Originally Posted By Kommissar89:


My "functional" camo here in the suburbs is jeans and a polo shirt with a jacket in the winter. Hides the CZ75 Compact tucked into the holster in my waistband. You'll never notice me.

I figure any kind of tactical gear is going to stand out like a sore thumb in the suburbs. Realistically I feel in the urban/suburban environment the tactical gear is for functionality not stealth.

The "black block" worn by antifa types is well suited for their purposes. They want to be able to stand around claiming to be peaceful protestors and be able to make a sudden attack and then blend back in to the crowd without being identified or even easily picked from the crowd.

Now I do have tactical gear. Most of it is multicam. Some of the older stuff is digital camo pattern. But I'm not a young activist looking to be part of mob. I'm an old guy who just wants to be left alone to live in peace and freedom. I hung my woodland camo BDUs up years ago. If you've forced me to put a uniform on again, regardless of camo pattern, you've already F'd up bad. I won't be trying to blend in.

I have serious questions about the appropriate tactics to use given everything that I've seen over the past 6 months or so. One thing that seems clear to me is that getting kitted up in full tactical gear and showing up at a protest is pointless. Counter productive even. Even the guys saying they are protecting businesses are questionable in my opinion. The problem is the rules of engagement. For the moment at least, we still live in a civil society, at least theoretically. Legally you can't set up a perimeter and engage anyone who breaches it. Even in the case of defending a business, unless someone's life is in immediate danger, you will have a hard time justifying a use of deadly force. From a tactical perspective, it's Catch-22. You aren't law enforcement. In most cities you will be greatly outnumbered both because commies/socialists tend to congregate in cities while patriots are spread across the country in rural areas and because commies/socialists skew young and are more inclined to show up at protests while patriots tend to be older and have jobs, families, and personal responsibilities that preclude them from doing that. If you have reached the point where you are in danger of death or serious bodily harm, it's already too late. You're in a fight for your life. But legally you can't engage before that. So what exactly are you going to accomplish standing around in tactical gear? I believe what Kyle Rittenhouse did was legal. I don't think it was smart. I have no desire to be the next Kyle. I won't be wearing mine unless and until we've reached the point of a complete breakdown of civil society on a large scale. At that point I won't be worried about what the police or the District Attorney thinks as they'll no longer exist and I'll be able to engage as appropriate for a given tactical situation.