One of the topics on TV this morning - since today is the anniversary of the Virginia Tech massacre - is whether or not students should be able to go through training and get permits to carry guns on campus.
I asked RT what he thought about it. RT is a gun enthusiast. He has been through gun safety and gun training classes. One of his favorite activities is taking his shotgun to a clay target range and practicing his shooting. His goal is to get 25 out of 25 shots. He’s up to 23 out of 25 right now. I sometimes go with him to shoot skeet. I admit that it can be fun - just the challenge of improving one’s score. It’s a competition thing, and the people we meet at the clay target range have been really good people.
When I asked RT about guns on campus, he said that once a person goes through the training, they are almost afraid to use the gun - even in a self defense situation.  It is stressed repeatedly that the day you have to use a gun is the worst day of your life - with lifelong repercussions. And, if you think about it, it would be. While you might save your own life and the lives of others, you are also immediately put under scrutiny - and every move you made will be studied and debated, and if you end up killing a shooter/assassin, you then must deal with all the issues related to that. And that’s just the external considerations. You must also deal with the emotional and psychological considerations of having used a weapon to harm and/or kill another person.
The idea of students being able to carry guns on campus is scary. However, it’s equally scary to think of students not being able to defend themselves on campus and being “sitting ducks” for every lunatic that decides to exit this world in a blaze of self-perceived glory. I don’t know how I feel about the issue.
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