Comments

1
Whoever writes the Morning News 'should' just give it up. Provide the newslink, and let the chips fall. Unfortunately, I know you little kiddies love showing off the literary skills you learned from masters such as Savage and Goldfarb.
2
Cue the resident SLOG trolling gun humpers...
3
"The presence of a weapon in our stores is unsettling and upsetting for many of our customers"

'Cause some people are incapable of seeing a inanimate object without going spastic, fearing it will somehow jump off the dude's (or dudette's) belt and begin blasting away by itself.

I have a right to protect my life. Gun-free zones are immoral.
4

However, messages were mixed when Starbucks started putting for sale on their ceramicware shelf:

http://www.thinkgeek.com/product/eaa0/?i…
5
Hey, I've got a fantastic business idea. A chain franchise of gun themed coffee shops. We'll encourage our employees to "shoot for a great customer experience!" and decorate the walls with all sorts of historic weaponry. Can I discriminate against idiot non gun carrying customers? Also, I've got like $800 life savings, so will probably be in need of investors. I'd suggest you not pass up this can't miss opportunity to get in at the ground floor. It's gonna be a fuckin' blast.
6
@2--You were just waiting for delbert, SRoU, and the rest of the developmentally delayed, weren't you...
7
#3: In other words, you have the right to be an antisocial cunt who needs to make everyone around him know that he's in control and he has the power. You also equate carrying guns with moral action. Good to know, you weird ass person.
8
#2, #6

Cue the indiscriminate labelers and groupers.

9
@3, nobody thinks for a second that the inanimate object is going to do anything on its own. We all just think that you're too emotionally unstable to be trusted with it. As Goldy says you gun nuts tend to be extra confrontational when you're packing heat. I've had many disagreements with people over the years and the most aggressive fuckers I've ever dealt with are the ones with bulges on their hip because they believe they can bully me with impunity. They can escalate the situation to any extreme and know that even if they take a swing at me first I can't swing back or they'll put a hole in me. Sure, there's a chance they'd go to jail for it but that doesn't help me.

In short, it's not guns that we're afraid of. It's gun owners. If I could ban emotionally stunted unstable fucks like yourself from the world I would. Since that's not an option I'll just have to try to keep deadly weapons out of your hands.
10
@3,

Florida woman shot at Starbucks by friend who forgot gun was in her purse.
11
I wonder how certain Americans could cut it in major cities in other countries without such rampant gun culture, where nobody thinks of arming themselves before going for coffee. It must be an alien concept for a great many people here to go from Point A to Point B without threat. I feel sorry that your law enforcement and mental health funding let you down so much that the paranoia path was the most obvious. I say this as someone with a family who's lived most of their lives unarmed and happy in one of the top murder capitals of the US.

Does the paranoia come from moving from a small town in a red state to a midsize city in a "blurple" one?
12
"Are you gonna argue with some guy carrying an assault rifle who, say, cut in front of you in line?"

In which Starbucks does that happen?
Because unless you want to start a physical altercation that should not matter.
13
if i enter a business-place and see someone with a gun (and no likely uniform) then i immediately leave. i realize this isn't enough to cause Howard Schultz to shake in his diamond studded boots; but i would humbly recommend this simple act of protest to others.
14
I'm glad Starbucks has clarified their stance. Now maybe the morons will take the stickers trumpeting coffee and guns off their cars.

Any civilian who openly carries a gun is outing themselves as an extreme form of coward. Seek help, please.
15
@3 - Gun-free zones are immoral

Oh my god. I can't believe you just said that. Carrying a deadly weapon in public is about morality now?

Oh do tell! I can't wait to hear your explanation!
16
"Which gets to the heart of the whole reason to open carry: to intimidate other people."

Sorry David Goldstein but intimidation with a firearm is already illegal under the RCW.

Of course you believe that intimidation of citizens by armed agents of the state is totally ok. After all the majority of murder in the 20th century was caused by socialist governments that disarmed their citizenry.

BTW here is the latest study from Harvard School of Law that states a lower rate of gun ownership has no correlation with a lower homicide or suicide rate.

http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs…

Oh No looks like the facts are contradicting your widdle feelings again.

17
Well I don't like sharing Pioneer square with the cracked-out cast of the Thriller video but I just have to tolerate democrats wherever I go. My guns are a civil right that you'll Ned to tolerate. You have no choice so tough shit. Why don't you start putting filthy woodcarvers, begging crackheads, and other euthanasia candidates behind bars/committed where they belong and then we talk out my guns.
18
@14
Yea I guess I should man up and let my face get smashed in by a group of thugs, perhaps they will be nice enough to let me live.

And women who carry should go ahead and give it up to sexual assaulters. After all rape only last a few minutes but killing someone with a firearm last forever.

To do othewise would be cowardly.
19
@17 "Ned to tolerate" ~ you speak volumes...
20
Cascadian Bacon and Robot Ghost can carry a fucking RPG into Starbucks if they're so fucking scared of woodcarving Natives, I don't care.

I just don't want Schizophrenics to have firearms. And I don't think that's too much regulation to ask our Militia to accept. They already accepted regulation of automatic weapons - and that's one hell of an infringement.
21
@17 You do realize the difference between being in a public space and being in a business that is open to the public? The spaces are not the same.

Starbucks does not have to tolerate you carrying guns into their stores while you, on the other hand, have to tolerate the other people enjoying Pioneer Square.
22
Personally, I'm okay with guns in Starbucks. If a gun wants to walk in and order a delicious coffee-like sugar beverage, more power to it.

But when a gun isn't showing up on its own, however, and instead carried by someone who thinks they have something to prove... that's a little worrisome.
23
@20
I agree and that law is already on the books.
Firearm rights can also be lost when a person has been involuntarily committed. RCW 9.41.047



24
Open carry is for small-dick fanny-pack losers. Go flip your ATV and die.
25
@3:

Does that "right to life" also apply to anyone who might have the misfortune to be caught in your cross-fire?
26
@23: yeah, well, that law's working for shit. involuntary committment is too high a bar.

exhibit #1: ian stawicki. his family knew he was schizo, they knew he had guns, tra la la. never committed, involuntarily or otherwise.

"Walter Stawicki said that his son was "a gentleman," but regrets he didn't act to have his son committed for mental-health care."

http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2…
27
Open carry is not about civil rights. It is about dick swinging. My second amendment rights are perfectly fine when I carry concealed. Open Carry activists are attention seeking jack asses who do nothing but make the rest of us look bad.

As a former Starbucks employee I love the I <3 Guns & Coffee folks. I think they're hilarious. Incidentally they think the Open Carry crowd who prompted Howard to make his request are a bunch of idiots.
28
Open carry is stupid but concealed carry is our most important freedom. The right to self defense. You can put up all the faggy gun free zone signs you want but unless you intend to frisk everyone you'll never stop me from carrying ANYWHERE I want. I could be sitting next to you at Victrola right now.
29
@17

"My guns are a civil right that you'll"

So you were born that way?

Unless you can provide pictures of your birth with you actually brandishing that fire-arm , I don't think you will convince anyone.
30
@ A bunch of your douchey commie homies in Chicago felt the same way as you. The NRA and the SCOTUS handed them their ass. They were the last holdout illegally denying rights.
31
Gun owners who start swaggering about, calling people fags and commies, and saying 'I could be sitting next to you with a gun right now.'

Feeling super reassured over here. Always good to know that the guy who hates you is ALSO armed and ready to kill.
32
@30: Must you be a douche canoe? You are not helping.
33
@16: Let me tell you why that's bullshit.
Hey look! Let's look at raw murder, suicide, and gun ownership rates across twenty or so European countries and draw conclusions just from that! Yeah, sure, those countries vary widely in terms of governing structure, population density and urbanization, and poverty levels, but we can totally compare them directly to each other, because we only care about the first-order correlation of guns and crime. Control? No, we don't need to control or account for confounding variables!

This is why science should be left to scientists, not lawyers. What I wouldn't give for a society that valued statistical rigor and good experimental design.
34
So, pro-gun folks: Bacon, Robot, and others--

What was the 'Open Carry in Starbucks' thing supposed to accomplish? Serious question. People promote a cause or a gathering in support of some issue to raise awareness of it.

For one example, all the work to make LGBT folks seem perfectly normal, like the family next door (which they are) has made other people realize that supporting LGBT rights is a good thing.

What was large numbers of people openly carrying guns inside coffee shops supposed to accomplish? Do you need more awareness that you need to carry your guns? Did you think that if more folks saw you carrying guns, more folks would be sympathetic to your cause? What is your cause, anyway?

Last question, did you expect the thing would, um, backfire on you the way it did? Did you expect that (as Schultz notes) patrons expressed nervousness with regard to other patrons openly carrying?

Was making other customers uncomfortable your plan?

Did you expect that management (up to and including Schultz) would notice? Did you think he'd view it all negatively? Sorry, that was more than one question. But I am genuinely curious.
35
@32: lissa, robot ghost is your gun-culture peer. own it.
36
I don't hate anyone (maybe Marxists like Mudede) I was using the term "faggy" a la South Park meaning lame. I voted for marriage equality BTW. Yes open carry is stupid and pointless but luckily we're on our way to CCW everywhere in the US at some point. Nothing you can do about. NRA train is rolling and well funded. If a certain party insists on drooling crack heads and psychos running the streets because of their sacred civil rights then the least they can do is respect my right to self defense. BTW that old cliche about Reagan throwing the insane into the streets? If you tried to put them back in without freedom that they don't deserve the left would blow a gasket. I'm sure the "racism" lawsuits alone would last decades.
37
@26
I agree completely, it is too hard to get an involuntary commitment in Washington, I have seen doctors throw out patients who are literally begging for help, I have personally taken a plastic bag off the head of a discharged patient attempting to suffocate himself in the ER drive. He still did not "meet criteria" for commitment. In WA assessment by a County Mental Health Professional is needed for involuntary treatment, there is a shortage of CMHP's patients may wait hours to days. Even if they are committed there is a shortage of mental health beds causing many patients to spend days in 4 point restraints on a MED/SURG floor, which is healthy for no one. The problem exist system wide and there is no simple solution, and unfortunately not even any funds available for even study. The mentally ill are swept under the rug like social garbage, going in and out of the revolving doors of jails and hospitals. Typically the treatment is give them 2mg of Ativan and send them on their way.

On the other hand when I was working at an psychiatric assessment center in California, commitment was way too easy, all it took for a 3 day hold was a short form written by a police officer. Officially the patient had to be a Danger to self, danger to others or gravely disabled, but the reality was that all commitment took was confusing a cop. But again we did not have the resources to deal with the patients we received. Our unit was built to hold 16, typically we had around 30 with 52 being record during my employment. Most people discharged had no idea that they had lost their rights, despite the fact that they had been wrongly committed, and were not told about filing a writ of habeas corpus to clear their records.

@33
Yea dude, I am sure you are SOOOO much wiser than Harvard Law professors. That must be why they locked you up for being insane and you support child rape as long as it is done in the name of the profit Mohammed. I seem to remember a society that claimed to be based on statistical rigor and good experimental design, they had gun control too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_German…

@34
Honestly I don't go to Starbucks, not do I open carry if I am not on the way to the range or inna woods. I keep my gun concealed and prefer to drink Vita, Vivaci or Stumptown. I think both sides of the issue were trying to draw Starbucks into their personal crusades, whereas Starbucks just wanted to stay neutral and sell their overpriced sugar loaded burnt coffee.
38
@37 Thanks. If I can continue, you note in your post that the mental health system is underfunded (15 beds for 30 pts). Want to speak for a moment here about the forces that are causing state mental health care services to be underfunded? Obviously, I'm fishing for something along the lines of 'well it's all the fault of the republicans', but that's just my opinion. I'm genuinely interested in yours, especially as health care funding is a liberal issue that conservatives dislike, but gun rights are a conservative issue that liberals dislike.

Since you're in the trenches on both, what's your take on state mental health care funding, especially in the two scenarios you noted?
39
More, gun nuts, more. Keep it up. The more you hype this sideshow the better it gets for gun regulation.



Shultz has hit the ball back in your court. Now, time for a big open carry demonstration. Loving every minute of it.
40
@35: Is he now.
I am afraid you are mistaken Max. No culture, not even "gun culture" is monolith.
41
Carrying a rifle around scaring people is asinine. I wouldn't blame Schultz if he worded it a lot more strongly, or just told people to go to McDonalds for their coffee, or maybe to grow the fuck up and get a life.
42
Oh... no no no! Am I the only one terrified at the thought of mass concealed carry? The intimidation factor is stupid, but I fear the reason many are forcing the open carry issue is to scare us into agreeing with concealed carry. I realize many do it now illegally, but if these "responsible gun owners" actually exist, I hope at least those people follow the law and respect my right to leave the area if I see a gun on your hip (or, with better laws, for you to get a ticket if the safety is off). I don't have that opportunity if the gun is concealed.
43
If someone is close enough to me to cut in line whilst being a jackass (ie the place is crowded & they cut, not "oops, there are so few people I didn't see the line" cutting), that person is probably *too close to me* to shoot me with an assault rifle.
44
Fine fine, you want to open carry in coffee shops. Why idk. fear, a bully/abuser complex, small dick whatever. But if you do shouldn't cops be allowed to stop you immediately, determine whether or not your gun's safety is functional and on, and that you are legally registered and licensed to do so? And arrest you on the spot if either of those two things are lacking?

45
@34

I'm a pro-gun guy and I have no earthly idea why anyone would want to open carry in Seattle. It's knuckle-draggers like the open carry fucktards that make all of us look bad.

That being said, in 29 years of living in Seattle, I've never seen anyone open carry...ever. So is it really that big of a problem or is it just something else for the anti-gun zealots to froth at the mouth about and fetishize?

As an aside, I really didn't give that much of a shit about guns until I started reading the SLOG and its idiocy. I hadn't purchased a gun in 20 years or even been to a range, but when the zealots on these pages equated me to a baby-murdering psychopath, I'd had enough.

So last weekend I bought a Swiss assault rifle... because I can, and headed out to the gun range and had a great time! After 20 years, I'd forgotten how much fun it is.

Thank you SLOGgers for inspiring me to revive an old hobby!
46
@45: You may not have noticed, but Starbucks is kinda everywhere, not just in Seattle...
47
@45 - Cool story bro. It's awesome Slog has that much influence over your life. Maybe you can bring it to Show and Tell too!
48
1. get a bunch of friends / flash mob to set their phone ringtones to gunfire.
2. flash mob open carry day.
3. plan other friends to call / text within 5 seconds.
4. when the first ringtone goes off, someone scream omg he's got a gun.
5. dive for cover
50
@37: AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA no.
I'll give Mr. Kates and Dr. Mauser credit for this; they did at least acknowledge that their conclusions weren't particularly rigorous.
Of course, all other things may not be equal. Obviously, many factors other than guns may promote or reduce the number of murders in any given place or time or among particular groups. And it may be impossible even to identify these factors, much less to take account of them all. Thus any conclusions drawn from the kinds of evidence presented earlier in this paper must necessarily be tentative.
(page 673)
You, however, probably just skimmed the conclusions, thought "yup, this supports my opinions", and posted the link. Now let's look at the really fun stuff in your most recent post: all the ridiculous lies!
51
@45: CPN I can understand your reaction, but try not to take it personally. This topic brings up passionate feelings and I think we are all horrified and frustrated by the level of gun violence in our country. There are no easy answers and that, coupled with the effect commenting on the Internet has on people, gives rise to invective and hyperbole, and both sides resorting to villainizing each other and then just giving up and deciding that's the only answer: gun owners are murderers, and the other side are fascists. The End.
But that's not true. You and I are NALTs, and there are more of us than is supposed because rational voices on both sides get drowned out. It's up to all of us to try to cut through that noise.
Oh, and enjoy your day at the range! :)
52
@37: (cont.)
"Yea dude, I am sure you are SOOOO much wiser than Harvard Law professors."
Neither of the people who wrote the article you posted is a professor at Harvard. In fact, neither of them even went to Harvard nor are they in any way affiliated with that venerable institution of higher learning. They simply published their article in one of Harvard's numerous student journals.

"That must be why they locked you up for being insane"
I voluntarily committed myself for a total of one week, and there has never been any legal evaluation of my mental or psychological status.

"and you support child rape as long as it is done in the name of the profit Mohammed."
One, it's spelled "prophet". Two, I am not Muslim and therefore have no reason to do anything in Mohammed's name. Three, no Islamic document or scholar advocates the rape of children. Four, Islam is monotheistic, meaning that things must be done in the name of God, and that doing anything in the name of Mohammed (other than acknowledging his deeds as a prophet) would be idolatrous. Five, I do not support or condone the rape of anyone, least of all children.

"I seem to remember a society [Nazi Germany] that claimed to be based on statistical rigor and good experimental design"
Nazi Germany was, in fact, based on a strong nationalistic identity to the point of regarding non-Germans as inferior forms of life, which precluded any respect for or attachment to scientific rigor. Their "scholars", for example, constructed elaborate and fictitious mechanisms explaining how the Italians and Japanese were descended from the same Aryan stock as they were.
Besides the obvious, I defy you to find a single reputable source suggesting that the society of Nazi Germany in any way claimed devotion to statistical rigor or good experimental design.

"they [Nazi Germany] had gun control too"
Not by any stretch of the imagination. The Nazi regime, in fact, loosened the strict gun restrictions imposed by the Weimar Republic in compliance with the Treaty of Versailles. Most weapons were made easier to acquire, members of the Nazi Party and its affiliates were exempted from many regulations entirely, and gun ownership was meaningfully regulated only in the case of the Jews and other select minorities. If you're interested, you can read this article by Dr. Bernard E. Harcourt, who ACTUALLY IS a law professor at one of the most prestigious universities in the world*.

So really, do you actually have any points to make? Or are you going to just continue making shit up?

*He's currently the Julius Kreeger Professor of Law and Political Science at my own alma mater, The University of Chicago. He holds an AB from Princeton and a JD and PhD from Harvard, and has previously taught at Harvard, the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences, Paris West University Nanterre La Défense, and Paul Cézanne University, and the University of Arizona. I believe "my" expert trumps "your" experts.
53
@52 - Beautiful pwnage there.

Let's build a raft out of semi-automatics, tell CB it's Libertarian Cascadia come to life, and float him out to sea.
54
@52: Honestly I do no know what possesses people to think that they can take you on.
You make me happy.
55
@3- An inanimate object which has a single purpose of killing things is different from one that dispenses salt. If you can't figure that out, you really ought not to be involved or voting or other grown up activities.

@16- Unless you're out hunting, then openly carrying a firearm is a declaration of willingness to shoot someone when you deem it necessary. No one viewing you has any idea whether or not you actually have the judgement to not shoot them just for looking at you funny or wearing the wrong color shoes after labor day. Openly carrying means everyone around you has to view you as a threat to life and limb.
56
The tree of liberty is watered by $4 mochas.
57
Your strange notion that Nazi gun laws wern't really all that bad because they "only" banned Jews from owning firearms is pretty revealing, Mr. Venomslash, and typical of the progressive anti-Semitism so often found here in the lovely Pacific Northwest.

I notice you don't want to say anything about the disarmament of the Ukraine peasantry and the subsequent mass murder or three million or so of them in a deliberately engineered famine, but of course that kind of silence is typical of your Northwest liberal as well, isn't it?
58
@57: I said that the Nazis didn't institute or support gun control. That is factually true.
I can't say as much for your image of me. I'm not some anti-Semitic Seattle-dwelling liberal like you think I am. Well, I am a liberal, but I'm Jewish (half Litvak half Ukrainian with a splash of Byelorussian in there) and I'm a proud Chicagoan.
Also, the famines that killed millions of Ukrainians were engineered by the Soviet regime and happened well before the second World War. And there's a difference between instituting martial law in conquered territory and disarming one's own citizens. Man, it's like you don't even check your information.
59
Hey guys I went out for coffee at a Seattle place and nobody there had their guns with them and it felt great! And by great I mean normal.
60
Okay, I've got it. Because of the undeniably lethal actions of a crazy few the law abiding majority should be treated like criminals.

So...when are you gonna ask Muslims to leave.

It's high time you people took an honest look at the truth of the armed citizen in this country. Those of you experiencing high gun-related crime rates live in areas with the most anti-second amendment laws. Those of you who live in areas with low overall crime rates enjoy such benefits because you have armed neighbors. Criminals avoid your home because there's a chance you might have a gun.

Of course, you can always prove me wrong. Just put a sign on your lawn that says something like: Proud To Be Gun Free! There are absolutely no firearms in this home.

Sleep well.
61
@60: Easy there Tiger, what did that strawman ever do to you?

Please wait...

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