Drop Out?

Here is an interesting off-shoot (pun intended) of the Virginia Tech tragedy. (HT Best of the Web Today)

College students across the country have been strapping empty holsters around their waists this week to protest laws that prohibit concealed weapons on campus, citing concerns over campus shootings.
"People who would otherwise be able to defend themselves are left defenseless when on campus," said Ethan Bratt, a graduate student wearing an empty holster this week on the campus of Seattle Pacific University.
Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, a group of college students, parents and citizens who organized after the deadly shootings at Virginia Tech University in April, launched the protest.

These students are taking on a mindset that simply refuses to compromise.

"You don't like the fact that you can't have a gun on your college campus? Drop out of school," said Peter Hamm, a spokesman for the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence.

Oh so if Mr. Hamm doesn't mind violating Aled Baker's Consitutional rights?

Aled Baker, a junior, said he loses his constitutional right to protect himself and others when he steps on campus.
"It's null and void when you go on campus," the mechanical engineering student said.

I wonder if Mr. Hamm would have such a cavelier attitude about it if his free speech rights were what was being curtailed?

The Daily Collegian (a Penn State University student publication) had a very well balanced story on the protest.

Nathaniel Sheetz doesn't care if you notice the empty gun holster strapped to his right hip this week.
That's the point, he said.
"People who carry concealed weapons go about their daily lives just like anyone else would," Sheetz (graduate-industrial engineering) said. "We are trying to show people that just because we might be carrying weapons, that wouldn't impact how we go about our business."

I can't help but think that Hamline University student Troy Scheffler needs to hook up with these folks. If anyone needs their help it would be him as Mitch, Ed and King have shown.

It is nice to see these kids standing up for their rights. Heaven knows there are times when a trained, licensed conceal carry wholder ould have kept a bad situation from getting worse.

On the morning of Aug. 1, 1966, few people had ever considered the possibility that they might die in an indiscriminate shooting spree. But shortly before noon on that fateful day, a 25-year-old former Marine climbed to the top of the University of Texas bell tower and created a worldwide reference point for such fears.
As police rushed to the scene, officers already on the UT campus struggled to formulate a plan. At that time, the Austin Police Department had no SWAT team. Officers were armed only with service revolvers and shotguns, both useless against a sniper firing from a fortified position high above the ground.
Seeing that something had to be done, students quickly retrieved hunting rifles from dorm rooms and fraternity houses, took up defensive positions throughout the campus and returned fire. In the August 2006 edition of Texas Monthly magazine, Bill Helmer, a graduate student at UT during the shooting, recalled the experience to journalist Pamela Colloff: He said he remembered thinking, "All we need is a bunch of idiots running around with rifles." But what they did turned out to be brilliant. Once the shooter could no longer lean over the edge and fire, he was much more limited in what he could do. That's why he did most of his damage in the first 20 minutes.

It is certainly something to think about.