SERV99 - "ever been around a bunch of 18-22 years old on a large college campus? Why add guns to the mix. A significant portion of the college population are still immature. All it takes is one student to be belligerent when drunk or when there is some other incident going on campus (e.g. mini riot when there schools wins the NCAA championship) where some pissed off kid who gets his car torched, decides to give some payback."
Yeah, I have.
There is a vast difference between the attitudes of students when I began college at the University of Arkansas, in Sept., 1955, and the college students of today.
One of the profound differences, in my opinion, is the students of the late 1940s and 1950s, were far more responsible than those of today. They also had respect for parents, teachers, and law.
That difference became manifest during the 1960s, with the various student riots against the Vietnam War, and about any other "cause" they could come up with to protest. Another factor, I believe, is the amount of illegal drugs used consistently and normally by many students today.
I was "independent" for a couple of years, then went into a fraternity. There were
lots of guns on campus, both in fraternities, independent dorms, and off campus apartments. I had a Colt's Single Action .38 Spec., and my Rem. 550A .22 LR semi-auto. My roommate had a S&W .357 Mag. and a beautiful Win. 70 .270. Other members had pistols, shotguns, and rifles.
Booze??!! Hell yes! Ran like heavy rain through a culvert! Just as today, students would get knee-walking snot-slinging drunk!
But, during the four years I attended, there was not one firearms accident or murder. The U. of A. at that time was a "small" university with only about 3,000 students, so word of an accidental shooting or intentional shooting of anyone would have spread across that campus like wildfire!
By the way, while I was there, there was not one armed robbery of students, either. The two campus cops were not even armed. Their main task was issuing tickets to cars parked illegally or giving a cite to some student who, while drunk, drove his car over the campus lawn and roses.
I will say, however, that one of my gun owning fraternity brothers, who loved firearms, was later killed... when he drunkenly drove his MG into a bridge abuttment at about 90 MPH. No gun: just booze.
I saw one guy being irresponsible with his Colt Govt. Model .45 ACP, while drinking. We took it away from him and didn't return it until he was sober. He never showed any irresponsibility with it -- around us, anyway -- again.
I know that
many of today's college students are not responsibile for
anything, nor do they have any respect for anyone or anything that might "restrict" them in any way. "Do your own thing, man, do your own thing!" Moral relativity personified.
Authority, respect, responsibility, tradition, are as dead as a burnt boot.
My point here is not to "Yea" or "Nay" CCW at colleges, but to address your contention that if there is booze around college students, no matter mature and responsible or not, no firearms should be allowed to anyone. It seems to me from your posts, you believe that because some students are heavy drinkers (and dopers, I'd add) all college students must submit to any and all attacks on them by vicious criminals without any effective means of protecting themselves.
L.W.
