By Kristen Santer
The students and faculty of Umpqua Community College have a moment of silence for the 10 students killed in a shooting.(Courtesy of Flickr).
Guns are making their way to college campuses. Tennessee became one of the 10 states to allow concealed guns on college campuses. On May 2 Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam allowed the bill to become law without his signature. The bill states full-time faculty, staff and other employees can be armed on public campuses.
“I have long stated a preference for systems and institutions to be able to make their own decisions regarding security issues on campus, and I again expressed this concern through the legislative process this year,” Haslam told Business Insider.
This law comes after the large number of shootings on campuses around the country. Arguments in favor of the bill state having guns in the hands of civilians are the best way to stop mass shooters.
However, supporters of the bill underestimate the complications this might allow. If guns are completely banned from campuses, it is clear to identify potential shooters and suspicious characters. If states allow faculty to carry weapons, shooters can more easily pass through security gates and offices undetected.
The bill tries to stymie the potential for accidental shootings by banning guns at sports games, hospitals and medical or mental health offices. But the reality of everyone following this law, or that this might deter shooters, is very low. Faculty and staff are not trained police officers, and are not given the right training to read a hostile situation and follow the appropriate course of action. They could misread a potentially violent argument or someone breaking into a dorm because they lost their key and use deadly force.
The best example of this scenario occurred in 2011 Tucson shooting that left 18 people dead. Joe Zamudio is credited as a hero in the shooting who ran to the scene armed and helped subdue the shooter. He had his gun in his hand ready to fire and was about to shoot the man who had his hand around the gun. However, that man had just grabbed it from the shooter, and was helping to take him down. In an interview with “Fox and Friends,” Zamudio said he was very close to shooting the man who was not the killer: “I was very lucky. Honestly, it was a matter of seconds. Two, maybe three seconds between when I came through the doorway and when I was laying on top of [the real shooter], holding him down.”
Gun legislation in the United States is moving in the wrong direction. Instead of allowing more access and use of guns, legislators should focus on fixing the current faulty laws that allow the mentally ill and criminals to access machine-style weapons.
The idea of good guys with guns stopping bad guys with guns is a stereotypical ideal exalted by American culture and society. Since the 1960s there has been a multitude of movies praising the lone hero with a gun stopping a bunch of villains in a mass shootout, like in a Western or Lethal Weapon.
Nevertheless, the research shows that this is not the case. According to POLITICO, more shooters attack in places where guns are allowed, such as homes, business and outdoor spaces where weapons are not banned. For example, Umpqua Community College, infamous for the mass shooting that killed 10 people last year, allowed guns on campus. According to NBC, the school did not strongly enforce the limitations it did have.
It is time to recognize encouraging a gun-toting culture does not lead to a safer society, but a more violent and aggressive one. Many Americans are too wrapped up in the “Wild West” ideals of protecting your own land and property to even consider the idea that someone else’s safety is just as important as your rights. Allowing guns on campus only further normalizes our collective obsession with guns, and will lead to scenarios in which students or faculty could get hurt accidentally or intentionally.
Kristen Santer, FCRH ’17, is a communication and media studies major from Stamford, Connecticut.
