Tim; please forgive me, but I am going to rearrange the order of your questions, just to take them in turn so you can understand where I am coming from. Hope you don't mind.
ORIGINAL: the_sandman_454
I think you may be buying into the emotional argument against guns when the subject of schools come up.
I totally agree with you Tim. It is hard for me to swallow the sense in this. I do see where you are coming from though.
Schools really aren't any different than anywhere else. There is no reason for people in schools to have their right to self defense revoked. The only problem with schools I can think of is posessing in dorms due to how many people are in and out of there who may gain unauthorized use of the weapon. If that problem is overcome, then I see no reason to ban guns in certain places.
I agree Tim. But I am looking at the problem differently. Let me reword the entire problem with guns and schools to something else, and then hopefully we can see each others approach:
You are looking at a headache and saying, how can we fight this, how can we make this go away? I am looking at the same headache and thinking how can we keep from getting a headache in the first place? I hope that makes a bit of sense.
Let me ask you this, SC: Do you support any members of the public carrying arms on our person for defense of self? Before you answer this, I want you to forget all about the location it is.
Of course I do.
Bad people can exist anywhere, at any time. Why would you want to help them kill people? By banning law abiding citizens from carrying weapons, you are helping these psychos kill more people. Instead of leading students to the slaughter like cattle, why not allow them the option of preventing that?
They would not have the option of preventing it... metal detectors and armed guards would be preventing it..... students with concealed handguns would be combating it.
Edited to add the following:
The fact that there are so many people without a moral compass, who don't value human life essentially helps make my argument for me. Who will protect people from people like these? The police can't, there aren't enough police to have an individual officer assigned to everybody. Even if there were, I wouldn't want to live that way. No, the way to solve this problem is for every single adult to step up and take responsibility for our own safety. This requires the ability to go about armed, although it's not the only thing that can be done, it's another tool in your toolbox, so to speak.
All I have to say in return is that it will only take one.... it will only take one accidental discharge in a school... or one hot headed young man bent up over losing his girlfriend or his scholarship to go off the handle and misuse that priviledge to perhaps completely ban concealed carry altogether. Do I think it is a good enough reason to rule out the option of carry in the classroom... no I do not. But it is something to consider and dwell on a bit.
Think on this too.... in a situation like VT, where you have shootings in multiple buildings, lets say that there were armed students, legally that is... when the police arrive, how do they identify who is on which side? How do they know the perpetrator from the good samaritan? This is one of the fundamental training tools with concealed carry.... when the police arrive.. you had best not have a gun in your hand! With a live situation like that, it may well errupt into a firefight. With casualties being caused by friendly fire. Again... is the risk worth it? just some food for thought. How do we decide who can carry and who cannot? Is it going to turn the Student Body Government into the Student Body Militia?