As a deputy sports editor for Technician, my primary responsibility is to cover and report on N.C. State athletics. I like sports. I understand sports. I enjoy everything about college athletics from the intensity of the competition to the tenacity of the fans.
In private, I also have a desire to read about politics, learn how the United States government operates and state my opinions on subjects that matter to me, always welcoming debate with my peers. However, I try to keep my political opinions out of the public eye, generally extending no further than Facebook and my friends.
Technician’s recent editorial, “Drills, not guns, promote safety,” hit a nerve with me. As a member of Students for Concealed Carry on Campus and gun owner, I was appalled to read the words, “This newspaper disagrees with (SCCC)’s stance, which if implemented would increase the number of guns on campus.”
Because I was not at that day’s budget and planning meeting, my input was not sought out for the matter. Naturally, the opinions of the editors present at the meeting became my own according to Tuesday’s Technician.
I am not only writing this to express my disdain for the editorial, but to ensure my integrity is upheld by defending it.
Dr. Susan Gratia Hupp, a former member of the Texas House of Representatives, was eating lunch with her parents at Luby’s Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas in 1991 when a mad man crashed his truck through the window of the restaurant. The man exited the truck and began opening fire on the restaurant.
Gratia Hupp would later testify before the United States Senate about a massacre she lived through, the deadliest this nation had ever seen until the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre.
Gratia Hupp opened her testimony by stating that she was not a member of the National Rifle Association, she abhorred hunting and she grew up in a house without guns. But when she was 21, a friend gave her a .38 revolver to protect herself with, which she received proper training with and kept in her purse.
When the shooter opened fired in Luby’s Cafeteria, Gratia Hupp and her father dropped to the floor and hid behind a table. After she realized what was going on, she reached for her revolver, only to remember she had left it in her car. She had taken it out of her purse because in some locations in Texas, concealed carry permit holders aren’t allowed to carry a concealed weapon.
The shooter continued to fire. Her unarmed father then tried to stop the shooter and was killed in the process. After escaping, she learned her mother had not followed her out, but was also shot in the head while cradling her husband’s body.
The shooter shot 50 total people, killing 23, before killing himself.
Gratia Hupp stated that taking her revolver out of her purse was the worst decision of her life because she could have stopped that shooter. She would rather have a felony knowing that she saved numerous people, including her own family.
She ended her story not by blaming the shooter, nor by blaming the guns. She placed the blame on the legislators that took away her right to defend herself and her family.
Tuesday’s editorial stated, “… A crowded campus is sanctuary from the police.” I could not agree more. If a small restaurant in Killeen, Texas can host such a catastrophe, just imagine the incredible susceptibility of a 30,000-student campus that does not allow concealed weapons on campus.
The editorial also quoted N.C. State Police Chief Tom Younce saying, “You’ve got about 8,000 to 9,000 students living close on campus — in dorm rooms — (and) I don’t think it’s a good idea (to allow concealed weapons).”
Most people living in dorms are below the age of 21. In order to carry a concealed weapon with a permit, you must be at least 21. Therefore, there would be very few weapons in the dorms, if any. In fact, a comparison of housing statistics and concealed weapon permit statistics in Texas (a state in which 1 in 55 people legally carry a concealed weapon, almost twice the national average) shows that between 10 and 20 people living on campus at the University of Texas at Austin have concealed weapon permits –10 to 20 people out of 38,000 undergraduates and 50,000 total students.
Furthermore, the state of Utah has allowed permitted individuals to conceal carry handguns on all of its public colleges and its public technical college since the fall of 2006 (30 total campuses). Both campuses of Colorado State University have allowed the same policy since 2003. Likewise, Blue Ridge Community College (Weyers Cave, VA) has also allowed concealed carry since 1995. As of January 2011, these 33 campuses have seen a single incident of gun violence (including threats and suicide), which involved two non-students/employees on the fringe of Colorado State’s Fort Collins campus.
Continuing the trend, 14 community colleges in Colorado have allowed concealed carry on campus since the start of the 2010 fall semester. There have been zero gun-related incidents since.
Now that this has been laid out for you, where do you stand? Do you ignore the statistics? Do you ignore the facts? Do you ignore the testimony of a woman that lived through one of the worst days in American history?
What do you want to happen when the shooting starts on our campus? Hide behind a table? Pray that the police make it there before you are killed?
I would want to do something about it. I would want to protect my peers, my friends, my loved ones and myself.
Don’t get the wrong idea. The police are doing the best job they possibly can to protect us. But as a former police officer recently told me, “When you need the police in seconds, they are only minutes away!”
Until students, faculty and staff are allowed to legally carry on campus, N.C. State is treading in dangerous water. Where will you stand when our Newtown happens?