Students for Concealed Carry, a national, non-partisan and student-run advocacy group, called for immediate action in allowing concealed carry on college campuses nationwide Jan. 17.
David Burnett, the group’s spokesman, called for legislators nationwide to respond to the alleged risks gun-free campuses pose to students, referring to the mass shootings of recent years.
“The mass shootings we’ve seen in recent years only prove killers don’t play by the rules,”he said.“Today we’re calling on legislators in every state to change those rules and stop colleges from trampling on the rights of good people wanting to defend themselves.”
But at Elon, the group’s proposal was met with mixed opinions. Gerald Whittington, senior vice president of business, finance and technology, said he is adamantly opposed to concealed carry on campus for any reason.
“The change in culture to accommodate allowing concealed carry would be antithetical to campus life,” he said. “If you have to consider that any person you see on a campus might have a concealed weapon, we would treat each other differently, our campus police officers would have a level of required vigilance and concern that would be necessary and unpopular and worst of all, simple disputes could easily escalate is ways that are tragic."
But others said concealed carry would prevent violence on Elon’s campus, not en- courage it. Freshman Jeff King said he values a person’s right to self-protection.
“I definitely think that people should have a right to protect themselves,” he said. “And if anything were to happen, it’d be better to have people around who have better intentions than the gunman and have guns on them, then have nobody to defend themselves.”
Senior Jared Silverstone also defended the constitutional right to bear arms, but he said reasonable limits still must be imposed, and the Second Amendment is not absolute, especially under the jurisdiction of private universities.
“When you get into private campuses like this, especially with schools, you are kind of pushing the right to bear arms beyond a rea- sonable limit,” he said. “I’m all for the right to carry arms in any public place and in your own home, but with a private university like Elon, it is pushing the limits of what is con- stitutional.”
Others said they believed matters of gun control and concealed carry are better left to the national stage, as opposed to allowing in- dividual universities to regulate themselves.
“I don’t really think that gun control is something the university should necessarily have a large say in,” said senior Alex Zubak.
But according to Whittington, the issue of concealed carry is about more than gun control. He cited other dangers on college campuses that could be deadly when combined with permitted concealed carry.
"Mix underage drinking and concealed carry and you have a recipe for disaster," he said. "Simply put, I am totally against it."
According to Zubak, though, concealed carry may be an attempt to control the uncontrollable.
“I think it’s one of those things that those people who are going to carry it anyway are going to do it, regardless of whether they are allowed to,” she said.