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from the protect-yourself-'cuz-no-one-else-will dept.
Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956
Concealed handgun license holders in Texas can carry their weapons into public university buildings, classrooms and dorms starting Monday, a day that also marks 50 years after the mass shooting at the University of Texas' landmark clock tower.
The campus-carry law pushed by Gov. Greg Abbott and the Republican legislative majority makes Texas one of a handful of states guaranteeing the right to carry concealed handguns on campus.
Texas has allowed concealed handguns in public for 20 years. Gun rights advocates consider it an important protection, given the constitutional right to bear arms, as well as a key self-defense measure in cases of campus violence, such as the 1966 UT shootings and the 2007 shootings at Virginia Tech.
Opponents of the law fear it will chill free speech on campus and lead to more campus suicide. The former dean of the University of Texas School of Architecture left for a position at the University of Pennsylvania because of his opposition to allowing guns on campus.
Officials told the Austin American-Statesman it was a coincidence that the law took effect 50 years to the day after the UT shooting. Marine-trained sniper Charles Whitman climbed to the observation deck of the 27-story clock tower in the heart of UT's flagship Austin campus, armed with rifles, pistols and a sawed-off shotgun on Aug. 1, 1966, killing 13 people and wounding more than 30 others before officers gunned him down.
(Score: 3, Touché) by vux984 on Monday August 08 2016, @08:13AM
It's insanely neurotic (and authoritarian) to believe that a person has to have a uniform and a badge and some mind-numbingly inadequate academy training in order to make a positive difference in a dangerous situation. Law enforcement are frequently even more idiotic and dangerous than the fellow citizens you are so fearful of.
Juxtapose that with:
but are actually likely to fall into several other categories of people who are quite well-trained [...] They might be:
[...]
- Former law enforcement
- Current, off-duty law enforcement
So... law enforcement is barely trained and even more idiotic and dangerous than the fellow citizens; so we should allow the ordinary citizens to carry guns because ... wait for it... hidden amongst those idiots will be quite well trained active/former/off duty law enforcement -- which are even more idiotic and dangerous than the fellow citizens.. GOTO START
Those two arguments pretty much cancel each other out. ;)
There is logic in many aspects of gun control arguments, like requiring background checks and waiting periods, and requiring the passing of written and practical skill tests. But this portion of the gun control argument, that a few more armed citizens will cause nothing but imminent and ongoing disaster, is very weak.
Without the former, the latter WILL cause nothing but ongoing disasters. You want to arm more people in public, I'm in principle fine with that if its the right people. But you need the background checks and waiting periods and to take away the privilege when people abuse it; and you need to require them to demonstrate some training. Otherwise you are just arming the idiots. And it doesn't matter if half the people walking around with guns are responsible citizens, if the other half are idiots they'll do enough damage by themselves.
I'm not actually anti-gun -- but I don't think "wanting a gun" and "has $50" is sufficient criteria to carry a loaded gun around in public.
Further, you are changing the venue for your argument to 'campuses'. The scenario I wrote my post about was 'night club'. Those are very different scenarios, don't you think? Do you think your argument applies equally well to night clubs? I don't.
The other part of your argument I want to look at:
What finally stopped the Orlando shooter's rampage? Police officers, with firearms.
Police officers with firearms, acting pretty cohesively, all sober, and in communication with eachother.
Not 20 randos at various stages of intoxication from all walks of life who just happened to be in the building.
Did the armed security guard inside the club have at least a chance to stop the shooter? Yes, he failed, but he at least had a positive statistical chance to stop the shooter before he killed 50 people and injured 50 others.
No disagreement with this part. It would have been better if there had been a couple more guards but there wasn't.
But again, that bunch of randos isn't really adding anything to the picture either except a lot more guns in the chaos.
Did the armed security guard end up killing a bunch of innocent bystanders while attempting to stop the shooter? No.
He had some training, had some procedures, and so forth.
Is it logical to worry so much about a bystander or two being injured when you're dealing with someone attempting to kill as many dozens of people as he can get away with? No, that doesn't seem logical to me.
Yes, that's precisely the logic I'd expect a semi-intoxicated rando to take when he sees some other semi intoxicated rando with a gun turn his way...
By the way, it's actually not that difficult to identify which one is the real bad guy in these situations. He's the only one carrying a RIFLE and wearing an outfit that's quite out of place, typically.
The attack is adapted to the parameters of the situation. This goes back to the previous poster who argued that the guy has the advantage to plan and adapt; why can't he be dressed to blend in? why does he have to have a rifle and try to mow people down? As soon as you change the parameters, you have to assume the attacker will make suitable adaptations.
I am only countering the ludicrous and frequently unchallenged assertion that an armed citizen (who isn't wearing a badge) will always, without question, be so useless and dangerous that they will make any situation worse. It is illogical that this can be true.
Fair enough. But you also have to allow that many of them will be so useless and dangerous that they WILL make any situation worse. And further, that without any sort of control on which people have guns, many of the people choosing to carry them are PRECISELY the people that will be useless and dangerous. And STILL FURTHER, that they will be useless and dangerous even when there aren't any terrorists attacking. So they'll just generally raise the level of useless and dangerous to everything.... from road rage incidents, to being cut in line at starbucks. They'll lose the guns to pickpockets on the subways and leave them on the bar when they go to the can, they'll scratch their back itches with them, and shoot at their exes when they've been jilted. And the idea that Orlando would have been better if a bunch of people had taken their guns out drinking?? WTF??
And since they can't know a terrorist attack is coming the premise is that we'll be safer if everywhere everyone takes there gun out drinking... that's ridiculous. Even if it actually deterred orlando (and the terrorist simply couldn't think of a better attack??!) their'd be 50 dead in a week in 50 separate inicidents from all the useless dangerious idiots just being useless dangerious idiots to eachother after too many drinks.