Armed Protest

[Belsnickel]

(01-14-2021, 01:19 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Large scale protests are designed to intimidate as well.  That's the entire point of them.

Not with the threat of violence, though. There is a distinction, there.

(01-14-2021, 01:19 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I have to say these two answers are troubling to me, as they both come from intelligent posters whose opinions I respect.  For me it comes down to the law.  If open carry is legal where they are protesting then open carrying while protesting is perfectly acceptable.  It doesn't matter if it intimidates other people, that's not a bar the action has to hurdle.  "Intimidation" is obviously subjective, what intimidates one person does not intimidate another.  That being the case, whose standard of what constitutes intimidation do we use?  The answer is very simple, the law's interpretation.  Ergo, if the protest is conducted within the law the fact that a particular individual, or individuals, are intimidated by this lawful action is irrelevant. 

I'm not saying I disagree with you on this, because I am really trying to hash out my thought process on this issue. I haven't fully committed to one side or the other. I think that, constitutionally speaking, the exceptions for 1A protections are specific and narrow for very good reasons. Fighting words and incitement, for this reason, have to be explicit in their expression in most case law. So jumping off from the idea of "if it's legal to open carry then it should be legal," at what point would rhetoric from the armed protestor make the speech unprotected by the 1A? This isn't necessarily asking you for the case law on it, but more about where your opinion lies. I think we would both agree that at some point, even it legally carrying, the rhetoric from the protestor could move the act into an unprotected realm. It is just a matter of where that line is.