Staff Editorial: Right to a gun-free education

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Illustration by Elizabeth Spooner.

If passed, House Bill 2353 would allow conceal-to-carry inside any public institution. The authoriza­tion permitting registered handgun owners to be armed on college grounds. Our question is, why would anybody ever need to have a firearm inside a math class?

Having a gun inside the closed doors of your home is one thing, but carrying it around Johnson County is pushing safety to a whole new level. What kind of city do we live in if people feel the need to be armed while going to talk to Finan­cial Aid? There is no logical reason for concealed guns to be carried on campus. The fear students will gain from this mandate heavily outweigh the profit of the paranoid few toting around a loaded firearm.

Many supporters of this bill use the argument of safety. But here’s the deal; allowing any and every registered gun owner to decorate their belts with a concealed firearm only creates for a more hostile and violent atmosphere. Tolerating guns is tolerating guns. We fail to see the safety and comfort it will somehow bring our students and faculty. Isn’t it common sense that people would prefer to learn in a gun-free zone? It is only going to encourage the insta­bility of the select few who believe their safety rides on packing a gun inside a community college.

A lot of people also like to throw around “right to bear arms” in hopes that it is argument enough to carry a gun wherever they please. At what cost is your “right?” The selfish desire to house a handgun is somehow trumping the thousands of other people who now feel too unsafe to come to school. We can­not think of one solid and intel­ligent reason why it is anybody’s “right” to have a loaded handgun inside the classroom.

If the ignorance of a few allows for this bill to be passed, what measures is the college going to be forced to take in order for guns to be on campus? Security checkpoints might have to be installed. Extra police officers might have to be hired. What’s to say a gun doesn’t get stolen or somehow makes it into unstable hands (or is already in unstable hands). Allowing for guns on campus is just a set-up for dangerous, drastic, and unnecessary measures.

Bill 2353 isn’t positively aiding to a single person. People have been safely going to class without their firearms for decades, why allocate a dangerous change? The reasoning be­hind this mandate is twisted and likely to founder.

Allowing conceal-to-carry is only allowing violence inside our school walls.

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