IMO, there is a huge difference between gun owners buying that shirt vs. gun owners shopping at an anti-gun establishment like costco:
Gun owners who buy that shirt are at least honest about how they are supporting an anti-gun organization.
Gun owners who buy from anti-gun establishments like costco hide behind obfuscation, feigned ignorance (like mr. isgavo above) and - as clearly evidenced in this thread alone - personal attacks and pretty much total irrationality.
Freedom to spend your money where you see fit as gun owners in no way implies freedom from being called on your hypocrisy. If you can't handle the heat, stay out of the kitchen - or better yet - go back to du where you belong.
I can't remember whether I ever knew the answer to this question or not, but don't you live in N. Bama where the only Costco (that I know of) in the area is in Huntsville? If I am remembering that right, have you ever tried to OC in Costco? I'm pretty sure that I remember that you were OC'ing, or at least involved in trying to normalize the practice, for quite awhile before the 2013 change in the law. I've only been doing it since after that law went into effect, but being as one of the benefits of my wife's last and current jobs was a paid membership at Costco, we did do quite a bit of shopping there over the last six or seven years. Since Aug. of 2013, I OC'ed every time I went and nobody said a word to me about it. Don't live up there anymore and there's no Costco (again, that I know of) anywhere around here (a little outside of Dothan), so we don't shop there anymore, but I gotta say, all this character assassination over where someone chooses to shop for whatever reason(s) they deem appropriate for their own lives ain't helping anything at all. I'm no hypocrite, and I sure as Hell ain't no refugee from DU. What I am is a man who spent the better part of the last 40 years trying to convince
government what my rights are and trying to stop them in any way I can think of from overstepping their authorities in controlling my rights, all while taking no issue at all with private citizens and/or companies exercising their property rights as they see fit.
Between maybe '94 or '95 and 2008, my wife and I both worked the off-season of our own business at Domino's, she as a manager and me as a driver. The guy we worked for had several stores, was a devout Christian, was a former Marine and he had a huge collection of guns. In fact, we met the guy while at the range one day, and him knowing that the business we had at the time was seasonal, introduced himself and we shot both paper and the bull all day that day, with a casual invite to come to work for him in our off-season if we wanted and/or needed to. After going to work for him, he thought highly enough of our combined work ethic that when we asked him about training to become franchisees, he not only offered that program right off the bat, but offered to sell one of his stores to us, and carry the paper for up to 10 years to boot. Domino's is not anti-gun from a political perspective - they've never made a corporate-level public statement that I've ever heard saying anything about not wanting their customers to carry - but they do have a very strict no-guns-inside-the-stores by employees
or franchisees. After much thought and soul-searching we decided not to franchise with Domino's, but it had nothing to do with their gun policies. As an employee, I ignored their no-guns policy, at least for the bulk of the time I worked there. I never asked the owner, and he is/was kind of a portly fellow so I couldn't say for sure, but it would surprise me to find out that he, likewise, didn't ignore the policy. Was he a hypocrite or reject from DU? Was I for deigning to earn some extra cash during the off-season of my business? Would I likewise have been either of those things if I deigned to buy a very lucrative franchise even though corporate had some anti-gun policies?
The thing is, a franchise business like Chipotle for instance, more likely than not is not owned by an anti-gun franchisee. The owner in the Dallas store where all the uproar eventually caused corporate to impose a system-wide ban on OC was fully on-board with OCT. They were invited to be there. Assuming the same owner is there now, that store is no more "anti-gun" than you or I, but what I'm reading here suggests the guy should be shamed into having to give up his franchise because of policies that corporate imposes upon him, lest he be called a hypocrite or told he belongs "back" at DU "where he belongs." That's some screwed up stuff right there.
Though I almost always find myself wishing that Axe could find less in-your-face ways of expressing himself, even on the one or two issues we have consistently disagreed with each other on, I find it ludicrous to say or imply that he's anti-gun, a hypocrite or a refugee from DU just because he patronizes businesses owned by people with whom he has disagreements about gun issues. Not that you named Axe as the target of the post I quoted above, but whomever that stuff was aimed at really doesn't deserve it just over their own personal choices about where to shop. The Mommies shirt was a rather overblown analogy too.
Seems we all could benefit from lightening up. I consider myself strongly allied, if not as good a friend as people can get to be from only internet interaction, with most of the regulars who have posted in this sub-thread of the thread, and because of that I don't enjoy taking this contrary position to the majority one being promulgated, but contrary my position is. It's not unusual for me to agree with Axe, but in this case with some of the participants aligned against him being folks with whom I almost never take a contrary stance, it is more difficult than usual. Be that as it may, minus all the talk about who's got big enough balls to carry this way or that way, or this place or that place, I'm with Axe on this one.
Blues