By Dean Weingarten

Arizona – -(Ammoland.com)- In a brilliant bit of second amendment promotion, members of Wisconsin Carry went door to door in a bad part of Milwaukee, offering free training required to obtain the Wisconsin concealed carry license.

The south side of town does not have a good reputation, and it has a high crime rate. Milwaukee has 10 percent of Wisconsin residents and 60 percent of Wisconsin murders.

Wisconsin Carry has been giving free classes so that people can obtain the Wisconsin permit since 2009. The Wisconsin shall issue law went into effect in November of 2011. Wisconsin exceeded 200,000 permit holders in September of 2013. From jsonline.com:

Sonia, a mother of two on Milwaukee's south side, doesn't want guns in her house. But with a pair of convicted sex offenders nearby who have just been granted allowance to leave their home unsupervised, Sonia has begun to think about some form of protection, perhaps pepper spray or a Taser. When gun rights activists fanned out in her neighborhood Saturday afternoon, handing out fliers promoting free classes for training on carrying firearms, Sonia was one of the first to sign up — since Wisconsin residents need similar training to legally carry a Taser.

Scholar John Lott has found that the demographic group who benefit the most from concealed carry permits are urban minority women. As an instructor, I have found that women are very receptive to self protection when they obtain serious information on the subject, instead of emotional appeals.

It is legal to openly carry in Wisconsin, though that right had to be fought for and defended in court before the Wisconsin legislature corrected police abuses by with a specific declaration that open carry was not “disorderly conduct”. Utah recent followed Wisconsin's lead.

While the comments at the jsonline article show numerous anti-second amendment individuals fearful of allowing people to exercise their second amendment rights, Sonia, who does not want a gun in her house, did not have any problem with approaching the pair of open carriers who were handing out fliers:

“Are you from Wisconsin Carry?” Sonia asked, running out of her house on a chilly afternoon. She had heard the group would be in her neighborhood and wanted a copy of the group's flier, which advertises the next free training session for carrying a weapon. Sonia went back inside her house and immediately registered for the free class, to be held April 19.

Another program designed to address the defensive needs of inner city dwellers, The Armed Citizen Project, is planning to distribute free shotguns and training in nearby Indiana.

The number of women gun owners is growing rapidly. I suspect that as Sonia becomes educated, she will join that cohort.

c2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included. Link to Gun Watch

About Dean Weingarten;

Dean Weingarten has been a peace officer, a military officer, was on the University of Wisconsin Pistol Team for four years, and was first certified to teach firearms safety in 1973. He taught the Arizona concealed carry course for fifteen years until the goal of constitutional carry was attained. He has degrees in meteorology and mining engineering, and recently retired from the Department of Defense after a 30 year career in Army Research, Development, Testing, and Evaluation.