of the Team America Brigade. Shoot 'em up! Because you're judge, jury, and executioner in all matters of the rough and tumble social geography that is Northern California’s suburban jungle. In a ‘hood where chai tea soy lattes come dangerously over heated, where shamefully oaky Cabernets offend your palate with overbearing tannins, and pesky kids run rampant on your lawn as they revel their youthful imaginations, only you have the courage to destroy the evil enemy, whoever they are or whatever they are doing... which you can't articulate at this point in time without sounding racist, but your publicist tells me that you can tell me with absolute certainty that "they" are out there. I know it. You know it. We all know it.

"They" are out there, whoever “they” are.

Seriously though, I got to thinking that maybe holding a gun isn't such a bad thing. It would be great to go gallantly about my town, protecting my loved ones, my neighborhood, my Constitution, my country.

As a matter of fact, since we have the right to carry guns, I'm going to get one. Yeah, that's right; I'm going to walk around with a firearm on my hip.

Better yet, I’ll one-up you "Open Carry" dudes by proudly displaying my firearm in a place where I could, I don't know... actually use the protection!?!?

I've never lived in such a neighborhood, and I don’t know if you guys have either; but I'm pretty sure things go down like this:

The good guys wear white hats, and the bad guys walk around in black hats. The bad guys also wear red and blue bandannas over their face so that they can't be identified, even though it makes it easier for everyone to spot them.

I will valiantly journey to the edge of the neighborhood, the liquor store. Its ramshackle edifice will hover over me like an emblem of unearthly evil. The gum sticking to the sidewalk will remind me of my long lost lover’s embrace – she’s so far from me now. It’s me against the world.

The sidewalk is cold and wet, but I can smell the evil simmering around me, hot and sticky as summer in Larkspur.

As I step around the discarded Frito-Lay packages rolling around my feet like urban tumbleweeds, I'll walk up to a black clad bad guy and say, "Well there stranger. You from 'round here?"

He'll say, in an evil tone, "Actually, yes I am. I live over there.” He’ll point to the church across the street before asking me, “Are you from this area sir? Can’t say I’ve seen you here on Sundays past."

I'll respond with the stank eye as I gesture to my trusty friend.

He'll ask in that wry, evil tone, "Uh, are you sure you want to do that?” Perplexed but unafraid, he’ll match my bravado. Tricky bastard. My gaze of glory will let him know I mean business.

“I mean, I'm just on my way to get more bread so the kids at Bible study can have toast,” he'll stammer, afraid as he rambles on something incoherent like, “But some people around here might feel threatened by your blatant display of violent potential. You might be perceived as a threat to some people’s interests here. Maybe they think you're a cop even. It’s like you’re asking for trouble or something. Have you thought this through?"

"Now wait a minute varmint," I'll reply strongly, brave in the face of evil. "You've got no right to tell me what I can and can't do. Now turn around, pace out ten steps, and damn it pilgrim, you'd better draw before I do. I came here to clean this town. No more black hats 'round here."

"Suit yourself," he'll say as he pushes by me and enters the liquor store. I will then frantically pull ammunition out of my Dale Earnhardt Jr. fanny pack (since, peaceful and law abiding as I am, I'm will not carry a loaded gun or keep ammunition near it. It’s against the law).

When I'm organized, the evil bastard will lurk out from the liquor store hiding pathetically behind an armful of cheap white bread. Doesn’t he know they used bleach flour in that bread? He’s contributing to childhood obesity, that evil prick!

I'll give him one last evil eye as my clip clicks into position. A round enters the chamber. I'll shout my best combination Clint Eastwood, '90s action movie one-liner.

"Lock and load, punk!"

And he will run into the church, no doubt to cower before God and ask for forgiveness! Huzzah! The bad guys are running. Score one for the white hats! Yeeehhaaawww!!!

And as I turn to walk back the other way, a random fifteen year old plants a shank in my back six or seven times. I get one shot off before I hit the ground and bleed to death on the sidewalk.

As I fade to black, I lay with the comfort of a warm gun in my palm, secure in my ignorance of the fact that my desperate, prideful discharge killed a little girl walking home from church on the other side of the street.

So, congrats to all you political spaghetti-westerners out there. I’m with ya.

Keep the movement alive.