Above: the photo for the article Bar owners coming up with ways to deter gun carriers. Caption: “Kim Carpenter, left, and Holly Aucreman pose for a photo Wednesday at Citi Bar with a pair of metal detector wands. The wands might become a necessity if a proposed change in Ohio’s concealed carry law allows permit holders to carry their guns into bars.” Define necessity . . .

Citi Bar on West Main Street and Orange Carpet Lounge on North Columbus Street already have bought metal detector wands to ward off customers who are carrying weapons, [bar manager Kim] Carpenter said.

“(Bar customers) are not going to hear the part that you can’t be drunk [and carry a concealed weapon,” said Mark Brobeck, who owns both Citi Bar and Orange Carpet Lounge. “That part is going to be drowned out.”

Brobeck said he intends to post signs that guns are prohibited in his bars.

I’m astounded (not to say incredulous) that a bar owner would consider wanding his customers. Aside from losing business (and rightly so), what’s his well-trained staff going to do when they hear a sound which might indicate a gun (or might not)? Frisk them?

What if they find a gun? Are they going to secure the weapon, detain the scofflaw (somehow), ask the potential perp to “show me your papers” and then keep the illegal gun toter under citizens’ arrest until the cops arrive? How would any of that increase customer safety?

I mean, seriously? TTAG contacted the article’s author to verify the wand action and check the authenticity of the photo showing a pair of $183 Garrett Superwand Security Metal Detectors.

“The metal detectors belong to the bars,” Richard Rouan assured us. “And they plan to wand everybody who comes through the door if the bill is signed by the governor.” Because there’s no other door in or out—other than the ones required by the fire marshalls.

Heads-up girls! The bad guys are already carrying guns into bars (and everywhere else). Restrictions on legal gun owners does nothing to deter them. If you think you’re going to wand away armed aggression, you are living on Planet Uh-Oh. More to the point, any bar owner who wants to “ward off” legal concealed carry owners is like a drunk looking for his keys under a streetlamp because the light’s better.

Now let’s talk about bars with a shotgun under the counter. No wait! What about the cops who don’t seem to have a grasp on the current situation re: guns in bars, never mind any change in the regulations allowing law-abiding citizens to exercise their Second Amendment privileges where the owner agrees:

Fairfield County Sheriff Dave Phalen said he has “mixed feelings” about the bill.

Restaurants that serve alcohol likely won’t cause problems for law enforcement, but adding the potential for guns to bars with a history of violence “would probably not be a very good idea,” he said.

“I think, in general, this is not helpful to law enforcement,” said Lancaster Police Chief David Bailey, who is against the change to the law.

Bailey said it is unlikely a person would go to a bar without drinking and that the law will put an extra burden on police officers breaking up fights in bars.

“They have to be very cautious that there could be concealed weapons involved,” he said.

As opposed to now, where they can simply assume that patrons are unarmed? As Bob Dylan sang, “When you gonna wake up, and strengthen the things that remain?”

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17 COMMENTS

  1. 1) I don’t give a flying fuck about what’s helpful to law enforcement. Freedom is freedom.

    2) If somebody is high enough on the shit-for-brains/fuck-the-law-and-decency scale to commit robbery, rape, murder, or assault, they won’t obey prohibitions — not in bars, not in restaurants, and not anywhere else.

  2. If that was my local bar, they’d never see me in there again. I don’t care if the owner backed down, screw him!

    I respect “no guns” signs, and I’m smart enough to not drink when I carry, I expect a little respect in return from someone I’ve given a LOT of business to.

    • Yeah, it’s pretty incredible just how discourteous these people seem to be. Searching their patrons as if they were the TSA, and being douchebags in general. I’d just choose another bar. And I don’t drink at all – I only go to bars with buddies so they can drink — none of them have guns when they start drinking on them, and one always surrenders his gun to one of us when he does.

      • It’s just hard for some people to wrap their minds around the idea that people with licenses to carry firearms aren’t idiots or thugs.

        They need to take a look at my state (VA) where it’s been legal to conceal carry in bars and restaurants that serve liquor for about a year or so now (Before that it was OC only). Nobody around here has felt the need to strip search clients who just want a beer.

        • No! If they look at Virginia, they’ll just move there in droves from shittier states and fuck everything up (like they did Vermont and Maine).

          You guys have got to be careful about that. Watch out for New Yorkers especially. <_<

        • Well, I live in Virginia too. Virginia does not have bars, per se, but the better restaurants serve alcoholic beverages. In the days before Virginia’s more permissive law, I couldn’t go to a nice restaurant, but now I can. There is a certain mentally common in folks who operate this kind of business. A lot of Virginia restaurant owners ranted and raved and threatened to expel anyone who they could identify as carrying a gun. Since the law was passed, there have been almost no problems. I grew up in Cincinnati. I can well believe that there are people who now live in Ohio who might not be trusted with a gun.

      • I think this is a great way to keep decent, law-abiding gun owners and their money out of your bar.

  3. There are currently bars with metal detectors and such–usually not friendly neighborhood bars, but rather bars that have problems with violence. If you need metal detectors to keep your bar safe, I’ll go somewhere else instead.

  4. Like most bar owners these ladies understand what you guys pretend not to. The idea of guns in bars is bad news, it doesn’t matter who’s got them. Just because we cannot expect criminals to obey the law does that mean we shouldn’t expect you to either? Or, are you suggesting that escalation thing? Let’s try to get as many lawful gun owners to carry in the bar as there are criminal maniacs, then when the shootin’ starts everything will be swell. Is that the idea?

    Guns in bars is a bad idea, period. It’s common sense.

    • What does this have to do with common sense? It’s a stupid idea. And it won’t change anything.

      If if you’re not responsible enough to carry in a bar, you shouldnt have a gun or be drinking.

      I’m tempted to go there and try them to pull this crap on me. Frisk me if you want, I’ll sue for sexual harrassment. They have to comply with the law. If this law is signed, they have to. If the law allows me to do this, then case closed. I’m expecting some lawsuits hitting them.

      The only thing this will do is them losing customers. They follow the typical “gunz r bad durrrrr” mantra.

    • mikeb302000. So in your world the criminals are knife weilding? I do not drink, but until bars start taking the keys from their drinking and driving patrons and give them breath test before they can have them back I would say that ALL bar owners are responsible for more death then ANY LAW ABIDING gun owner ever. This is the point that you go out of your way to ignore, law abiding gun owners are not the cause of gun violence, the problem it is the criminals that cause most violence and would love to live in a world were only they and the cops had guns. If you want to know what that looks like all you have to do is look at the violence in Mexico, were the Government has guns the cartels have guns and the law abiding citizen are target. You live in a dream world if you think outlawing guns to law abiding citizens will not end criminal violence.

      • Todd, In fact I’m not ignoring anything, you are. Bar owners have been blamed for what their drunk customers do after leaving the bar. It’s quite commonplace nowadays for bar owners to cut people off, call them a taxi, or encourage the less-drunk friends to do the driving. That’s a good example of shared responsibility.

        I’ve spent enough time in bars to know that responsible people often have too much to drink and end up doing stupid shit. Haven’t you seen that? Why can’t you accept that it’s better if those folks are not armed?

        Of course, you should consider taking gunnutmegger’s advice. As a shining example of the Armed Intelligentsia, he feels that someone who disagrees with him and sees things differently, is a troll. He would prefer an echo chamber in which you all blow smoke up each other’s asses and tell each other how right and intelligent you are.

    • Ohio law — before this bill — allows the owner or a designated representative to carry a weapon. Same requirements as those placed on CCW holders — no drinking allowed. So the bars already have guns in them, and the only requirement is that you can get hired by a bar owner and given the nod to carry.

      And yet none of the things you predict have happened.

      As always.

  5. Hey maybe they’re on to something. We can’t carry a gun anywhere in Chicago…and look how safe we are! Very little crime here.

  6. I wish they would bring this law to South Dakota (I keep writing my state senate about it). I do not drink. I had cancer a while back and one of the things I gave up to restore my health is alcohol. So… I always end up as the designated driver. I would like to be able to carry while acting as the DD.

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