Crisis may soon come to campuses
by Michael S. Sanders
November 11- As unsafe as some people may feel, a new piece of legislation may offer them protection: or make things even worse. The Michigan legislature is considering a case that would allow concealed weapons to be brought on campuses state wide. However, the bill would still prohibit possession of guns in the classroom and dorms.
Concealed weapons are already permitted on campus at Michigan State University according to U.S. News.com. The case raises concerns, if incidences such as Virginia Tech are what happen while weapons are forbidden on campus, what will happen, once they are allowed?
“I disagree with it”, says Eastern student and teaching major, Jeffery Bowermen, “Ypsi is not the safest place or any place for that matter, but there have been school shootings, and there are people who will make mistakes.”
Fellow sophomore student Ted Wells agrees about keep guns off of school campuses, “While I’m all for gun rights off campus, I don’t support allowing people to carry guns within a campus. There’s too much of a concentration of immaturity on campuses, and the risk associated with allowing people to have those sorts of weapons on campus outweigh the possible benefit of someone being able to defend themselves or quickly end a school shooting.”
As Wells points out, there is a very possible risk of confusion with such a law. “There’s also the possibility that people or police would end up getting confused about who is a shooter and who is someone just defending themselves.”
Of course the shooter themselves is only one aspect one variable that must be taken into account during a shooting. Procedures about alerting the campus population and police response time must all be considered when an incident occurs.
“The schools contingency planning of how to handle disasters, especially how they notify and advise people during emergencies like a shooting is much more important. If the faculty within a school is not qualified to make these plans, there are plenty of qualified businesses they can hire to audit things like this”, says Wells.
“The schools contingency planning of how to handle disasters, especially how they notify and advise people during emergencies like a shooting is much more important. If the faculty within a school is not qualified to make these plans, there are plenty of qualified businesses they can hire to audit things like this”, says Wells.
Other students disagree however. Mark McMullen sees the bill as a measurement of protection.
“I think it’s a good idea because then that means people will be able to protect themselves," he said. "I think it will loosen the amount of crimes but probably raise the people who get shot though. It would lower the amount on crime because all the people have guns which means the ones who want to do the crimes will be afraid of them or something like that.”
“I think it’s a good idea because then that means people will be able to protect themselves," he said. "I think it will loosen the amount of crimes but probably raise the people who get shot though. It would lower the amount on crime because all the people have guns which means the ones who want to do the crimes will be afraid of them or something like that.”
