Texas is an "open-carry" state, meaning people can walk around freely with their beloved rifles and machine guns and other weapons of mass destruction without fear of being persecuted for their fetishistic attachment to firearms. At last week's protest march in Dallas--the one that ended in mayhem as a sniper opened fire on police and marchers, killing five police officers and wounding several others--"20 to 30" of the marchers showed up at the protests carrying assault rifles, and several of them were further wearing fatigues and gas masks and bulletproof vests. Because 'MURRICA! When the shooting started, these people--correctly--ran for cover, but their presence predictably caused confusion for the police, who were trying to determine who was shooting and from where.
Now, these "patriots" exercising their constitutional rights, were presumably examples of the semi-mythical beast that the NRA and its enablers keep telling us about: "good guys with guns." You know, the ones who are supposed to prevent mass casualties by coolly and calmly using deadly force against the enemies of law and order. Now, as I say, these people undoubtedly did the right thing in running away--the last thing anybody needed at that time and place was even more bullets flying in random directions. But my question is: If these passionate devotees of gun-culture had absolutely no intention of using their weapons for self-defense or defense of others--the very thing gun fetishists insist they need their weapons for--then why were they carrying them? And why in God's name should any of us listen when the NRA insists that that is that the guns are for?
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