When it comes to the Second Amendment, views and beliefs are strongly held and can even be polarizing at times. A couple years back when Texas first passed the legislation for campus carry, I wrote a post about the negative, unfounded overreaction by some Texas college professors.
Fast forward to this week when the policy was implemented, and apparently there are still Texas college professors upset over the legislation. A news article described a professor who showed up to class in a helmet and body armor. He claimed not to feel safe knowing there were so many more guns being carried around campus. He used the same logic as those professors who protested previously, that a student who was upset could use force immediately against him or any other professor. This is insane, uninformed, ill-conceived logic.
A study last year, as reported, found that concealed permit holders are some of the most law abiding citizens in the nation. In fact, they rank above police officers. Generally speaking, violent felonies attributed to allegedly being committed by concealed permit holders were less then 1% of all violent crimes committed, while violent felonies committed by police officers were just over 1%.
Most states allowing for concealed carry of a firearm require a permit to carry, including Texas. In order to obtain such a permit, a person must be eligible by meeting certain requirements. Because of these requirement, people who obtain the permit are already law abiding citizens. Someone who has always obeyed the law their entire life is not all of a sudden going to become a violent felon just because they now carry a weapon. Rather, they comprehend the responsibility that comes with carrying a firearm and take it seriously. A concealed permit holder values their right to be able to carry and guards against losing that right. They are not the type of individual who will get mad and use their weapon at a professor. Honestly, the type of person who would do this would most likely be ineligible for a concealed carry permit in the first place, and if they did use a firearm against a professor, it would have been illegally concealed and brought onto campus regardless of whatever law is in place.
Bad guys are smart. They want to succeed in their unlawful quest. They will take the path of least resistance or abstain if the risks are too great. Laws don't stop bad guys, that is why they become criminals because they did not obey the laws and thus are held accountable. Gun laws placing restrictions on where weapons can be carried only detrimentally affect the law abiding citizen. The law abiding citizen will follow the law and refrain from carrying and thus being able to protect themselves or others from harm.
Bad guys go where they will not be stopped. A gun free zone is exactly the kind of place bad guys seek out. They know there is no one to stop them, or at least quickly. However, an area that encourages or even just allows law abiding citizens to carry will not be a favorite spot of bad guys. Why? Because the law makes provision for self-defense of oneself or others, meaning — the good guy can stop the bad guy!
The Texas college professor should be ecstatic about the new policy because in fact, he is far safer. Even IF a student should get mad and draw a weapon (which I hold would be illegally concealed), there would be other students, or even the professor himself, who could stop the mad student. Under the old law, that same mad student would still have brought in a weapon, but there would be no one to stop him from using it. Simply have the policy in place is a deterrent to bad guys because the bad guy will never know who, if anyone, is actually carry (it's called concealed for a reason). At any moment, any single person on campus could have the capability to stop a bad guy before the bad guy succeeds at his ill-conceived plan.
Arguably, crime rates will go down, not rise, on the Texas college campuses where guns now legally can be carried concealed. The professors, students, and others, regardless of how they feel, are in fact safer today then before the policy went into effect.
