By Brandi Bunch, Managing editor
As the headline told you, the Oklahoma legislature is presently considering the idea of allowing those with concealed carry licenses to carry weapons on college campuses. There are presently several universities in the U.S. on which licensed individuals are allowed to carry.
The question of concealed weapons on campus is a very difficult one for me. I am intensely devoted to the right to bear arms, but I hate the idea of guns on a college campus.
The notion of carrying a gun around at all times seems extreme, to say nothing of paranoid. The concept of feeling it is necessary to have a gun on you while on a college campus, a place of learning and the exchanging of ideas, invokes mental images of tinfoil hats.
I do not want to think of a scenario in which a gun would be on campus for any reason.
Then again, I would never have wanted to think about the shootings at Columbine or Virginia Tech.
It is true that guns assisted in those violent acts, but it is also true that guns were not allowed on those campuses and appeared there anyway, just as it is true that those guns were wielded by disturbed individuals who went to those places with the intention of killing.
The punishment side of the justice system can be strong (you will note that I said “can be,” but that’s a different article), but the prevention side of the law only works on those who intend to follow the law anyway.
If an individual intends to take life, a “no weapons here” sign is not going to stop him. A series of signatures on a federal document is not going to stop him. Gun control laws will not stop him.
For that matter, lack of access to a gun may not even stop him; imagine the damage that could be done with a vehicle.
Like I said, I don’t want to think about it, but this is the world we live in, so I have to. The truth of it is that if someone is going to go onto a college campus with the intent to kill, my first thought is that I would rather there be someone there who can shoot back (assuming said someone had enough intelligence to operate the weapon without further endangering others).
I’m guessing this is part of the reason this legislature is being considered, and I acknowledge its validity, even though the assumption that everyone will be able to think clearly enough to do so in such a situation is an extensive one.
The safety issue with walking across campus at night is also an understandable argument, as is self-defense for those living in the campus-adjacent apartments, especially in light of the robbery that took place recently and the Bryan County Jail’s less than exemplary track record.
Students are not currently allowed to possess weapons of any kind on campus, unless they are there for university sanctioned activities. This even includes such things as pepper spray.
However, being thoroughly attached to my right to self-defense is not enough to make me feel comfortable with this idea. There are just too many safety issues.
What will they do for the dorms? Not every student living in a residence hall will have a concealed carry license or familiarity with a gun (yes, we live in Oklahoma, but I’m sure there are two or three people here who don’t know their way around a firearm).
What happens when someone’s clueless roommate stumbles onto the weapon? Will there be raids to make sure every gun has a lock on it? Will those students living on campus property be denied the opportunity to utilize this new legislation in order to prevent unlicensed persons from accessing weapons?
Honestly, I don’t have an issue with licensed individuals carrying concealed weapons, even though I believe bringing them onto a college campus is over the top. The problem is that the nature of a college campus just provides too many opportunities for firearms to be misplaced or mishandled.
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By Joel Dameron, Staff writer
Here lately, I have been hearing all this buzz around campus about Oklahoma’s decision to consider allowing concealed carry on college campuses. I honestly could not believe that a thought like this would even exist.
To allow anyone with concealed carry license to bring a gun on a college campus is crazy. It would be irresponsible for our state to allow this to happen. Weapons are at best left in the hands of professionals like the city police. Let them protect us, it is their job after all.
Why would this be considered? Some say that it would make them feel safer. Some say that it is good because it “creates the opportunity for a person to defend themselves in a life or death situation.” Some feel that because it is their constitutional right they are going to indulge in it, which means “I’m gonna do it because I can.”
To the first I say if you are walking around worried all the time that someone, somewhere at some point is going to try to shoot and kill you, then you have bigger issues than gun control. Paranoia is very powerful. It can take over your ability to think.
To the second I say, it also creates the opportunity for more violence and death to occur when there otherwise could have been nothing. If a criminal tries to rob you at gunpoint in a car garage and you pull your gun out and try and shoot him, he will probably shoot and kill you (+1 deaths.) Had you cooperated with him he most likely would have went away (0 deaths). Which solution saved more lives?
The third answer is completely immature and I am not going to dignify it.
My issue is not with the guns themselves but with the people holding them. After all guns don’t kill people, people kill people. Somehow I do not think the Conceal and Carry class is enough to make the person taking it qualified to use a gun in an intense situation. Not everyone possesses the intestinal fortitude it would take to spring into action if such a situation was to present itself.
We have strong, agile young men that march into battle every day and forget all their training when the situation takes a turn for the worse. Those men are not cowards. I think most people would do the same in that situation. If our courageous Marines cannot do it, what makes you think that you can?
Another good point to add is that college students are stressed out, over worked, tired and frustrated. I know many that freak out if they get a bad grade and I am sure you can name a few as well. I do not think throwing guns in the mix would make things any less stressful.
I am not foolish enough to believe that if you took all the guns away it would magically solve the problem. It will not. Criminals are criminals and they will always find a way to get a gun. It is easier to buy a gun illegally anyway. In the same way I do not believe that not allowing guns on campus would prevent a student from harming others, I am saying I do not believe it would make a campus any safer to allow C&C. I believe it would make a lot more students uncomfortable than comfortable.
I do not hate guns either. I also do not have a problem with conceal and carry. If you want to tote your gun around town like it is the old west, go for it. But a school is a place for learning, not for guns. Students should be able to feel safe on campus without having to walk on egg shells around everyone because they are afraid of provoking them.
If for no other reason than out of respect for those killed in Tucson, let’s not allow concealed carry on campus.