Quote Originally Posted by euphoricism
CCW laws are not the answer. If our goal is to deter crime, rather than just kill people who commit crime, then open carry (as in, you can see that fucking glock on my hip and I ain't hiding it) should be an option.

In Florida open carry is specifically illegal and we're one of the most pro-gun states around. I think that's absurd. The idea behind CCW was that the criminals would never know who was carrying and who wasn't -- but criminals DO know that the odds of anyone in a given area carrying are still very very low. I can't think of any good reason not to allow both.
I agree. I think concealed carry is a better option though, but that's just my personal opinion.

Also, re: Florida-- http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcdgcon.html

In 1987, when Florida enacted such legislation, critics warned that the "Sunshine State" would become the "Gunshine State." Contrary to their predictions, homicide rates dropped faster than the national average. Further, through 1997, only one permit holder out of the over 350,000 permits issued, was convicted of homicide. (Source: Kleck, Gary Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control, p 370. Walter de Gruyter, Inc., New York, 1997.) If the rest of the country behaved as Florida's permit holders did, the U.S. would have the lowest homicide rate in the world.

David Kopel, Research Director at the Independence Institute comments on Florida's concealed carry experience:

"What we can say with some confidence is that allowing more people to carry guns does not cause an increase in crime. In Florida, where 315,000 permits have been issued, there are only five known instances of violent gun crime by a person with a permit. This makes a permit-holding Floridian the cream of the crop of law-abiding citizens, 840 times less likely to commit a violent firearm crime than a randomly selected Floridian without a permit." ("More Permits Mean Less Crime..." Los Angeles Times, Feb. 19, 1996, Monday, p. B-5)
there's a lot of good stuff in there...

John Lott and David Mustard, in connection with the University of Chicago Law School, examining crime statistics from 1977 to 1992 for all U.S. counties, concluded that the thirty-one states allowing their residents to carry concealed, had significant reductions in violent crime.