Some Texas Tech students who believe concealed hand guns should be allowed on campus with proper certification are wearing empty holsters this week to protest gun-control policies. Hoping to raise awareness about the issues surrounding the prohibition of licensed firearm possession on college campuses, students attending approximately 110 college institutions nationwide organized and executed a protest at their respective campuses. An estimated 6,000 members of Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, the national organization of discontented gun owners, will symbolize their plight all week by donning empty holsters. "For the most part it's symbolic," said Scott Lewis, a spokesman for the organization and Austin resident. "We want people to realize that license holders are left defenseless, and thereby everyone else is left defenseless. The practical point of the holster is that it is a good conversation starter. That's what we want; we want to start a dialogue." The group, however, is not advocating just any possession of weapons, he said. It designed the protests specifically to promote licensed and responsible carrying of handguns throughout all parts of campuses. "We were really careful to make sure everybody sent out notifications to the campuses, both the administration and the campus police - or if they don't have campus police, the local police," Lewis said. "We have a lot of people who wanted to protest, but we wanted to make sure they took the proper steps to ensure there weren't any misunderstandings." Kyle Criswell, the representative of the organization's 50-member Tech chapter, said the shooting at Virginia Tech University in April 2007 motivated him to get involved and voice his opinion, which is why he joined the advocacy group and is wearing his empty holster this week. "I think already we've had a pretty big impact. There are a lot of people who didn't know about us but think the same way we do," he said. A lot of people have asked about the empty holster on his hip, Criswell said, and only one person, one of his professors, has disagreed with the goals of the organization but was impressed by the group's exercise of protest. It is important for some people to have the sense of protection that gun possession provides, Lewis said, because the alternative is unacceptable in extreme circumstances. Legal gun possession on college campuses will ultimately make them safer. "What is worst than an uncontested, execution-style massacre? This guy at Virginia Tech was walking from student to student, shooting them in the head at point-blank range," he said. "The chance that a couple of seconds of exchanged gunfire is going to cause more casualties than that is just baseless." Simply banning guns from a particular area is a poor reason to call it safe, said Lewis. "I'm a very strong believer that all rules governing concealed carry should be based on in-depth analysis and facts, not on feel-good rules that make people feel better," he said. "I think gun-free zones make people feel safer, but that doesn't mean they are." Weapons have no place on college campuses, said Doug Pennington, assistant director of communications at the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, a grassroots political organization based in Washington D.C. Firearms are the last thing students should be thinking about when they attend classes, he said. "The answer is not more guns on campuses. The answer is fewer guns on campuses." Penington said. "When it comes to colleges and universities, they should be havens - a bastion of safety. You're supposed to go to class to learn stuff, not wondering if the person next to you is competent enough to actually possess a firearm." He said he and his colleagues at the Brady Campaign believe a hypothetical situation in which students are shooting at each other is unthinkable lunacy, a sentiment about which the organization is not subtle. "Who is the expert marksman in that situation? Who?" Pennington said. "Isn't it possible that there is going to be some sort of John-Woo shootout in the French class at Virginia Tech? I mean, how many students in the middle end up getting shot?" Col. Gordon Hoffman of the Texas Tech Police Department said he understands both sides of the argument and respects the students' right to voice their opinion. Also, he said it is worth noting the perspective of police officers responding to these worst-case scenarios. "You see somebody firing a weapon, and how are we to know if that person is a potential victim defending their-self or if they're the active shooter," he said. "That's where I'm coming from. I know it's an emotional issue, and I can see some pros and cons, but I can go against more than I can for." Sgt. Lynn Rohland of the Department of Public Safety at the University of Utah, said students at the university are allowed to carry weapons with them while attending classes as long as they have a license to do so. She said the department has not taken any special measures to accommodate the legality of possession, but it has not had any incident there involving students with guns on campus. In addition to legal consequences, students who violate the university's policies on weapon possession and are convicted of doing so could face consequences of varying severity, depending on the details of the incident, said Ethan Logan, managing director of Tech's Student Judicial Programs.
Students protest campus gun policies
Published: Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Updated: Sunday, August 30, 2009
 "Photo: Caity Colvard")
Caity Colvard
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