The Wedge, Continued
Update: October 20, 2002
And the signs have gone back up.I've been in communication with Elizabeth Archerd—email address still the same; see below—at the Wedge. I'm not going to quote those emails without permission, although I will be indiscreet enough to say that of all the tons of emails that she received, every single one of them from gun-rights proponents was polite. If you do decide to email the Wedge, please continue to be. Polite, that is.
Some interesting lessons from it. Various folks have copied me on emails that have been floating around on the subject. What caused the Wedge to put the signs back up was a well-orchestrated campaign by the ill-named "Citizens for a Safer Minnesota".
They certainly should be congratulated for their effectiveness in this case. Now, shoppers who wish to avoid victim disarmament zones while they get their groceries are limited to Cub, Rainbow, Byerly's, Kowalski's, Everett's, Brennan's, Lund's, and only around 99% of the supermarkets in the state; they've been made to feel unwelcome in a half dozen co-ops, including the Wedge.
Frankly, I'm irritated. Irked, even. Despite what the CSM claimed—and, for some reason, removed—from their website, the Wedge didn't take down the silly signs because of "pressure" from the "gun lobby." It was reason, not pressure—the Member Services manager at the Wedge took down the signs because she came to realize, after some discussions with one person—me—and checking out what I had to say, that the signs didn't buy the Wedge anything.
And they don't. Permit holders can, with impunity, ignore the signs, and not be committing as much as a petty misdemeanor trespassing violation, until and unless they're personally notified, and asked to leave—and then, they can't be ticketed if they do leave. I hope that permit holders won't go there, though; the Wedge has, alas, taken a position that we're not welcome.
The pressure came from the antis, as it usually does.
I think they're to be pitied. As I've written elsewhere on this website, their "Campaign to Post" has been a humiliating failure. Instead of the perhaps 10-20% of the stores in the metro area that I initially predicted, or the probably rhetorical claims of "all stores" from folks like my own Representative, Jean Wagenius, there's been only a paltry number of the signs put up, and in some cases, as in this one, the antis have had to resort to immense amounts of pressure for that.
Look at their own website. Go to http://www.endgunviolence.com, and click on the "Campaign to Post" link. You'll find barely two dozen stores listed—and some of them are inaccurate. (Old Navy took down their silly signs more than a month ago; very few Dairy Queen stors have posted.)
The one niche in which they've been successful have been metro-area co-ops. Which is, in a sense, fair enough—co-ops are owned by their members, and in my opinion have the right to discriminate against anybody they care to, as long as it's lawful. It's their call.
It is, though, kind of sad. Many of the signs have already come down; see gunfreezones.
What has the Wedge bought themselves by posting? Trouble? Maybe; most multiple victim public shootings take place at victim disarmament zones.
Trouble from permit holders? Nah. A few polite emails, and a few holes in the air where customers ought to be.
Update: September 22, 2002
The signs have come down.I'd like to say that that's because the board of the Wedge, after careful consideration, has decided that it's part of the Wedge's mission to support 2nd Amendment rights, and to encourage citizens in their rights to self-defense, both at the Wedge and elsewhere.
But that would be untrue.
The truth is that the Wedge, like the vast majority of other merchants, doesn't want to take a position on political matters that don't directly impact on their businesses. And that's fine. Putting up the signs didn't do anything to make their customers safer—arguably, it was to the contrary. All it did was—unintentionally, I believe—give gun owners in general and permit holders in particular the impression that they weren't welcome at the Wedge.
That wasn't their intent, and the signs coming down say that very clearly.
As for me, I've got some shopping to do. At the Wedge.
Previously...
I got an email from Elizabeth Archerd (elizabeth@wedge.coop), the Member Services Director at the Wedge coop the other day, in response to my email about how I was going to give the Wedge a bye while their had their NO GUNS signs up.She kindly gave me permission to reprint this on this website.
I think it's worth reprinting, in part because I think it shows how far those of us on the shall-issue side have to go in reaching that admittedly small number of merchants who think that posting is a good idea.
She and I have exchanged some email since, and while I don't have permission to reprint that here—and I'm not going to ask for it; while it's a pleasant conversation, it's not all on point—I don't think it's at all unfair to suggest that the Wedge coop simply doesn't want to be corporately involved in the issue, on either side.
I think that's very reasonable. They're in the business of selling food. They've obviously got some strong convictions about what kind of food they want to sell, but having a corporate involvement on irrelevant issues is neither in their interest, nor terribly interesting to them.
Which is, really, as it should be.
My own opinion is that their NO GUNS signs give people on both sides of the issue the impression that they've taken a position. That's not a winning strategy. Sure, there are more permit holders and particularly gun owners than there are anti-gun activists, and ticking us off and—unintentionally, I believe—telling us to go elsewhere is not in their interest. But it's also not in their interest to tell the antis to go elsewhere, either.
Had the "Campaign to Post" not been such an utter failure, it might have put them in an actually difficult position. Rebecca and her merry crew claim, "no sign is an invitation to guns," and, to a certain extent, I've adopted their view.
But it's not really fair, all in all.
Not having a sign doesn't prohibit merchants from kicking out badly-behaved people, whether or not they're permit holders, after all.
But enough of that; over to Elizabeth.
Comments after.
Mr. Rosenberg,Firstly, it's worth noting that Elizabeth's email is absent the usual sort of hysteria that we've had good reason to associate with the anti-gun folks. I don't know what her position is on 2nd Amendment issues—I could speculate, but I don't know—but please note that she's being polite.I am sorry that our gun policy has made you decide not to shop here anymore. I respect your choice, but I don't understand it. Are you willing to share your feelings about this with me? A very few people have made the same comment and we are not sure why. We understand that the people who will not shop here without such a gun ban policy view it as a political statement (and they are shoppers who are personally against civilian gun ownership). But we do not understand why permit carrying gun owners object to our request that they not bring the guns into our store. We are obviously missing something.
I don't want to intrude upon your time, but if you are willing to share this with me, it would help us understand better. The new law put us, and all business owners, in an untenable position. We don't want to be in the midst of "culture wars" that include arguments over guns, etc. We just want to provide great food to the community in an environment where everyone feels welcome and safe.
Yours truly,
Elizabeth Archerd
Member Services Director
Wedge Community Co-op
What's incredibly frustrating to me is that it's clear from her email that she doesn't understand why permit holders and gun owners would want to give the Wedge a bye. She wants us—we're part of "everyone", after all—to feel both "welcome and safe", yet she's telling us that we're not welcome to carry our personal protection equipment with us in the Wedge coop.
That isn't because she's stupid. She isn't. I know where the blame for her having that impression falls: on us. On me. On you, if you're a permit holder and/or gun owner—we haven't, yet, made it clear to well-meaning, intelligent people like Elizabeth why we find the NO GUNS signs offense, and why we respond to them by taking our business elsewhere.
And we should.
I wrote back with the following:
Please do let me know if you mind if I post your well-written letter on my website. I think you've expressed your position well—and I think your confusion as to why permit holders and other gun owners will now give the Wedge a miss speaks to how much better of a job those of us in the self-defense community have to do in getting the word out. It's not your fault; it's ours. We've got to make our position clearer to folks who have only heard from Rebecca and her friends.... at a nonposted coffee shop.
> I am sorry that our gun policy has made you decide not to shop here
> anymore. I respect your choice, but I don't understand it. Are you
> willing to share your feelings about this with me?I'll be willing to share my *thoughts* about it; I'm not sure that my *feelings* are terribly relevant. I'm not just being pedantic, honest; I came to my strongly-held positions on these matters not out of feelings, but out of examination of what's happened in other states when such laws have passed.
I hope I write with some passion and conviction, but the source of both of those is, I believe and hope, intellect, rather than feeling.
See http://www.ellegon.com/features/data/morebadnews
http://www.ellegon.com/features/data/kindofpitiful
http://www.ellegon.com/features/data/posting
and http://www.ellegon.com/features/data/theskyisntfalling>http://www.ellegon.com/features/data/theskyisntfalling
I know that Rebecca and her friends have been very urgent about the supposed need to post. Still, it's really not a matter of opinion that their "Campaign to Post" has been a failure.
> A very few people
> have made the same comment and we are not sure why.Yup. All in all, those of your customers (it will, eventually, be around 3-5% of the population) with permits will, err, "comment with their feet." Given the paucity of posted supermarkets, and the availability of good natural/organic foods elsewhere, you're unlikely to get a lot objections— just a small number of holes in the air.
> We understand that
> the people who will not shop here without such a gun ban policy view it
> as a political statement (and they are shoppers who are personally
> against civilian gun ownership). But we do not understand why permit
> carrying gun owners object to our request that they not bring the guns
> into our store. We are obviously missing something.An entirely reasonable request—I hope you don't mind if I point you at my essay at http://www.ellegon.com/features/data/nogunsaredangerous/.
I'm not entirely sure that I do object to your coop's gun ban—I think you have the right to post (eminently clear under the law), just as I have the right to take my occasional coop business elsewhere. Up until you posted, I've occasionally shopped at the Wedge—and, as somebody who has had a permit for going on six years now, I've always carried there, without incident.
Beyond that, a few observations:
1. It's a matter of safety. I've got a stalker; I certainly am not going to willingly put myself, or my family, in a position where I, somebody known to be law-abiding, am at his mercy. Going into your store, or any other posted store, would do just that. Not a chance.
2. While multiple-victim public shootings, a la Columbine, are very rare (thankfully), they *invariably* occur at places where civilian possession of handguns is banned. A handgun ban clearly does make a small minority of people *feel* safer; it doesn't make anybody safer.
Since you're going to continue to post, you might want to consider also prominently posting signs that your cash registers are emptied *very* often. Robbers tend to prefer soft targets, and since you've decided to make your coop one of those, you might want to make it clear that there's not much cash to be gained from it. (Still, you're better off than those few liquor stores that have posted—and you'll note how few convenience stores have. They've got enough robbery worries already, without inviting more.)
3. Political statements aren't only restricted to folks who are against civilian gun ownership. I suspect you've seen some of the http://www.noguns-nomoney.com cards—I know I dropped one off at the Wedge. (I didn't enter the store, of course; I left it in the door.)
>
> I don't want to intrude upon your time, but if you are willing to share
> this with me, it would help us understand better. The new law put us,
> and all business owners, in an untenable position.Not really. The vast majority of business owners have simply decided to ignore the issue. Granted, from the perspective of both the antis and folks like me, that puts them squarely in our camp, but I can see why it was sensible.
Given the tiny percentage of posting businesses, it's pretty clear that most businesses know that NO GUNS signs are bad for business.
Just consider, for a moment, somebody who wants to go out for ribs. If they insist on a NO GUNS ribs place, they've got Famous Dave's. Period. If they prefer a permit-holder-friendly establishment, they've got the 19th Hole, Scott Jamama's, Rudolph's, and a dozen others.
In the grocery world, Lund's, Byerly's, Cub, Rainbow, and Kowalski's are busy "studying the matter" in perpetuity. I won't give out students' names, but I know why at least three of the independent supermarkets I shop at aren't posting: their owners have taken their training with me.
> We don't want to be
> in the midst of "culture wars" that include arguments over guns, etc.Yup. But one of the few things that Rebecca Holman and her small group of anti-gun activists and I can agree on is that, when it comes to activists on both sides, there is no neutral position. Most shoppers simply don't care; a few get frightened away by the signs.
But when it comes to gun owners in general (around 30-40% of the adult population, although probably somewhat less than that in the metro—maybe around 20%), and permit holders in particular, you've got a problem.
You're in, roughly, the same position as a Jim Crow-era Mississippi restaurant that didn't post a NO COLOREDS sign would be. Your failing to post would, by both sides, be interpreted as you being unafraid of your permit-holding customers.
Your posting will be taken by many (I would suspect most or all) permit holders as a slap in the face.
And the same is going to be true of many of the majority of gun owners who haven't chosen to take out permits. (Again, I'm speaking from experience— a friend of mine who lives on Garfield, just a couple of blocks away from the Wedge, now shops elsewhere. He doesn't have a permit, yet, but he has owned firearms all his life. He sees you as having aligned yourself with the anti-gun crowd.)
I'm speaking from some experience with the permit-holding community: I conducted the first AACFI-certified carry class after the bill passed, and many since, and a goodly portion of all my classes deals with posting. I advise my students that there is no penalty for ignoring the signs—one isn't guilty of a petty misdemeanor trespass even after going past the signs, until one is asked to leave and refuses to leave—but I also *strongly* advise them to take their business to friendlier merchants.
The Wedge has only been brought up by students a dozen or so times. Most just find that the supermarkets (throughout the state) and the coops (with some exceptions in the metro) simply haven't posted.
> We just want to provide great food to the community in an environment
> where everyone feels welcome and safe.
>
> Yours truly,
>
> Elizabeth Archerd
> Member Services Director
> Wedge Community Co-opI hope this is of some use to you. Realistically, the posting matter is only of interest to activists on both sides—rather a *lot* more on my side (if you don't believe me, ask your legislators about who they got more phone calls and emails from before the MPPA passed)—plus some probably small number of your now former non-activist customers who fight the signs frightening.
That said, while we find ourselves on opposite sides of the political issue— me by intention and conviction, you by not being willing to offend your anti-gun customers—I'd be happy to discuss it. My phone number is below; feel free to give me a call.
Heck, I'd even be happy to meet you for coffee and chat about it....