College Carry Debate response

[Guest jparn]

So, the following was a response I posted in a facebook debate (I know, I know) with a friend of mine over this article on the Texas bill to allow for permit carry on college campuses. I spent some time arguing this, so I wanted to get everyone's opinion on it.

Texas poised to pass bill allowing guns on campus - Yahoo! News

This is actually my first thread (I read much more than type, as I don't think I have much in the way of experience to pass on yet anyway) so bear with me if I don't get it all right on the first try. Oh, and the question that was posed to me was along the lines of "how does owning a gun make a person responsible?"

"You're all correct, merely owning a gun or even possessing a carry permit does not make people rational or even sane. I never put forth that thought because I see it as being ridiculous. But, what owning a permit does show (at least in TN) is that the person understands the fact that at some point he may have the need to defend his life or the life of someone close to him at some point and he has gone through several obstacles and spent some money in order to legally be able to carry a weapon in case he needs it. And, as any person owning a gun may bring that weapon onto a college campus whenever he chooses, why would a person who wasn't going to break the law bother getting a permit in the first place? It's not as if there are TSA pat down's and bag scanners before you walk on campus. If that were the case, then absolutely guns shouldn't be allowed. But that is not how it is. Do you see what I'm getting at? There is literally no point in obtaining a carry permit if the person is planning on keeping the gun hidden from view anyway until they use it in what could be shooting number 108 on the list you mentioned. A carry permit does not absolve a person from any criminal action they might take while possessing it.

As for it being too late anyway when you need a weapon, I could disagree more. The ideas become pretty situational at this point, but don't you see how their would be many times when you would be able to draw and defend yourself? Since we are on the school topic, how about this for a situation:

"I dove under a desk, and kind of prepared to die, I guess. He just started picking people off with the gun. I heard it more than I saw it. I just expected after every bullet, I just prepared myself for the hit. But it never came for me. Then he left the room, and the room was pretty silent — except for some sounds, some cries and some pretty gruesome sounds. I told everybody to stay quiet and play dead. I remember saying that — especially to this girl that was next to me. She kept crying for her friend, and I told her to stay quiet and play dead. And then the gunman came back. He started shooting again, and I'm assuming he just unloaded another round into everybody, even people who had already been shot. He must have unloaded three rounds because he stopped to reload, and then he'd do it again."

This comes from Clay Violand, one of the students in the classroom when Seung-hui Cho decided to start his killing. Here's the link:Student Describes Surviving Classroom Killing : NPR

Notice two points in this article:

1) Clay describes the scene as the gunman "He just started picking people off with the gun." See how helpless everyone in the room was against Cho?

2)He must have unloaded three rounds because he stopped to reload, and then he'd do it again." Cho had so much time that he was able to stop and reload his weapon several times. Don't you think that a person with a handgun would have been able to engage him while he was reloading? I don't think any of those students who waited for 'their bullet' would have agreed it was too late for action. In that room, Cho killed 22 people.

Finally, to answer Katherine's point, I understand that the knowing that a person in the room with you (obviously not police) who could be carrying a gun could be nerve wracking. It would be that way for anyone. But that "safe learning environment feeling" you speak of is just that, a feeling. It is not substantial. Anyone can walk onto campus whenever the choose with whatever the choose. Do you ever look around in class and think that maybe someone in there may already be carrying a gun on them, just not legally. I do. I ponder what I would do if if a person decided that was the day they wanted to die and they were going to take as many people with them as possible. I'd probably do what the people at Virginia Tech and Columbine did, which is throw a book at the shooter and wait under a desk for my turn to die, as I would have disarmed before I came to school in order to follow the law. Sadly, this is the situation we are faced with everyday we go to class. The VT shooting took 9 minutes. Cho fired 170 rounds. Police response took 3 minutes to the building (far better than anywhere other than a college campus or across the street from a police station would have been) and 5 minutes to break the chain to get into the building. Obviously "thinking" you are safe and actually "being" safe are not one in the same."

[LagerHead]

Good response. It seems you thought it through quite well. I would also add that other than the shootings in Tuscon last month mass shootings have traditionally ended in one of two ways: the shooter committing suicide or by someone with a gun. Never has a shooter been stopped by a helpless victim cowering underneath a desk or table. Also, the Tuscon shooting was the first mass shooting in the nation that happened outside of a gun-free zone.

[Guest 270win]

All schools, not just college campuses, should be legal in Tennessee for those with handgun carry permits. If it works in other states, such as California, Oregon, Utah, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Alabama off the top of my head, why can't it work here? A guy with a handgun carry permit has paid money to 'get legal' as we call it back home. Why should someone suddenly be illegal and worry about felony and misdemeanor criminal charges because he is on or in school property, but has a handgun carry permit? Kind of silly to mess up the good guys. Leave the good guys alone who have paid money, obviously legit, and spend time on the crooks.

[Guest Octo]

If it works in other states...why can't it work here? A guy with a handgun carry permit has paid money to 'get legal' as we call it back home. Why should someone suddenly be illegal and worry about felony and misdemeanor criminal charges because he is on or in school property, but has a handgun carry permit? Kind of silly to mess up the good guys. Leave the good guys alone who have paid money, obviously legit, and spend time on the crooks.

Agreed. Though not everyone sees it that way, and there is obviously much more to it than that. Frustrating.