Does anyone here carry a firearm everywhere they go?

[Starboard Tack]

84. Excellent points you make.

First, let me confess my initial ignorance, when I first started participating on this board, about what motivates people to tote guns on a regular basis. I have learned a lot since then and my position has changed somewhat. I used to think they were all loonies. I no longer think that. It has become apparent that people tote for different reasons. Some, because they feel the need to be in a constant state of preparedness against a possible attack, regardless of where they are or in whose company they are. Others employ a degree of reality testing, relevant to their need to tote, or the appropriateness in certain places.

The responses, as you can see, are all over the place. But it is clear that a few are compelled to carry everywhere it is legal. Others are quite discriminating. You make the point that compulsive toting is comparable to compulsive gambling. I think that is unclear. I have known some compulsive gamblers and was involved in researching that phenomenon, many years ago, with a writer friend. Compulsive gambling is an impulse control disorder and is self destructive. Obviously, there are gun owners who suffer from such pathologies, but I would say the majority do not. It is a serious psychological disorder and not a subject for discussion here.

My use of the words compel, compulsive, habitual are an attempt to learn how individuals operate in distinctly different ways in similar environments. Few of our friends here seem to take offense at my choice of words. I do not find the practice of habitual/compulsive toting, in itself, to be a mental disorder. I find it eccentric, but we all have our eccentricities.

I hope you have been as enlightened as much as I have by the responses of our fellow members.