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Yes, you can shutup about Colorado and keep your opinions on gun control to yourself

Reading Time: 6 minutes

I moved to Colorado about ten months ago.And though I am a native Texan, Colorado is my adoptive state. In my 31 years, 18 were in Texas and 12 were in Illinois, so that should tell you something. I love this state and the people in it. Just as the people of Texas are my people, the people of Colorado are my adoptive people. Recently, my Colorado people have suffered through forest fires. And now they’ve suffered through an horrific tragedy. My upbringing has been between one of the most conservative states in the union and one of the most liberal, as far as gun laws go. So I have a lot of friends on both sides of the gun issue that want to share their thoughts. And you know what? You can shut up about gun control for a day or two.

[Edit: July 26]An introduction to what you’re about to read

I wrote this article around midnight last Saturday. I live 20 or 30 minutes from Aurora. I know the theater. What happened wasn’t a piece of news, it was an event where live.  By midnight, Saturday, my friends in Illinois and Texas had already decided the fate of gun control for this country. I was fed up.

I am a web developer by trade. My blog averages 30 or 40 hits a week and suddenly, I was getting hundreds of views on this article. Business Insider picked it up and wanted to interview me. Because I am weary of what the media will write, I wrote the follow up article “I’m a hypocrite…” where I explained the reason I own an AK-74  was for fun and proposed that mandatory training should be the only regulation we need.  Fox News emailed me this morning and posted my blog post on their site (with an incorrect title).  And now I’m averaging 150 hits a minute.

What I wrote was a reaction to both the arguments for gun control and for concealed weapons. Both arguments have flaws and I wanted to rationalize the issues with both. If you’re looking for my position, it’s  the one where I have a 9mm Sig on my hip and an AK-74  in my hands.

And yes, I know an AK isn’t an assault rifle. I’m not an expert. 

My wife served six years in the Air Force, including time in wartime Bosnia. I applied to three different branches; I am unable to serve due to a medical condition. Saying that I don’t love the country, 2nd amendment, or freedom isn’t nice and it isn’t true.  Now… please put yourself in the context of a Saturday night in a suburb of Denver and keep reading.

[end of edit]

You can shutup about gun regulations and gun bans

I own an assault rifle, two handguns, and a shotgun. And of course, I purchased them all legally. I have a college degree and I don’t have any criminal history beyond speeding tickets. If you’re looking at a background check, I’m no different than James Eagan Holmes. Compare resumes and you’ll pick him; he had a better GPA than I did and actually pursued a higher education than I have.

The difference between James Holmes and me is that one of us walked into a theater and murdered people. One of us wanted to make our home into a giant bomb to kill our neighbors. One of us values human life.  There’s no law on the planet that will change how a man values the life of another. Outlaw online sales, assault rifles, guns, liquids over 3 ounces, and he still would find a way to murder.

You can shutup about how concealed carry fixes everything

Colorado isn’t much different from Texas as far as gun laws are concerned. In fact, Texas is the only state in the union where open carry is illegal ( the ability to carry a gun in public for all to see). Concealed carry is legal and fairly easy to obtain in the state of Colorado. In fact, my wife and I went through the class. Our course was taught by a police officer and firearms instructor; he was rarely qualified to educated us on conceal carry rules and the actual gun laws in Colorado.

So here’s a few things you should know:

  • It is perfectly legal to conceal a firearm in a movie theater in Colorado if you have a license
  • Colorado concealed-carry classes aren’t required to be taught by law enforcement
  • Colorado concealed-carry classes don’t require that you demonstrate proficiency with a fire arm
  • Colorado concealed-carry classes don’t require that you even shoot a firearm

You can shutup about how things would have been different if someone had a gun

I’ve fired and used guns my whole life. I don’t claim to be an expert or even overly proficient. And though I have shot a few thousand rounds in my life, I don’t think that would matter for me or  others in this situation. So here’s what you soon-to-be heroes with conceal weapons permits should know:

  • You’re not Jason Bourne, Jack Bauer, or Bruce Wayne. Situational awareness takes training that you don’t get as a civilian. You won’t recognize a threat until it’s too late.
  • Unless you’ve trained with the exact weapons system you’re carrying, you’ll you could  miss. It takes hundreds of hours with a firearm to really be proficient. Do you know what you’d do if it jams?  Can you reload before the last round leaves your chamber? How many rounds in your magazine? Have you even practiced drawing your weapon if it’s concealed? Now think about doing this in a firefight. 
  • Proficiency deteriorates without practice. When was the last time you fired your gun? Police and military practice regularly for their jobs. You do it irregularly for fun.
  • A thousand hours on the range aren’t the same as a hundred seconds in a real shootout. Can you recognize the threat, obtain a site picture, and neutralize the target with a gun pointed at you?  Police and military don’t just learn how to do this once, they actually train in these situations.
  • There’s a solid chance you won’t even pull the trigger. There is huge psychological trauma associated with taking a life. Estimates are that between 1/3rd and 1/4th of guns on the battlefield in WWII were never shot. There are even police officers and soldiers who have been killed because they didn’t have what it took to kill.
  • Even if you train with your gun, you do it until you get it right. Police and military do it until they don’t get it wrong.  You’re just not ready like they are to use your gun. Your reaction may not be the same as someone who’s trained for this. 

I really don’t care what you think could have been different

Real people died. This isn’t the time to run your mouth about politics and gun control. And while my friends are alive and well, some of their friends and family aren’t so lucky.  This is real to me.

So yeah…I’m betting that 100% of people getting shot would like to have a way to protect themselves. Not one person there was thinking, “I wish it were harder to get an assault rifle…maybe we should repeal the 2nd amendment.” They were running for their lives and praying for deliverance. Every person there wanted a way to end the violence. This is about surviving a shootout, not repealing guns.

I don’t give two craps what you think you would have done if you were there. You weren’t. Hundreds of others were. They could have been armed, and maybe some were. Just a gun isn’t enough. Even if you’re police or military, there’s a difference between training for this and experiencing it. Unless you’ve experienced a fire-fight, shut up.

Just shutup about Colorado

I live in the Denver area, and not very far from Aurora. On July 20th I woke up with the news and was scared for the lives of my church family. I’m not affected nearly in the same way these victims are. But I may meet these victims and their families. My wife may go to work with people who were there.  Families of victims may visit my church. This isn’t something that happened on the news. This is something that happened where I live.

I could have been there. I could have had a gun. I could have done something.

But I wasn’t there.I wouldn’t have had a gun (because I don’t have my license yet), and I don’t have a clue what I would have done.

So all I can do is shutup and pray. So should you.

[July 24, 2012: UPDATE: I’m a hypocrite. Rob Wile from Business Insider had a 45-minute interview with me on the subject of gun control]

[July 24, 2012: UPDATE: here’s a follow up blog post I wrote which summarizes my interview with Rob: ]

[July 25, 2012: UPDATE: Here’s the article on Business Insider]

[July 26, 2012: UPDATE: Fox news asks permission to repost part of the blog, and subsequently the world hates me. ]

[July 25, 2012: UPDATE: On account of the factual issues and general thoughts of what’s been written, I’ve written a small summary of corrections for you  to review]

459 Comments


  1. There is NOT a wide gap between the shooting proficiency of licensed civilians and police/military personnel.

    This blog post is riddled with inaccuracies and it’s a shame to see Fox News giving air to such nonsense.


  2. I can tell you that in my opinion there are several errors in your assumptions. However I really don’t care about that as much as you telling people to shut up. I have a feeling that this is a cleaver attempt by a progressive troll trying to silence the discussion. You state you are a gun owner and come from Texas to establish some credibility. Then you trot out a laundry list of faulty talking points. I believe you have the right to express your opinion but not to try and make any dissent seem unreasonable.


    1. Bill. I’ve been called lots of names today and I’ve tolerated a lot.

      I will not tolerate being called a progressive troll. That’s out of line.

      I’m not trying to silence the discussion. All I’ve said is that there are people in the hospital recovering from their wounds and I’d like for everyone and their brother to stop assuming that one person with a gun would have saved everyone.

      The fact that I’ve expressed disdain over how CCW owners have conjectured that they would react in the Aurora shootings is not a reason for you do think I’m some progressive fool.

      Not nice. I expect an apology.


      1. Progressive troll!


  3. As a CHL License holder in Texas, I just want to say my prayers are with those in Colorado. And I carry mine everywhere I legally can because you never know where a bad guy may attack. I carried to a movie with my wife not two weeks ago. Humbly, I must disagree with many of you on here. I am an expert with my pistol. I understand return fire, tactics, use of cover, shooting under pressure and shooting to kill. I would have, as many other CHL holders would have, been able to return fire on Mr. Holmes, and would have definitely altered his plans.


  4. I am a permit holder. I also live in Colorado. This is personal to me too. However, we are not talking about 1 person carrying. If there had been multiple armed people there they could have stopped him. I am former military. I am an IDPA competator. I would not have ran and hid like you say. I may not have won. But I would have tried. I do not cherish the idea of going up against an AR with my compact 9mm Kahr. But I would have tried. I only have 7 rounds. But I would have tried. The real problem was that it was a gun free zone! The only people who obey gun free zones are honest people. Criminals do not obey laws and rules. That is why they are criminals.


  5. A few things that are incorrect in your post.

    1) No, you don’t own an assault rifle. To be an “assault rifle” the weapon has to have a select fire feature (so the ability to choose between semi-auto and burst/full-auto). You also don’t own an “assault weapon.” This is a term made up by the antis to try and force an emotional response (much like calling 30rd mags “assault clips”). All you have is a semi-auto that looks like an assault rifle…but isn’t. Please quit playing into the antis hands and using their terminology instead of the proper terminology.

    2) Currently there’s 7 states (6 come 1 Nov) that ban open carry. They are TX, OK, AR, FL, SC, IL, and NY. DC has banned open carry but it isn’t a state, and CA has banned open carry of handguns in urbanized areas.

    3) No one could legally of had a weapon in the theater. This is because it was lawfully posted that weapons aren’t allowed on the premises. While I doubt charges would have been pressed if someone would have stopped the shooting via a gun, it doesn’t change the fact that it would have been a crime to of had the gun in the theater.

    4) I won’t break it all down, but simply put, you are wrong about the training the majority of our police and military recieve in regards to weapons use and active shooters. And let’s not forget that civilians average only about a 2% innocent bystander kill rate, while the police are at over 11%. So I would trust a citizen responding FAR MORE than the police.


  6. By the way…I often compete against law enforcement. Many of them are barely qualified to carry. I would rather have another IDPA guy that competes with me on the first Saturday of every month, than someone who shoots because the department makes them.


  7. It would be wonderful if everyone could coexist without the need for guns but these lunatics and all around bad guys make more of a case for ownership than ever. The population is like a sunami and our world is getting ever smaller with the media bringing even the smallest of incidents seem a mere block away. Have a gun than be educated in its use and safety so you do not accidently hurt yourself or others. Those of you that wish to be sheep or lambs in a lions den that is your choice. Assuming that everyone is Barney Fife with a gun is ludicrous and just shows how really uniformed you are. So before you give up your constitutional right thinking it will be a safer world study history. Our country can not be compared to others that have no rights. We have more people unless your talking China where only soldiers,Police and crininals have guns.
    The only thing gun control will do is boost the black market sales of real Automatic weapons that can hose a crowd with bullets and create a whole lot more damage than the so called semi auto got to pull the trigger everytime home grown AK or AR type weapon which people do hunt with these days more and more for various reasons. Weight,ETC


  8. Jason Bourne had to fight other Jason Bournes.

    The 71 year old man in Florida recently proved that one not need be a Navy Seal to use a gun to stop violence.

    Because the other guys typically a coward.

    The batman shooter was unwilling to exchange a single round when confront5ed by police.


  9. An armed patron may or may not have gotten a shot at the gunman. But I’ll tell you what an armed patron would have, that unarmed patrons could not have.
    A chance.


  10. This post if both sensible and ridiculous at the same time. Commenting on the training of LE and Military and implying they are better trained than civilian firearm owners is utter nonsense. I am a firearms trainer, prior LE and Corrections and former military, with special ops experience. Most military are support personal and don’t train regularly with sidearms. Police are rarely trained well with firearms, look to the FBI reporting of the world’s largest PD, the NYPD 20 year study, their hit ratio was 9 percent. Now, you apply that to the average gunner owner / hunter. I am a hunter and have friends who hunt, I would not have any fear of going into this battle with any of them. Training of civilians at least all well establish training firms, train to deal with low light conditions, firearm malfunction clearing drills, draw and host of other issues. From a corrections standpoint I am extremely familiar with the mindset of criminals, the last thing they want to do is face off with a trained armed civilian. Not to mention the hundreds of thousands of prior military vets out there. Fox should be ashamed of posting this nonsense and at the same time the blogger needs to stop watching so many movies and appeasing a hostile base who’s sole purpose is restricting our rights.


    1. Jake: +1 — I am a firearms instructor, former reserve police officer, retired military and a CHL instructor. I train MANY law enforcement officers who are very sub-par when it comes to their knowledge or desire to properly utilize a firearm. At the same time many of my ‘civilian’ friends are quite adept at carrying and would have stood next to ANY of them at that theater and felt like we at least had a damn good fighting chance. We train, we think about these exact sort of things happening and while we all pray it doesn’t, we carry in case it does!!


  11. Personally I prefer the open carry laws. As a non gun owner I want to know which idiot to stay away from. So if your going to carry a gun, carry it in the open maybe it will scare off the bad guys that might want to hurt you. The only reason to cary a concealed gun is to suprise some one after they confront you. Hey dude that is to late.


  12. Well, as far as his comments on someone shooting back, it’s not the point whether you would have hit him or not. People who perpitrate this kind of action are cowards. If anyone would have returned fire, he would have most likely turned tail and ran. And, you might have gotten lucky. I shoot several different disciplines of pistol competition, and fire thousands of rounds a year. To run or hide is never the answer when offered violence. The only response is to attack, with everything in you. And keep attacking until the threat is eliminated


  13. Good post Chris!!! But nothing will reach the Anti Folks except maybe and its a big maybe that some terrible crime is perpetrated against them or a loved one. There is a force that is apart of the human make up and its the “Fight or Flight” response! Some folks are driven by fear and some Common sense! It helps to be somewhat rooted in reality. The crazies that murder the innocent will always be here and they are more often then not everyday people till they cross into some mental state that reveals the monster in there own reality.
    To prevent this stuff is impossible but it is much lees likely to happen when people can defend themselves. Even the Crazies think twice!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


  14. I agree with most of what you said in you post, but I take exception with your sensationalist approach to the training that military and police get. Most cops and even soldiers get very minimal, basic training and have to qualify annually or biannually. The average cop or soldier knows little about firearms beyond what they are required to know about the particular weapon issued them. Most police officers have never fired their duty weapon, nor have they been fired upon. Most of the training you insinuate that they receive is only for special units – not the average grunt. The “professionals” in most cases are just as under-practiced, under-trained, and vulnerable to psychological shock and being taken in by the element of surprise as the rest of us. SWAT teams perform well because they are the ones initiating force, on their terms. The same is true for Special Forces units. They don’t sit around waiting for an assault to happen to them – they go looking for the fight and that gives them the upper hand. In a situation like the one in Aurora they would have been sitting ducks like everyone else. So while I can’t argue whether or not a person with a concealed weapon could have made a difference, I can say with great certainty that a cop or even a Navy SEAL sitting in that theater would have fared no better than the average Joe.


  15. Makes sense now, the blogger is a web developer, to him he was making comments that he believed although they were not accurate and now major news agencies are picking it up and running with it like it is credible. Effing unreal, hey news agencies, here is a novel idea, contact / interview someone with actual experience in the field you are posting articles on. Fox has been going down hill in my opinion, anyone else see lunatic O’reilly’s rant supporting, get this, “Heavy weapon registration with the FBI?” I stop watching this clown after he continued to bully and argue with people who dared agree with him on subjects. The idiotic comments regarding “Assault Weapons” only having sporting purposes shows more complete ignorance from so called rights and firearms supporters, I hunt with an AR 10, and AR’s and I know a good deal of people who deer hunt with SKS’s. Ignorance knows no bounds.


  16. I hold carry tickets in three states. A take-down robbery took place at a restaurant I frequented in Albuquerque NM. I was not there when it happened. I have pondered what I would have done if I had been there. A young employee was killed in that incident. I probably would have had a high percentage chance to take one of the three robbers out. The one with the AR. That would have left two with pistols though. I’m very glad I was not there.

    One thing that surprised me after receiving my first carry permit was that it made me much more polite in public. The best way to avoid a shooting situation is to stay away from trouble. And keep your eyes working. Got that funny feeling? Time to get out of Dodge.

    Of course, sitting in a theater… Who could anticipate someone walking in with all that fire power?

    I’m still very glad I carry. Wearing a gun now is like wearing underwear. The only time I notice it is when I don’t have it on.


  17. Mr. Taylor just because you own a few firearms does NOT make you an expert nor a mouthpiece for CHL holders. I DO practice regularly. I HAVE trained to draw from concealment while sitting, in a car, in a confined chair and in ANY other place/position I could think of. YOUR mental impediment to shooting another human being who is randomly killing innocents demonstrates your sheeple mentality. YOUR inability to train and/or shoot more than the “1000 rounds” that you’ve shot in your life is NOT the same as MANY of us who carry a firearm as a lifestyle. I shoot that in damn near a month! I CAN reload as soon as my weapon is empty!! I CAN clear a Type I, II or Type III malfunction WITHOUT thinking about it. And you know what, I’m saying all this because I know MANY other Texans who can do all these things. I am a proud Texas CHL instructor and I’m glad you’re now in Colorado. You’re an individual who doesn’t realize he’s nothing more than a liberal who happens to own a gun!!
    P.S. The bad guys aren’t superhuman either. Look at the 71 year old patron in Florida who ‘engaged’ the robbers and they summarily FLED!! You’re doing nothing more than feeding the liberal argument from a fake-conservative viewpoint!!


  18. What a snide condescending little blog. Just ignore all the case you hear about on local news all the time about people using their little .22 pisol to stop a threat, people who really don’t train all the time. OOO so you have shot thousands of rounds? PSH. Are you kidding me. That is nothing. I’ve shot way more rounds as a civilian than I ever did as an infantry marine. What kind of cheesy gun expert are you supposed to be? I will take my chances in a situation like that with a pistol rather than without. And you would to, so come off of your high horse. None of your points change the fact that armed citizens stand a better chance of living in such a situation.


  19. Mike is right! Going to the range and qualifying annually or even semi annually sharpens your aim and weapon familiarization and safe use but not so much your defensive skills and threat response.
    Well i have to see the Movie Dark Night now with my Teen.
    Hope you all have a good Day and remember “United we stand,Divided we fall.”


  20. Just so the misinformed anti-2nd Amendment people more ammo, let’s deal in facts about “assault weapons”. They are NOT semi-automatics. Per the Federal laws, they ARE FULLY automatic, military grade. You cannot buy or hold one without a Federal permit, which is vetted by both the FBI and ATF. If caught with it without that permit on your person, you go to Federal prison. Hence, few people have any interest in owning one.

    Use one and it is a SERIOUS FELONY!

    The “assault weapon” tag is a media invention only meant to grab headlines, to characterize them as more deadly, to mislead citizens.


  21. Frank, You said that many soldiers in WWII never fired their weapons. Well my dad was there and I can tell you, he fired his and so did a lot of other GI’s! Thank God or we’d be under a repressive regime speaking German. If a number of ccw holders were in a situation like what happened in that theater, maybe one of them would freeze but I’d bet you most would respond properly and hopefully prevent the loss of innocent lives.


  22. Thank you for putting my thoughts into articulate form. And never give Fox News permission for ANYTHING.


  23. Actually, while it may be legal to carry a weapon in theaters in Colorado in general, Cinemark designates all of its theaters as gun-free zones. Thus no one had a gun and no one was equipped to defend themselves. Even one gun could have frightened and distracted the gunman enough to save lives (and yes, now, when the public consciousness is concentrated on the issue, is a perfectly good time to discuss gun laws).


  24. NH is open carry also. I believe you’ll find it on you tube under “nh freemen” or ”
    nh open carry”. I personally saw a man walk into a Hannaford store with a Glock in his back pocket. No one said a word.


  25. Your blog is wrong on Colorado law – concealed carry in the theatre was illegal if the theatre’s owner posts “firearms prohibited” at all entrances – as was posted in Aurora. For proof and pictures see: http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/2012/07/no-guns-policy-at-cinemark-theaters.html
    On retirement from the Army after 28 years I enrolled in one of the best concealed carry courses in the nation to learn the legal differences of carrying a weapon as “just a civilian” and also to refresh my shooting skills. I was encouraged by the maturity of the students (no “Rambos”) and their shooting skills. I have no doubt most of them left the course with both the shooting and tactical skills to have made a difference in that theatre.
    But that isn’t really the point — shouldn’t every person in that theatre have had a choice of whether they wanted to defended themselves or just sit quietly and hope the police got there before it was their turn for execution? Cinemark took that choice away from them and, when they did, I believe assumed full responsibility for their protection while in their theatre. Since only “good guys” obey such signs, isn’t any gun-free zone really just a “hunting preserve for psychopaths”?


  27. Frank M. Taylor obviously is not familiar with guns. This is obvious by his statement under the picture “…AK-47 assault rifle cartridges…” . The photo shows “magazines” not rifle cartridges. “Rifle cartridges” are the bullets plus the cartridges. How pathetic that our journalists are so ignorant of the proper terminology.


  28. You probably need to shut up about pre-judging what anyone else would do in the situation in Aurora. You see, I’m fundamentally different from you. I have a concealed carry license. I am certain that, had I been in that situation, I would have done everything in py power to stop the killing. I’m not willing to spend the rest of my life hearing the cries of the wounded and dying and know that I could have done something, anything, and didn’t. You, on the other hand, seem resolved to just throw your hands up in defeat. That mindset makes me different from you. I am very serious about protecting my life and the lives of those I love. I get the training I need to accomplish that goal. You seem content to just tell folks to shut up. Maybe you need to just take your concealed carry weapon off and leave it at home.


  29. I’m not questioning your right to own guns for hunting and protection. I just want someone to explain why you feel the need to own a semi-auto.Just asking.


    1. By that I mean an assault rifle


    2. The same reason someone owns a 350hp Mustang. Why ? To go 65 MPH ?


  30. This opinion is B.S. Assault rifles by definition are full- auto. I will not take seriously anyone with their facts wrong who tells all to ‘shut up’. This dork obviously does not read National Rifleman or any other local gun rights related copy or dork would know people use guns to stop vioulent crime frequently. As the son of a decorated combat vet, I have been raised to beleive in armed self defense. Those who buy into dork’s opinion – go screw your selves!

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