Shooting points to need for less restrictive gun laws
Title
Shooting points to need for less restrictive gun laws
Description
By: Danny Mistarz
Posted: 4/24/07
After the tragic events that took place at Virginia Tech April 16, the anti-Second Amendment crowd has once again reared its ugly head. The usual claims of guns causing violence and the necessity to ban personal ownership have come out. But what if one person, a student, a professor, the RA in the dorm, had been carrying a gun? Would dozens of lives have been spared?
The state of Virginia's legislature had a bill proposed last year, HB 1572, proposing that handguns be permitted on college campuses for those persons with proper permits and certification. The bill was shot down in subcommittee, never making it to the house floor. At the time, it was celebrated by a VT spokesman as a stride toward continued public safety. Was the wrong decision was made? Guns are used 2.5 million times in self-defense annually, saving approximately 2,575 lives for each life lost annually according to the Second Amendment Foundation; could HB 1572 gave saved thirty-one lives on the morning of April 16, or even just one?
Let's assume that guns were permitted on campus at Virginia Tech, and that one student or one professor in the engineering building was carrying that day. This coward would never have been able to level a gun on hundreds of his classmates had he known there was the possibility of having to defend himself. What if a student on the hall of the dormitory had a gun, just in the room for protection? Certainly the first two gunshots, would have been heard and within a minute of the start of a rampage, 31 lives could have been saved. All it would take is one person, carrying one gun.
No gun law could stop people who want to get guns from getting them any better than our current drug laws work. Perhaps the gun laws that need arguing against are the gun laws that limit us, not the laws that protect us.
Danny Mistarz
Pratt '09
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Original Source: <a href=http://www.dukechronicle.com/home/index.cfm?event=displayArticlePrinterFriendly&uStory_id=8436d5a8-6250-459d-b726-78d5453835b3> Duke Chronicle - April 24, 2007</a>
Posted: 4/24/07
After the tragic events that took place at Virginia Tech April 16, the anti-Second Amendment crowd has once again reared its ugly head. The usual claims of guns causing violence and the necessity to ban personal ownership have come out. But what if one person, a student, a professor, the RA in the dorm, had been carrying a gun? Would dozens of lives have been spared?
The state of Virginia's legislature had a bill proposed last year, HB 1572, proposing that handguns be permitted on college campuses for those persons with proper permits and certification. The bill was shot down in subcommittee, never making it to the house floor. At the time, it was celebrated by a VT spokesman as a stride toward continued public safety. Was the wrong decision was made? Guns are used 2.5 million times in self-defense annually, saving approximately 2,575 lives for each life lost annually according to the Second Amendment Foundation; could HB 1572 gave saved thirty-one lives on the morning of April 16, or even just one?
Let's assume that guns were permitted on campus at Virginia Tech, and that one student or one professor in the engineering building was carrying that day. This coward would never have been able to level a gun on hundreds of his classmates had he known there was the possibility of having to defend himself. What if a student on the hall of the dormitory had a gun, just in the room for protection? Certainly the first two gunshots, would have been heard and within a minute of the start of a rampage, 31 lives could have been saved. All it would take is one person, carrying one gun.
No gun law could stop people who want to get guns from getting them any better than our current drug laws work. Perhaps the gun laws that need arguing against are the gun laws that limit us, not the laws that protect us.
Danny Mistarz
Pratt '09
--
Original Source: <a href=http://www.dukechronicle.com/home/index.cfm?event=displayArticlePrinterFriendly&uStory_id=8436d5a8-6250-459d-b726-78d5453835b3> Duke Chronicle - April 24, 2007</a>
Creator
Danny Mistarz
Publisher
Duke Chronicle
Date
2007-06-24
Contributor
Sara Hood
Rights
David Graham <david.graham@duke.edu>
Language
eng
Citation
Danny Mistarz, “Shooting points to need for less restrictive gun laws,” The April 16 Archive, accessed April 19, 2024, https://april16archive.org/items/show/591.