Starbucks gun debate heats up

[onearmedswordsman]

More on the Starbucks open carry laissez-faire policy


http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/8ef...cks-Guns/id-p07708dc4c1314c2a9f807cf5532aada7


Starbucks asks not to be center of gun debate
MAE ANDERSON, Associated Press Writers
MANUEL VALDES, Associated Press Writers

SEATTLE (AP) — Coffee chain Starbucks Corp. is sticking to its policy of letting customers carry guns where it's legal and said it does not want to be put in the middle of a larger gun-control debate.

The company's statement, issued Wednesday, stems from recent campaign by some gun owners, who have walked into Starbucks and other businesses to test state laws that allow gun owners to carry weapons openly in public places. Gun control advocates have protested.

The fight began heating up in January in Northern California and has since spread to other states and other companies, bolstered by the pro-gun group OpenCarry.org.

Some of the events were spontaneous, with just one or two gun owners walking into a store. Others were organized parades of dozens of gun owners walking into restaurants with their firearms proudly at their sides.

Now, gun control advocates are protesting the policy. The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, launched a petition drive demanding that the company "offer espresso shots, not gunshots" and declare its coffeehouses "gun-free zones." And Wednesday, that group delivered 28,000 signatures to the coffee giant's headquarters in Seattle.

The group also held a press conference near Seattle's Pike Place Market, just a few yards away from where the first Starbucks cafe opened. Gun rights advocates showed up as well, some carrying handguns in holsters around their waists.

Brian Malte of the Brady Campaign said carrying guns intimidates and frightens people, and said the group thinks Starbucks will "do the right thing" and change its policy.

"They're putting their workers in harm's way by allowing people to carry guns into their stores, especially open carry," Malte said.

More than a dozen pro-gun supporters, some with Starbucks coffee cups in hand, chanted during the press conference, at points interrupting speakers.

"I think the (Brady campaign is) trying to strong-arm private businesses into banning the rights of the people," said Bev Carman of Everett, Wash. Carman held a sign that said: "Criminal Control not Gun Control."

Businesses can choose to ban guns from their premises. And Starbucks said Wednesday that it complies with local laws in the 43 states that have open-carry weapon laws.

"Were we to adopt a policy different from local laws allowing open carry, we would be forced to require our partners to ask law abiding customers to leave our stores, putting our partners in an unfair and potentially unsafe position," the company said in its statement.

It said security measures are in place for any "threatening situation" that might occur in stores.

Starbucks asked both gun enthusiasts and gun-control advocates "to refrain from putting Starbucks or our partners into the middle of this divisive issue."

Starbucks shares closed Wednesday down 27 cents, or 1.2 percent, to $23.06.

Read More

 

[Ravenous]

I'm all for gun rights and think that Starbucks is doing the right thing. However setting up open carry gatherings at Starbucks because you can is rude and creates negative publicity for our side. Let's all praise Starbucks for standing up to the antigun advocates but let's keep it friendly. Knowing I can go to a Starbucks concealing and if somebody notices, it doesn't matter and that is good enough for me.

 

[smurf hunter]

I'm all for gun rights and think that Starbucks is doing the right thing. However setting up open carry gatherings at Starbucks because you can is rude and creates negative publicity for our side. Let's all praise Starbucks for standing up to the antigun advocates but let's keep it friendly. Knowing I can go to a Starbucks concealing and if somebody notices, it doesn't matter and that is good enough for me.

+1

 

[Teufel_Hunden]

Yes let’s go hide and never exercise the rights we have. I'm sure no one will try and take those rights away...........
I bet the gun grabbing crowd would prefer a nice quiet coup.

Our rights are like dominoes. They'll fall one after the other.

Stop them............stop them now or take what the looney left gives you!

One can either fight for the rights we have left, or as Bobby Knight once said, "if rape is inevitable you may as well just lay back and enjoy it".

I say no way! I have e-mailed Starbucks and congratulated them for keeping out of this and cautioned that if they make any move to ban legal carry in any form I will not support their business in any way ever again.

https://customerservice.starbucks.com/app/contact/ask/

:bash:

 

[jdub75]

email sent.

 

[smurf hunter]

Yes let’s go hide and never exercise the rights we have. I'm sure no one will try and take those rights away...........

In my head, I'm trying to balance exercising my rights with decent social behavior. I'm not inclined to wear t-shirts with offensive language, or bring up politics/religion in polite company. That does not mean I don't support the right of free expression.

While it may be within your right to open carry, you must be willing to accept the impressions it makes with people.

Seems like a classic risk vs. reward situation.

 

[Teufel_Hunden]

So NEVER excercise this right.....??

They have won then...

You can hardly equate wearing an offensive shirt to legal law abiding open carry. The practice is only offensive because we allow it to be. The more we cower in the corner and say, I just want to get along, our rights are continually being eroded.

The dolts that have conditioned society to accept these offensive t-shirts etc. are the idiots that want your guns.

That does not mean I don't support the right of free expression.

Yes but are you willing to stand up for it?

 

[tonyspdx]

The battle has been won at Starbucks. Now its time to focus on other business.

 

[MountainBear]

The practice is only offensive because we allow it to be.

This practice is offensive because society has changed. Its no longer the old west. People are no longer conditioned to see people out in public with guns on their hips. Right or wrong, its the way it is.

Our community is way too fragmented over this issue to ever come to a common position. The concealed carry crowd will never convince those who choose to open carry to do otherwise (trust me, I've tried). The open carry crowd isn't going to convince those who CC that open carry is the way to go (trust me, search for all the closed threads with dozens of pages of people trying both).

You have the right to your opinion, TH. Its not right, its not wrong. Its your opinion. But remember, the rest of us have the right to our opinions as well. And we don't deserve to be accused of being anti-2nd any more than you deserve to be called a stupid redneck cowboy by the Brady campaign. Please keep your arguments based on facts and refrain from telling the rest of us how we don't support the 2nd because we oppose open carry in certain places.

Anyone else see this thread getting closed rather quickly?

 

[Teufel_Hunden]

Okay MB but with all due respects the facts are: If we do not excercise and protect any right, someone will try to take it away!

T_H

 

[Jamie6.5]

Support Starbuck's,...
Buy a cup of their coffee and thank them for their support of the 2nd A.

Whether yer packin' or not!

 

[MountainBear]

And that's true. However, I lump concealed carry and open carry into the same right. I believe that by exercising concealed carry where appropriate (such as in high visibility public places) and open carry where appropriate (such as out hiking, and such), we are not failing to exercise our rights. In fact by acting in the above manner we are winning two-fold. We are exercising our rights by getting CCW permits (while I don't agree with HAVING to get one to carry) by letting our states know that we want our right to carry firearms. By not frightening the sheeple (right or wrong people are scared and intimidated by open carry, and we will never get enough people to open carry to change this fact, societies change) we keep them at the worst not willing to fight to take our rights away.
For instance, if a person who is otherwise on the fence over the 2nd amendment debate reads in the paper how applications for carry permits has risen over the last year (as it has since the current administration took office), but does not see a rise in people carrying in public (or a rise in shooting deaths, as the Brady's claim is inevitable), then perhaps they ask one of their pro-gun buddy's about carry permits. Maybe its an inroad. At the very least he remains on the fence, rather than becoming rabidly anti...

Got to go boys, I'll check back in on the debate this evening...

 

[asiparks]

Okay MB but with all due respects the facts are: If we do not excercise and protect any right, someone will try to take it away!

T_H

The facts are that protecting and exercising are two different and individual actions and that to argue that not exercising = not protecting is banal and simplistic...By not talking loudly, constantly on my cell phone am i weakening my 1st Amendment rights ?

In the case of open carry, exercising it in a obnoxious way may well be counterproductive to the point that if Starbucks feels it's damaging their business they'll be compelled to ban it on their premises. The fact that the have not caved in to pressure from the Brady idiots is, in this day and age, surprising and admirable. As posted earlier, time to move on from Starbucks.

 

[Teufel_Hunden]

This mind set is the problem;

In the case of open carry, exercising it in a obnoxious way

You've bought their argument and that’s the 1st steps in the erosion of our rights. I agree that we shouldn’t make an attempt to be “obnoxious”. But having a meeting in a public venue while exercising a perfectly legal right is only “obnoxious” because we buy into the premise that there is something wrong.

OC or CC we must support each other or we are ALL destined to lose our rights.

Open carry is easy to attack because it is overt in nature but don't BS yourself, concealed carry is just as much on the hit list as OC. OC is just an easier target..........until its gone.

Then we're next!

I like O.F.F. s motto. "Gun Rights, No Compromise".

 

[crosse]

i support starbuck's decision to respect laws and trying to stay out of public lime light except shultz sold the sonics so I still hate starbucks.

"Still steaming in Seattle"

 

[Ravenous]

It wouldn't bother me in the slightest to walk into a Starbucks full of open carriers, but then again you don't need to change my mind on second amendment rights. Are you supporting Starbucks or are you using them as a venue to support your rights? I would say that if you wanted to support Starbucks write a letter, buy their products, tell your friends to support them. Have a pro 2nd amendment meet isn't the issue I have. Pro second amendment has nothing to do with showing you have a firearm and everything to do with showing your support for the cause. Have a gathering of like minded individuals. Wear shirts stating you are meeting for a pro-gun gathering, pro-gun bumper stickers. Here is a company extending an olive branch. Starbucks for all intents and purposes is the domain of the liberal crowd, scaring their "normal" customers doesn't support Starbucks and is the quickest way to get Starbucks to ban firearms from their establishment which is well within their rights and with this kind of media coverage would cast a negative light on us. Is it right for them to be scared of an open carrier? Absolutely not, but it is what it is.

 

[supergenius]

Just because you can doesn't mean you have to.

Points already proven, time to make progress elsewhere.

 

[TILLER182]

One thing I'd like to throw out into the mix is that in my opinion, open carry can have significantly more risk. I dont have any statistics in front of me but far too many cops are killed by their own guns. Cops use double or triple retention holsters and at least train somewhat in weapon retention. The average civilian style holster is at best a snap holster or level one.

This puts you at real risk of having your gun taken from you and used against you or someone you are supposed to protect. Concealed carry prevents a lot of retention issues because if no one knows its there, no one can pre-plan a gun snatch.

Politics aside, I vote for CC.

I praise Starbucks for their stance, let law abiding people do lawful things.

 

[ak56]

It wouldn't bother me in the slightest to walk into a Starbucks full of open carriers, but then again you don't need to change my mind on second amendment rights. Are you supporting Starbucks or are you using them as a venue to support your rights? I would say that if you wanted to support Starbucks write a letter, buy their products, tell your friends to support them. Have a pro 2nd amendment meet isn't the issue I have. Pro second amendment has nothing to do with showing you have a firearm and everything to do with showing your support for the cause. Have a gathering of like minded individuals. Wear shirts stating you are meeting for a pro-gun gathering, pro-gun bumper stickers. Here is a company extending an olive branch. Starbucks for all intents and purposes is the domain of the liberal crowd, scaring their "normal" customers doesn't support Starbucks and is the quickest way to get Starbucks to ban firearms from their establishment which is well within their rights and with this kind of media coverage would cast a negative light on us. Is it right for them to be scared of an open carrier? Absolutely not, but it is what it is.

The fact is, around here, including liberal downtown Seattle, some people regularly open carry into Starbucks, as they do almost everywhere else they go. And those liberal "normal" customers hardly give it a second thought; same for most of the employees of Starbucks. It's not as scary as the Brady folks try to make people believe.

 

[Member 5605]

Caught this on the news.. Fox news. Haven't seen it else where but then again I don't watch other news channels.

It's not just Starbucks either, count in Home Depot, Walmart, Best Buy...