On Monday, Gov. Mike DeWine added Ohio to the Constitutional Carry states of the nation. The law change, that will take place June 12th and marks the most significant upgrade to Ohio’s firearm policy in decades, has been met with the usual blood in the streets declarations and ‘how dare they have no background checks or training!’
It’s the usual tripes that sound dangerous on the surface but fail to hold much relevance when you start digging a little bit. Permits aren’t going away, they are just no longer required. Anyone who bought the firearm they are carrying from a dealer or in a state that requires private handgun transfers to be background checked were background checked. Felons carry without a permit or background check all the time, they don’t care, they just try not to get caught and if they do… oh well.
Let’s address a few of these.
No Training
That’s a bold assumption when there is a thriving private instruction market, but perhaps if there is ‘No Training’ you should take steps to make quality training publically available and as close to free as you can manage? Wouldn’t that be the responsible solution instead of throwing up additional blocks to safe handling?
No? You just don’t like guns then, gotcha.
Why solve problems? You’d have to stop complaining about them then.
Also the standards for concealed carry classes nationwide are a joke if you believe the grant proficiency. Hell, the Ohio law enforcement qualification standard is absurdly easy. I have friends in OLE and they can take just about anyone and get them to pass the standard with a couple hours of practice… and the reverse of that is on the job LE often fail the qualification, and must retake it multiple times…
So if we aren’t holding our armed professionals to solid standards, allowing multiple redo’s, make-ups, and waivers, why are we concerned about the public who have a right to carry arms but no professional liability?
The public’s liability, with or without training, is the same. It doesn’t change. Don’t murder, don’t attempt to murder, don’t threaten, and don’t negligently injure. That’s it. With or without a license. With or without a record. With or without a gun, that covers the public’s responsible for liabilities.
No Background Checks
This one is laughable, what is that NICS check stopping? NICS is so blaise that the only way they make it feel effective is by quoting the initial denial number, so everyone in gets put into a delay status or a deny status. They don’t like then quoting the proceeds, transfers complete, denial overturned, and actual transfer stats. They also do an abysmal job following up on attempted purchases by felons because they don’t consider most of those attempts to be of major concern. If it isn’t major concern this person tried to get a firearm, why can’t they have a firearm?
Background checks won’t stop a motivated non-felon. It won’t stop a felon who just ignores the rule. It punishes people with felony records who are supposedly reformed and safe to enter society again by denying them rights. You, Joe/Jane Public McStrawman, have no idea if the people next to you have records of anything, including drunk or reckless driving. You will still hop in your car trusting everyone around you to be licensed, or more importantly drive safely. We need to normalize this attitude with firearms as well. Trust them to get it right, encourage proper education and training, improve access to both of the latter to further encourage the former.
Go Ohio
So, despite my genetically ingrained geographic animosity against the region known as Ohio, actually far more accurately the Buckeyes of Ohio State (Go Spartans AND Wolverines). Good job and well dones are owed to the Ohio assembly and Governor in helping to continue to normalize firearms owners also being able to carry their firearms.
