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--> An Open Letter to Those Who Wonder Why Citizens Would Want to Carry Guns in Public

Carrying a gun? Around with you? Isn't that kind of stupid... and dangerous? Why does society even allow people to do that?

These are questions that are always raised by someone when the topic of carrying a concealed handgun by law-abiding citizens (CCW).

And while everyone is certainly entitled to their own opinion, it tends to be best when opinions are grounded in facts. Here are some to consider.

Thirty years after Florida passed their CCW law there are now almost four million citizens legally carrying handguns in 40 plus states. [...]

Nationwide, there have been no law enforcement officials shot by any person with a CCW, no school or church shootings by any person with a CCW, no "blood on the streets", no "Dodge City shootouts", no instances of the guns being taken away and used by the badguys, no rise in accident levels, no prisons full of untrained CCW holders who shot otherwise innocent people willy-nilly, and no examples of children shot dead by CCW holders.

The states with concealed carry permits on average have a revocation rate of less than 0.04 percent. That is four out of every ten thousand holders. In the majority of these cases the revocation is due to a minor technical infraction equal to a traffic ticket, rather than the result of a crime. [...]

the comfort is never in knowing that one can take a life with a gun, but the sure knowing that one can save a life with a gun. My life, my wife's, or maybe my daughter's. These are the people I am responsible for.

I know in your heart you believe terrible things might happen if citizens carry guns, but I have one question: Why have none of the doom, gloom, and scary stories you believe might happen not come true in any state that has passed a CCW law? Not one. [...]