People who have advocated for the almost unlimited right to own as many guns as they want, be able to carry them around everywhere openly or concealed, and free from any requirements for proper training or registration or insurance argue that having a heavily armed citizenry actually makes society safer, using slogans such as “The only thing that will stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun”. The catch is, of course, that when you have armed people wandering around with a vigilante mindset, how will they know who is a good guy and who is a bad guy?
Michael Foster, a customer at a Florida Walmart, seemed to have a simple rule: if you are black, you must be a bad guy.
According to the Hillsborough Sheriff’s Office, 62-year-old Clarence Daniels was entering Walmart with his legally concealed firearm to buy coffee creamer on Tuesday when he was spotted by 43-year-old vigilante Michael Foster.
Foster, who is white, had observed Daniels conceal the weapon under his coat before he came into the store. When Daniels crossed the threshold, Foster tackled him and placed him in a chokehold, Hillsborough Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Larry McKinnon explained.
Following a struggle, the men were separated and now Foster is being charged with battery.
Fortunately no one died or seems to have been seriously hurt. While it was inevitable that this kind of thing would happen, what surprises me is that it does not happen more frequently and with more serious injuries or even death.
One can only speculate what might have ensued if the colors of the people had been reversed and a black vigilante had tackled an armed white person. Fortunately that is less likely to happen because black people do not tend to see themselves as auxiliary members of the police force.
What’s really ironic is to consider that one of the causes of the gunfight at the OK Corral was the Earps were enforcing a new no-guns-inside-city-limits law. Yes, in one of the wildest towns in the west, the citizens had concluded that letting “law-abiding” citizens carry guns was a bad idea. In 1881. So much for the march of progress.
It’s just amazing that there were no shots fired, no deaths. What might have happened if another vigilante assumed that an unprovoked assault was taking place? Which it was -- but this was possibly abated by the fact that the target was black and therefore automatically suspect.
I guess he thinks that the second amendment right to bear arms only applies to white people. Then again, if the reasons for it I’ve read are true, that it was included to allow southern states to have civilian militias patrolling for runaway slaves, then I guess that was the original intent of the founders. I wonder what Scalia would say?
As it happened before, this becomes relevant again:
The variety of headlines on this story is interesting. Whose point of view will they take?
Daily Mail: Hapless hero is left facing charges after he put Walmart shopper in choke-hold when he saw his legally concealed pistol
Tampa Bay Times: Man shopping for coffee creamer at Walmart attacked by vigilante for carrying gun he was legally permitted to have
…
Foster has been charged -- anyone want to bet he gets off scott-free?