File this one under "Emails you never expected to get at work"

[pixiecrinkle]

Today is an odd day. I keep discovering that I am talking aloud as I'm typing. Not a terrible thing when I'm coding, but when I am writing emails and such....not so great.

We got a mass email here at work today about Ohio's Concealed Carry Law, which goes into effect next week. We are, as a quasi-government agency, allowed to keep guns out of our building, apart from the Sheriff's deputy in the lobby. How we are to know if someone carries one in is not clear to me.

I hadn't really thought about this at all before, because it's so out of my realm of understanding to even come up with the desire to carry a gun while doing something as mundane as running errands or going to work. (I have enough trouble juggling keys/wallet/cellphone/ipod/laptop without having to worry about a potentially deadly item as well.)

This is especially worrisome too, since one of our sister agencies did have a person show up with a gun to their office a few years ago because of a denied disability case. I can't imagine what people who work in more "controversial" lines of work are thinking. They had a piece on the news a few nights ago about all the new training emergency medical personnel are having to take when dealing with a patient with a concealed weapon. That never occured to me either.

I'm wondering, if so much of this never occured to me, how much of it actually occured to the people who thought this was a good idea in the first place??

I've got the househunting bug again I think. I've been mulling over the idea of a condo for the past few years, but after living in my current apartment, which is a townhouse, for several years now, I think I might be better served by a small house. I did find something cute today, but it's on the upper end of my price range. Found a second cute one in the same area too, but it's so far on the lower end of my range that I fear it could be a total dump.

I may take a drive this afternoon and try to find both of them. Both are qualified for some of the programs they have to get people to move downtown in Columbus (convenient, since I have no desire to live elsewhere in the city) but the one in particular I actually have too much income to qualify for. I was closer than I expected to their limit though, so I might be able to find another program that works for me. The good thing is, that even if my financial situation makes it impossible for me to buy a place, I still love the apartment I live in, so I'm happy where I am.

Am going to see The Company tonight with K & S. I already told them I'd probably miss dinner because I thought I'd have to work late, but now I'm thinking I'll get out of here at a decent time, and may use that time to drive by these places instead. Hmmmm.....wheels are turning.

Comments

[pixiecrinkle.livejournal.com]

OK, I thought I posted something in response to this last night, but it looks like LJ ate it. Basically, I just wanted to say thanks for responding to this, because I figured you'd probably differ from me when I posted this and I am interested in what you have to say on this topic.

I do want to clear up one thing that I did *not* write well in my original post: I'm wondering, if so much of this never occured to me, how much of it actually occured to the people who thought this was a good idea in the first place?? When I wrote that, the person I actually had in my head was Governor Taft, who signed the bill despite the fact that so many people (including law enforcement groups) encouraged him not to. I just don't have much confidence in him on any issue, and I find it probable that he didn't conceive of the cost of things like gun carriers in ambulances and such at the time. I sincerely doubt there's a portion of that bill that provides the financial support for the support services needed to uphold it. Maybe I'm wrong--if so, I'm glad.

Anyway....

I grew up around guns too. On a farm, it's a normal thing to have a shotgun in the truck at all times. My dad had a lot of guns--some were family heirlooms and some were used around the farm. My sister and I were sort of taught to shoot (one of my earliest memories is my dad teaching us how to work a double-barreled shotgun when I was about 10 and she was about 7) but not being taught fully had more to do with us being girls than anything else. And, my dad did use the gun once to hold two burglers until the police got there when a business mom & dad ran out of our house was robbed. The criminals in this case were only armed with tire iron they hit dad over the head with, but nonetheless, there were guns in the building they were in (it was a hunting business).

The vast majority of my friends growing up had guns. And despite a certain degree of that being normal, I was never comfortable with it. I knew very few people who had a good feel for the responsibility of owning or using a gun. It was so normal that it was taken for granted. Guys in high school used to brag about near-miss accidents and such. One shot a hole in the floor of a brand new pickup. And while some of that was high-school-boy-syndrome, most of them are the same way today.

This is where my problem comes in. As you said about your family:

I also trust them both implicitly with regard to gun safety, or I wouldn't allow them near me while carrying - I'm freakishly careful about that.

That's exactly the reason I have a problem with this law. I know I'd trust you, my dad, your family, other responsible gun owners with no problem. But I don't trust that everyone with a registered weapon has that same sense of responsibility about it. And this law means I have little choice about whether or not to allow someone to have a gun near me. Yes, I had no choice before if someone was disobeying law anyway, but this makes it all the easier.

I'm also not convinced that having registered the gun means a person is less likely to commit criminal action with it. The serial I-270 shooting suspect who was recently arrested and brought back to Columbus had four guns properly registered in his name -- one was the one he used in the highway shootings. His family and many other people who knew him had no clue he had the capacity to commit illegal acts with them.

My other major problem is with the protection issue. So many people seem to confuse "protection during a crime" with "retribution because someone's doing a bad thing to me." To me, protection would mean I could stop someone from harming me, but that doesn't equate in my head with causing that person unreasonable harm in doing so. I know that you're not saying this, but I hear a lot of people who talk about protection who do say it.

I apologize that I'm not articulating this very well -- I'm at work and am writing this while I wait for the computer to finish stuff. I will try to take a look at this later on though and fill in the holes.