Open Carry in LA Times

[MengerFan]

Really? Well how come those open carriers get so much shit from the cops? Wasn't Dave Ridely held at gun point for a while?

No.

I said "seems" because well, that's the way it seems from here.

I guess you only watched the couple of reports were people were hassled, and not all the reports of litter pickups, etc., where no one said anything negative.

Because there are a few jackasses around who think that if they harass us, we'll just give up.  Often imports from other states, trying to force NH to become whatever they just left...

Joe

Four PorcFest attendees were held at gunpoint for a half hour by six nazis in Manchester yesterday for open carrying. They were forced to stand in public with their hands on their heads while their sidearms were confiscated, and then berated and lectured about the "dangers" of carrying loaded weapons.

If a half dozen cops will gang up and assault peaceful individuals, then I would say that constitutes a pervasive mentality. Suppose it were just a few jackasses. How would you be able to take a sample of six from the entire Manchester police department and just happen to have it turn out that all six were sadistic sacks of shit? The probability is extremely low. Therefore, we can reject the hypothesis that there are only "a few jackasses".

[margomaps]

Four PorcFest attendees were held at gunpoint for a half hour by six nazis in Manchester yesterday for open carrying. They were forced to stand in public with their hands on their heads while their sidearms were confiscated, and then berated and lectured about the "dangers" of carrying loaded weapons.

They were Nazis, MengerFan?   

If a half dozen cops will gang up and assault peaceful individuals, then I would say that constitutes a pervasive mentality. Suppose it were just a few jackasses. How would you be able to take a sample of six from the entire Manchester police department and just happen to have it turn out that all six were sadistic sacks of shit? The probability is extremely low. Therefore, we can reject the hypothesis that there are only "a few jackasses".

I basically don't agree with anything you just said.  I have no idea what happened yesterday (beyond the description you gave, and Dave Ridley's report -- which mentioned 2 porcs btw, not 4 as you stated), but it certainly seems possible to me that there were 1 or 2 bad apples (hypersensitive cops who don't know the law), and the others were there as backup.  I seriously doubt anyone was assaulted.  Hyperbole is not helping your argument here, it's just calling into question everything else you're saying.

Look, I don't mean to downplay what seems to have happened.  It's not cool that anyone should be detained by the cops for lawfully open carrying.  As Ridley mentioned, as a result of previous open carry incidents, the mayor supposedly had a talk with/issued a memorandum to Manchester cops about leaving open-carriers the heck alone.  I just don't think it's fair to say this incident is indicative of a problem endemic to the Manchester police department.

There are a few questions I'm looking forward to hearing answers to:

Was anyone actually held at gunpoint?  (was a gun drawn?)
Other than the detaining (  ), were the cops hostile, polite, did they lie about the law, etc.?
Did the porcs get the names of any of the officers?
Can we bring this to the attention of the mayor and have him speak to these officers about following the law?
Does NH law allow police to detain a lawful open-carrier based on a whim/suspicion?

[MengerFan]

Main Entry:
    as·sault
Function:
    noun
Etymology:
    Middle English assaut, from Anglo-French, from Vulgar Latin *assaltus, from assalire
Date:
    14th century

1 a: a violent physical or verbal attack b: a military attack usually involving direct combat with enemy forces c: a concerted effort (as to reach a goal or defeat an adversary)2 a: a threat or attempt to inflict offensive physical contact or bodily harm on a person (as by lifting a fist in a threatening manner) that puts the person in immediate danger of or in apprehension of such harm or contact

Yep, I stand by it. Men with guns stealing property from innocent individuals under threat of violence sounds like assault to me.

So the ones who stand by and watch their comrades abuse other individuals don't count as bad apples? hmmmm

The way they told me the story, two of the gentlemen were carrying, but there were four individuals in the group. They were told by the drawn-weaponed costumed thugs to place their hands on their heads. The cops refused to identify themselves. They also forced the individuals to relinquish their ID's, even when asked directly, "Are you requiring me to provide my driver's license?"

As if all this were not enough, they then had to attack the individuals verbally to try to make them feel as if the entire episode were their fault.

I understand that there may be some less rotten apples who perhaps assault and rape innocent people less than others, but this is the standard behavior of these goons. This is how they are trained. This is how they are incentivized to behave.

[Dylboz]

Did they get their weapons back? Oh, and having a gun pointed at you is absolutely assault.

[margomaps]

Yep, I stand by it. Men with guns stealing property from innocent individuals under threat of violence sounds like assault to me.

If guns were drawn by the cops, then I agree 100%.  I'm waiting to hear corroboration that guns were drawn.  Note that I'm not disputing you, but I'd just like to hear more information (hopefully Ridley will interview these guys soon?)

So the ones who stand by and watch their comrades abuse other individuals don't count as bad apples? hmmmm

Imagine 2 hypersensitive cops who are detaining 4 people, and they call for backup.  The 4 backup officers arrive and see the 2 officers and 4 others, some of them with their hands on their heads.  I wouldn't automatically label the other 4 "sadistic sacks of shit."  Again with the hyperbole -- it just doesn't help you out in any way, shape for form, and it will alienate 99% of your audience.  Once the facts of this incident come out, I might agree with you 100%.   But running around calling people "sadistic sacks of shit" on tenuous evidence is just a bad idea IMO.

The way they told me the story, two of the gentlemen were carrying, but there were four individuals in the group. They were told by the drawn-weaponed costumed thugs to place their hands on their heads. The cops refused to identify themselves. They also forced the individuals to relinquish their ID's, even when asked directly, "Are you requiring me to provide my driver's license?"

Yeah, the drawn-weapon part really makes this infinitely worse.  If that's what happened, I'm extremely disappointed in the Manchester cops, and I'm sad that these out-of-town FSPers (or perhaps used to be FSPers) experienced this.   

As if all this were not enough, they then had to attack the individuals verbally to try to make them feel as if the entire episode were their fault.

Ok, before you said "berate" and "lecture", and now it's "attack".  Soon it will be "the cops beat their brains in with their mean, nasty words!".       

I understand that there may be some less rotten apples who perhaps assault and rape innocent people less than others, but this is the standard behavior of these goons. This is how they are trained. This is how they are incentivized to behave.

Meh, I'm not convinced.  There are way more bad apples and control-freak, non-law-knowing, hypersensitive cops than there ought to be, no doubt.  But let's not get crazy here.

[Porcupine_in_MA]

If this is the same case as my buddy Ryan and a few others were involved in, they said the cops weren't abusive, but by their own rules had to respond to a call about someone carrying a gun in public. I didn't hear anything about being "held on gunpoint" with their "hands held on their heads". Maybe I didn't hear about that part. I was told it really wasn't such of a much.
Maybe this was a different case?

[Porcupine_in_MA]

Either way its not something to judge New Hampshire's gun culture on.

[Porcupine_in_MA]

Meh, I'm not convinced.  There are way more bad apples and control-freak, non-law-knowing, hypersensitive cops than there ought to be, no doubt.  But let's not get crazy here.

Unfortunately, I've had a lot of VERY bad experiences with cops and I doubt New Hampshire's cops are any better. Maybe they are, I don't know for sure because thankfully I haven't had any run-ins with them yet, but my experience is that asshole authoritarians get drawn to the job and thats what they act like. Even the nice ones have the "I have no choice but to follow the law even if it's a bad one" mindset, which is also a load of crap.

[margomaps]

MengerFan -

Check out my post in Dave Ridley's thread about what I think after having seen his interview with Neal and his friend: http://nhunderground.com/forum/index.php?topic=14322.msg246864#msg246864

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The Boston Globe published my letter.