Our View

Situation:

All but 11 U.S. colleges and universities have concealed weapons bans.

Stance:

Eastern needs to uphold its weapons ban and focus on keeping harmful students out.

Having armed students on campus would not be a good idea. Most of us already get in enough trouble for shooting off our mouths or driving two-ton automobiles into other cars, buildings or pedestrians.

According to MSNBC.com, at least 11 colleges and universities already allow students to carry weapons, which is banned in 30 states. Illinois is one of those states, and a state that prohibits concealed weapons anywhere in the general public. But national movements are spawning from student organizations on campuses across the country called Students for Concealed Carry on Campus.

“In Utah, all nine universities allow concealed carry on campus,” said Eric Stein, president of the Kansas University SCCC group. “Colorado State and a community college in Virginia allow concealed carry. There are a combined 60 semesters on those campuses without an increase in gun violence or negligent shootings.”

While campus shootings such as the Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois University tragedies are the main line of reasoning for having weapons, violence should not be solved with more violence.

“Banning is a real extreme thing, it is an easy way out. It is ‘feel good’ type of solution that doesn’t address what real problems are. Banning guns is a lazy way to do it,” said Matt Checketts, a student senator at the University of Utah, to The Associated Press in 1999 when his university was supporting a proposed ban on concealed weapons.

Simply put, we are students enrolled in an institution for higher education. We’re paying to be here to learn and the university guarantees our safety. That’s why we have an outrageously long student conduct code. Each campus has judicial boards and campus police for a reason; so let’s let them do their jobs.

What happened at Virginia Tech and Northern were inconceivable disasters that would have resulted badly whether or not other students had guns. Those types of catastrophes don’t happen every day, and no matter how many people have guns, unneeded death will occur in any similar future events.

We have enough to think about as students, so let’s just allow the office of Judicial Affairs to weed out harmful students and go about our college days wearing pajama pants and short shorts that don’t get weighed down by heavy metal.