Target Stores Want to be Left Alone

While reading today, I discovered that the Target chain of stores had declared itself off limits to guns. Mrs. PolyKahr likes to shop at Target, and occasionally drags me into the store as well. So, I grumbled, "another place where I have to take my gun out of the holster, secure it in the car, before going into the store. Great."

But not so fast. It seems that Target took a neutral stance. Dave Workman has the actual statement made by Target stores interim CEO, John Mulligan at the Examiner site Did Target Really Accede to Moms Demand Social Prejudice?.  In essence, Target said to follow the law, but we would appreciate if you left your long guns when you come into the store.  It is hard to argue with that.

The old saying that you can "catch more flies with honey than with vinegar" is still true today. Sure, you can be shrill, confrontational, and insistent that YOUR rights be respected. Or, you can go through this world with a smile on your face, having patience and understanding for you fellow man, and respecting the rights of others as much as you expect them to respect yours. Frankly, my first reaction to the Demanding Moms is that the group is shrill, and suffers from selfishness and carries an ego driven message which can tolerate no other point of view. Even if I were not a gun rights advocate, I would be repelled by their antics, and I am sure many store and restaurant owners are equally repelled.

My advice, for what it may be worth, is to take the opposite approach from that of the Demanding Moms.  If you are as old as I am, you have seen, and experienced the loss of freedoms in the country.  I can remember a time when everything you think and do was not a matter for public debate at the national level.  We do not live today in the United States I was born into.  Realizing this can make you angry, and righteous anger can make you take counterproductive actions.  The gun rights community can do what it wants, of course, and it will, but think hard before baring your teeth.  You will probably make more allies that way.