Concealed Carry and Shooting Sprees
Having a concealed carry license holds many responsibilities, handling a weapon safely of course being one of them, but there is also the “political” component. As clearly seen from a number of violent incidents covered by the news media in recent years, the way in which a fire on this situation is reported or not reported can go a long way toward swaying the debate on gun control. Opponents of the right to keep and bear arms often seize upon the details of a gun incident to sway public opinion against people having the ability to conceal and carry.
This worry seems to be limited to civilian’s who carry concealed, however. The famous Empire State building shooting in August of 2012 is a case in point. On this occasion, a former employee shot and killed a coworker right on the street in front of the skyscraper, and then was promptly killed by NYPD officers. But the two cops fired 18 shots in order to get it done, which wounded nine pedestrians and bystanders. These officers obviously flunked the fourth rule of firearms that says essentially “don’t take the shot if you may end up hitting somebody innocent.” Nothing happened to these officers as a result of their over-zealousness. The big question: what would’ve happened to someone who had a concealed carry license, if they did the same?
As it stands, the media’s handling of the event was appalling, since they treated the event at first as a massacre by a crazed gunman, strictly on the basis of the reports of nine bystanders being hit. As more facts became clear, showing the killer was only after one target, and that it was the police officers who had hurt all the bystanders, the story quickly faded away. The politics of the debate, and media coverage, clearly seem to evidence that a person who had a concealed carry license (or none at all) who had wounded that many people, would’ve been treated much worse, or even treated as the “crazed gunman” he was trying to stop.
Sadly, what such incidents mean is, the poor firearms training of many cops will be ignored or downplayed. In the meanwhile, the standard of gun handling by those with a permit to carry out will have to be stellar and above reproach, to avoid the negative treatment many drew this will give to the use of firearms by a civilian in the same situation. Gun owners who carry must realize they are ambassadors for the positive public reception of their right, and handle themselves responsibly.
