PA Bill Number: HB1661
Title: Further providing for schedules of controlled substances; and providing for secure storage of xylazine.
Description: Further providing for schedules of controlled substances; and providing for secure storage of xylazine. ...
Last Action: Act No. 17 of 2024
Last Action Date: May 15, 2024
Anti-Gunners: Outback doesn't serve (BANS) good guys with guns :: 10/03/2016
The National Rifle Association and its allied politicians love to promote the false narrative that more guns and "good guys" with guns make everyone safe. As legitimate studies show, nothing could be further from the truth.
My wife and I make it a point to research businesses that prohibit open carry. When we saw a post coming from one particularly radical gun group recommending they boycott Outback Steakhouse because they weren't "gun friendly," we were heartened. Our family, Alison included, had been Outback patrons since the early 1990s.
Last week as we were being seated at the Roanoke, Va. location, a heavy-set, middle-aged man with a crew cut lumbered into the waiting area with a holstered gun. I approached and asked him if he was law enforcement. He looked at me and simply said, "no."
I told the server we were leaving and on the way out I told the guy with the gun who I was and said, "We’re leaving because of you." He just shrugged and mumbled something to the person sitting next to him. I called the manager and she said Outback's policy is to allow open carry because it is legal in Virginia, but alcohol would not be served to the carrier. All I could think of was this fool with a gun pretending to be a badass. If an incident did occur, he would either be ducking under a table, running away like his fellow badasses who did nothing during the Dallas shootings in July, or worst case pulling out his gun and shooting everything and everyone other than his intended target.
Outback Steakhouse working on signage to notify the public that firearms are prohibited at their restaurants. (Carlo Allegri/REUTERS)
That evening I left a message on the Outback corporate website telling them we would never patronize another Outback. I also let them know I was posting that message on social media to get the word out to others like us who thought Outback was like other responsible national chains banning firearms on premises.
Father of slain Virginia 13-year-old Nicole Lovell opens up
Boy, did they get the message loud and clear. The regional manager called and said they screwed up. He said due to staff turnover, some of the managers don't know the policy, and that Outback does not allow firearms. He's working with corporate to get signage to post at the entrance. He also acknowledged that Outback had been blown up on social media, and not just in Roanoke. I thanked him for the response, told him I'd pass it along, and said I was glad we could safely enjoy the blooming onion again.
Andy Parker and his wife left an Outback Steakhouse after seeing a man with a gun exercising his right to carry in Virginia. (Ron Bailey/Getty Images)
Our Outback experience illustrated what a dangerous environment we live in and prompted a new thought that gun lobby politicians should be, in theory, giddy to implement. With their "guns save lives mantra," NRA politicians enthusiastically support open carry in states like Virginia. If they truly believe that, I don't think they would have a problem enacting legislation requiring businesses to put up signage to that effect. If, as they suggest, patrons should feel safer knowing that a business welcomes a "good guy" with a gun strapped to his belt, they should welcome this initiative. It also gives people like us the option of not patronizing that business based on the signage. Sympathetic state legislators with open carry laws should find someone to carry (no pun intended) a bill like this. Of course the gun lobby pols will run from it like the gun toters in Dallas, but at the very least it will shine a spotlight on their hypocrisy. Come on guys, what are you "patriots" afraid of? You want to arm every man, woman and child in this country. What a great way to advance that agenda. Let's see if it works.
Andy Parker's daughter Alison was a Virginia television reporter shot to death on live TV in August 2015.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/businesses-follow-outback-gun-signage-article-1.2791082
