To paraphrase The Ghostbusters; If something goes down on campus, who ya gonna call? The Campus Police. Unfortunately, that’s your only option. It’s sad really. Help is only a few minutes away, but by then you and half your class has been shot. Assume you’re a responsible, stable, and intelligent student who wishes to exercise your 2^nd Amendments Right to personally keep and bare arms for personal defense. Secondly, assume you have completed all necessary training courses and have received your concealed carry permit. Good? Now assume you’re a student in class on any College or University anywhere in the country when you here a gunshot in the hallway of the building your class is in.

Your first instinct is to flee, but to where; you on the second, third or even the fourth floor and the there’s no ledge to use to escape lower. You hear more shots and now screams as the gunman or gunmen go from class to class shooting, wounding and maybe even killing. Then you remember that you’re armed. Or are you? Unless you attend college in Utah, you may as well flip a coin on your chances of living, dying or being wounded.

The scenario continues like this. You live in Utah, and the gunman enters you class room attempting to fire on you or your classmates you can put him down. The story ends here. There will be reports and statements to fill out for sure, and the NRA may even pick up the tab for the rest of your tuition (if only).

The alternate scenario ends a little differently. Now you’re a student Illinois. A state with unconscionably restrictive concealed carry laws. With the same flight or fight options, except you don’t have a weapon. You can’t leave because your too high, the gunman is blocking the door. Within minutes 3 dozen shots are fired and you, your friends and the TA are in shock, wounded or dead.

This scenario is the most common example of what happens when the federal and state government tell us that they will be our protectors. Now, it’s not all their fault, we share some blame for this too. We are not telling our congressmen and women or our senators that we demand the return of the ability to protect ourselves. Time after time, shooting after shooting.

Talking heads tell us that we need more gun control, more “Gun Free Zones”. The ironic thing about these statements is that only law abiding citizens, and in this case students, listen to them anyway. The Trench Coat Mafias (Columbine) and Seung-Hui Cho’s (Virginia Tech) of the world don’t give a damn about silly laws that make what they intend to do easier. Obviously they didn’t stop the Gun Free Zone signs, but the law abiding students who did and left their weapons in their cars paid the price for our inaction.

Whether you agree with the premise of guns on campus or not is beside the point. The question you must ask yourself is whether you will allow the most sacred Right in the history of man, the ability to defend yourself, to be trampled on in the name of assumed security at the expense of your life. Secondly, for those of you who believe so wholeheartedly in the rights to free speech, a free press and the freedom to assemble enshrined in the 1^st Amendment, you must ask yourself what gives you those The only thing preventing those rights from being infringed upon anymore is the 2^nd Amendments guarantee that you can personally defend yourself against attack by an increasingly oppressive government.

I’ve saved the good news for last. Eleven states are considering legislation to restore to students who are lawfully permitted the right to carry concealed handguns on their campuses. With your help, more may follow. What do you think about this issue?