Professors packing heat!?

[GoVols876]

Senate Bill 3730, sponsored by State Senator Dewayne Bunch (R-09) and companion House Bill 3014, sponsored by State Representative Stacey Campfield (R-18), would authorize full-time faculty and staff with valid handgun carry permits at public schools, colleges, and universities in Tennessee to carry handguns upon completion of an annual firearms training course. Both bills are in respective Judiciary Committees.

If this bill passes, it will allow staff and faculty to carry weapons on campus. There has been a lot written for both sides of the argument in our newspaper about why this is a good or bad thing. I wanted to know how you guys feel about it.

Personally, I do not like the idea of people carrying guns on campus. It makes me uneasy. I think schools should be gun/drug/alcohol free zones. The fewer guns on campus the better.

 

[WAY-J]

College with no beer??? repent son, you are going to hell.

 

[dickens821]

Senate Bill 3730, sponsored by State Senator Dewayne Bunch (R-09) and companion House Bill 3014, sponsored by State Representative Stacey Campfield (R-18), would authorize full-time faculty and staff with valid handgun carry permits at public schools, colleges, and universities in Tennessee to carry handguns upon completion of an annual firearms training course. Both bills are in respective Judiciary Committees.

If this bill passes, it will allow staff and faculty to carry weapons on campus. There has been a lot written for both sides of the argument in our newspaper about why this is a good or bad thing. I wanted to know how you guys feel about it.

Personally, I do not like the idea of people carrying guns on campus. It makes me uneasy. I think schools should be gun/drug/alcohol free zones. The fewer guns on campus the better.

Yeah. That way when some idiot with a semi-automatic pistol and a sawed off shotgun walks into our classrooms we are stuck there with nothing to defend ourselves with.

 

[volfan55]

It would end people sowing up late for class and talking back i guess...

 

[lawgator1]

Yeah. That way when some idiot with a semi-automatic pistol and a sawed off shotgun walks into our classrooms we are stuck there with nothing to defend ourselves with.

I say with great confidence that the rare scenario in which that prevention actually might occur would be dwarfed by epsiodes of teacher's guns killing or injuring people accidentally, being stolen and used at that time or later, or being way too handy in the heat of an argument.

I don't know about your professors, but thinking back to mine, if any of them had a gun and some nut walked in and started shooting, I have very little hope that the professor's ownership of a gun, which may or may not be accessible, loaded, and in working order, and which the professor may or may not have any clue how to operate, would do anything other than make the situation worse before it made it better.

You want to do something abut this issue, use metal detectors or post security around campuses. That's about the best you can do.

 

[volfan55]

OR why not have a guard in every building?

 

[allvol123]

I say with great confidence that the rare scenario in which that prevention actually might occur would be dwarfed by epsiodes of teacher's guns killing or injuring people accidentally, being stolen and used at that time or later, or being way too handy in the heat of an argument.

I say your great confidence is mistaken. Most gunowners I know are very aware of where their guns are kept and take measures to make sure other people don't get their hands on them.

 

[lawgator1]

I say your great confidence is mistaken. Most gunowners I know are very aware of where there guns are kept and take measures to make sure other people don't get their hands on them.

How many of them are professors?

 

[volinbham]

I've been teaching college for almost 18 years. I can't imagine carrying a gun to class to prevent a shooting. I would imagine I've "gone to class" about 5000 times in that period. The odds of having a gun in the exact instance when it is needed is incredibly low.

 

[allvol123]

How many of them are professors?

You mean educated people that live repsonsible lives? Well none are professors, but I would hope people that have made education their profession would understand the significance of packing.

 

[allvol123]

I've been teaching college for almost 18 years. I can't imagine carrying a gun to class to prevent a shooting. I would imagine I've "gone to class" about 5000 times in that period. The odds of having a gun in the exact instance when it is needed is incredibly low.

I agree. Just saying I don't think it is a big deal if someone wants to carry one.

 

[VolunteerHillbilly]

I think a big part of this proposal is to make potential wrongdoers at least consider the possibility that they may be facing armed resistance, as opposed to fish in a barrel.

 

[lawgator1]

I agree. Just saying I don't think it is a big deal if someone wants to carry one.

You are forgetting all of the bad consequences of that, accidental and intentional.

I think a big part of this proposal is to make potential wrongdoers at least consider the possibility that they may be facing armed resistance, as opposed to fish in a barrel.

No offense, but when people started making that very same argument in the case of the Va Tech or the other recent Illinois college shooting incident I wanted to throttle the speaker for ignoring the obvious fact that the shooters in those cases planned to die and didn't care about someone else having a gun.

The notion that some lunatic, who is bent on going into a room or building full of students and shooting up the place, is going to be dissuaded from doing so because he might get shot by a professor is just ridiculous.

 

[BigPapaVol]

LG,

I'm with you, guns kill people. Let's get rid of all of 'em.

 

[KB5252]

I've been teaching college for almost 18 years. I can't imagine carrying a gun to class to prevent a shooting. I would imagine I've "gone to class" about 5000 times in that period. The odds of having a gun in the exact instance when it is needed is incredibly low.

Yes but if it were and it helped to save a couple of lives it sure was worth it. The odds are low that it would be handy at the instance it was needed unless it was concealed and ready at all times. Here is a scenario for you. You take two small cities. One city requires that you keep a gun in your home. The other city has laws that prevent people from owning guns. Which city would have a higher rate of burglaries and home invasions?

 

[dickens821]

I've been teaching college for almost 18 years. I can't imagine carrying a gun to class to prevent a shooting. I would imagine I've "gone to class" about 5000 times in that period. The odds of having a gun in the exact instance when it is needed is incredibly low.

I'm sure that's what the Virginia Tech or UNI people thought too.

 

[cibai]

would this include coaches :unsure:

 

[volgolferarch]

It would end people sowing up late for class and talking back i guess...

Nice...

And as a current student, I would not like it at all if our professors were packing. And I would not trust any of my professors with a gun, to be honest. Leave the guns to the Barney Fifes of the UTPD.

 

[lawgator1]

LG,

I'm with you, guns kill people. Let's get rid of all of 'em.

Impossible. But, I think every responsible authority out there acknowledges that arming people to deal with people who are armed is unlikely to result in a decrease in shooting deaths.

Especially when the person who started it doesn't care that someone else may be strapped, too.

 

[BigPapaVol]

Impossible. But, I think every responsible authority out there acknowledges that arming people to deal with people who are armed is unlikely to result in a decrease in shooting deaths.

Especially when the person who started it doesn't care that someone else may be strapped, too.

I think Britain is a very nice case study for you in what transpires when those who choose to follow the laws are forced to give up their guns. The ensuing blank check for the non-law abiding types was a bigger problem than any British do-gooder parliamentarian could have ever expected.

 

[dickens821]

Nice...

And as a current student, I would not like it at all if our professors were packing. And I would not trust any of my professors with a gun, to be honest. Leave the guns to the Barney Fifes of the UTPD.

If they were required to take a gun class I would be 100% fine with them having a gun.

 

[UTGRADnNC]

College with no beer or marijuana??? repent son, you are going to hell.

FYP.

 

[utvolpj]

Nice...

And as a current student, I would not like it at all if our professors were packing. And I would not trust any of my professors with a gun, to be honest. Leave the guns to the Barney Fifes of the UTPD.

I would prefer professors have them over the UTPD. At least most of them passed HS

 

[cibai]

I think Britain is a very nice case study for you in what transpires when those who choose to follow the laws are forced to give up their guns. The ensuing blank check for the non-law abiding types was a bigger problem than any British do-gooder parliamentarian could have ever expected.

Yeah, your gonna need to go ahead and back that up with something substantial for me (a British citizen) to see this as anything more than your waxing about something you have no idea about.

 

[BigPapaVol]

Yeah, your gonna need to go ahead and back that up with something substantial for me (a British citizen) to see this as anything more than your waxing about something you have no idea about.

actually, I'm not. I'll let you do your own homework regarding the crime rates, violent and otherwise, pre and post the ridiculous 1997 Firearms Act. I believe the first real information you'll find is about 1999, but it's less than helpful to the gun banning types.

I suspect that I know less than you, but to state that I know nothing of it proves unequivocally that you know nothing about that of which you're speaking.