Raging Chicken Press has obtained a copy of a draft of a new weapons policy for all the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education universities. Last spring, we broke the story about PASSHE universities quietly changing their weapons policies to allow students, faculty, staff, and citizens to carry weapons on campus. The intense media attention paid to the issue in the weeks that followed led the Chair of PASSHE’s Board of Governors, Guido Picchini, to ask all 14 universities to stop any work updating their weapons policy until a new task force review all the policies. Apparently, the task force has just about completed its work.
For those of you who have been paying close attention to this issue, you will notice that the draft policy linked below, is basically a slightly updated version of the PASSHE model policy circulated to university presidents this past academic year. The main difference seems to be that PASSHE administrators are not going to demand a uniform policy allowing guns on campuses.
Here is a copy of the policy:
PASSHE Draft Weapons Policy
All this does is create a defenseless victim zone. Backwards thinking from PASSHE disregarding the facts. I’m not surprised they would choose the emotional solution instead of an actual solution.
So, smoking on campus is dangerous, but guns aren’t. Except that the policy acknowledges that they are dangerous, which is why there’s any policy at all. And because even the braintrust behind this idiot idea aren’t that stupid.
If they’re dangerous enough to ban from buildings or events, that’s it. They’re banned. That’s what college campuses are–places where people go to school, in buildings, and attend events where the ban would still apply. Why does anybody give a rat’s [insert body part here] if Joe Citizen wants to carry his .44 on campus? Screw that.
Seth, I think the policy seeks to address the chance encounter a student, faculty or staff hunter that might be out hunting in the morning and then come to work/class later, or the person that’s passing through the campus that isn’t a student, who may be otherwise lawfully armed.
It’s too bad that PASSHE administrators refuse to look at the facts: lawful, licensed/certified concealed carriers are statistically the MOST safe and MOST law abiding demographic (including the police officer demographic), more accurate than the police when forced into shooting, defend themselves (as a group) 2.5 million times annually (frequently without a shot ever being fired), and that the overwhelming majority of these mass shootings occur in places where carry by ordinary persons is prohibited by law or policy.
PASSHE wants to talk safety, but all they’ve done is create 14 different killing fields. Open access plus forced disarmament of the average person means an armed attacker can kill many people with impunity. 30 people were killed at Virginia Tech -after- the police started actively looking for the shooter. It’s time to look for -real- solutions using -real- evidence and not feel good policies that serve only to turn classrooms into bloodbaths.
No, the policy seeks to quell some complaining students and a wingnut governor who believe their 2nd Amendment rights trump everybody else’s right to safety. And we know this because a spokesperson for the Board of Governors said almost exactly that (not as angrily, but they reported that the impetus to do this was their fear of a lawsuit).
The rest of this debate is a non-starter. I could go point for point answering you, and script exactly what you’d say back, and exactly what I’d say back, and exactly what you’d say back the next time. It’s the same every single time.
You have no right to safety, and the police have no obligation to protect you. See: Castle Rock v. Gonzalez, DeShaney v. Winnebago County, Warren v. District of Columbia.
Which place is going to be safer when a deranged, armed psychopath decides he wants to kill as many people as possible – a university that disallows civilian carry, or out in the public where legal concealed carry is allowed? Because all of the attacks with a high body count invariably occur in places that lawful firearm carry is prohibited.
The 2nd Amendment is an enumerated right that is acknowledged by the Bill of Rights, not granted. The Right of the People to keep and bear arms is not granted or limited by the 2nd Amendment, it is acknowledged by it – your (and my) right to self defense exists outside of government approval or allowance – same as your right to freely practice your religion of choice, peaceably assemble or write/say what you wish.
Your casual dismissal of the argument does not make your correct, it just makes you arrogant.