From the article:
"Texas is preparing to give college students and professors the right to carry guns on campus, adding momentum to a national campaign to open this part of society to firearms.
"More than half the members of the Texas House have signed on as co-authors of a measure directing universities to allow concealed handguns. The Senate passed a similar bill in 2009 and is expected to do so again. Republican Gov. Rick Perry, who sometimes packs a pistol when he jogs, has said he's in favor of the idea."
And the guy in the picture firing the pistol in public, surrounded by tall buildings, is the Governor of the state (the same guys who favors secession from the US).
One hopes those are blanks.
Or that he is aiming at someone who currently does not have a gun. Like a college student or professor.
Just imagine an argument on campus or in class. Now add some guns. I think you see the problem.
We have a Second Amendment right to carry and bare arms. Yet, the government is allowed to pass reasonable gun controls to keep us safe. The only question is what is reasonable.
In our history, you've not been able to carry guns on campus. Texans think that is unreasonable.
Imagine what will happen if this bill becomes law and Oklahoma beats Texas in football, at the campus of Texas. How long until a student pulls a gun for the sake of this rivalry?
This is not a very wise choice to allow students and professors to carry concealed weapons on university grounds. What if a fight breaks out between two students? If those two students now had hand guns, you would have two guys with gun shot wounds or worse dead, instead of two guys with bloody noses. I don't see the reason to carry concealed weapons on campus for the sake of safety. Campus is one of the safest places a student can be. The campus crime alerts actually blow these reported crimes out of proportion.
ReplyDeleteI don't see how a campus setting is any different from the rest of the public. People get in fights all of the time, and gun violence rates do not reflect, say, assault and battery. People that shoot other people are usually not allowed to own or possess a gun anyway (felons, drunks, etc). Law abiding citizens that own guns legally, and follow the law in the use of them, are rarely criminal. Gun control laws do not work and they only create situations where criminals can prey upon unarmed citizens. I would bet that the Virginia Tech shooting would have been over much faster if laws like this were not in place. And even if it would not have helped, these laws do not stop someone from doing anything. If someone is going to muder someone else, some law saying they cant have a gun in a particular place is certainly not going to stop them.
ReplyDeleteAs we have discussed in class, campus crime should be the least of our worries. Although it is our constitutional right to bear arms, there are a lot of "freedoms" we must curtail when we sign a theoretical social contract with Appalachian State. By accepting our invitation to admission or selecting a class, we must abide by the rules of individual professors and the university. The United States Supreme Court has ruled that students have a "reduced expectation of privacy" in schools; this is why our lockers were able to be searched without warrants in high school and why we are asked to turn our cell phones to vibrate or silent by our professors. It is not because we do not have the "right," but because it is essential that we relieve ourselves of some small liberties in order for more efficient functionality in general. They would not only arguably create more problems and generate more violence, but would be a distraction in classrooms, just like cell phones. No one likes to hear their neighbor's phone go off every five seconds in class and I am not sure I would want to see a gun sticking out of someone's backpack at 8 am while trying to pay attention. Just like faulty media reporting and plastering crime all over the news, seeing guns everywhere would lead people to think that we have a problem with campus violence.
ReplyDeleteStatistically, there is a miniscule chance our school will be targeted by predator violence, and an even smaller chance that we will individually bear the brunt of an attack. The best analogy I can think of is when we were elementary school students and only ONE person got to be the person to call 911 when there was a classroom emergency. If a gunman were to enter our unlocked (door that opens the wrong way) Belk classroom, I would be more comfortable taking my chances than to have fifty of my classmates and I whip out glocks. As NHS said, if someone has the intent to bring a gun to campus with the intent to kill, they will likely be successful.Therefore, the national government is reasonable in curtailing our right to bear arms on campus in that there is no necessity for us to do so. Guns have a place in our society - however, that place is not on campuses.
Lets recall that school crime is not as high as the media shows, and as stated in the book is not on the high and only a small percent of killing occurs at school. Personally, I believe that allowing guns at college campuses will not help prevent any other tragedy at college campuses in fact it might aggravate any situation specially when students get into conflict with other students...
ReplyDeleteAnother thing that I want to mentioned is the misconception that we have about criminals, they are like anybody else, like any other college student and this does not mean that college students will not engage in any criminal act, or shoot their own school.
I was reading an article on fox-news.com, and some people are in favor and some are against it,some of the concerns about the people against it is the fact that students and parents probably will feel less secure. This does not guarantee safety for students, but either way if someone wants to shoot a college campus they can do it even if guns are not allowed on campuses, now imagine the fact that it will legal to carry guns on campus that will give them a free pass...
If I have the option to change school, I definitely will not go to Texas that will really make me feel more insecure and accidents can happen....is bad enough to think about school shooting although is rare.