On Campus Concealed Carry

Before I begin the round, I would like to note that there was an error in the posting of the my previous round's case; when I directly copied and pasted from the previous debate, for some reason the Harvard study that I cited was not linked properly. Here is the link to the study as well as to the previous debate to prove that I had done this and that my opponent did have adequate time (over three weeks) to consider the source. Gun study: http://www.riskandinsurance.com... Previous Debate: http://www.debate.org... Let's go to the case. Remember that I previously proved that since the majority of attacks occur off-campus (which my opponent conceded), there is no reason to permit guns on campus because it will not have a major impact on safety. His response was that there could be a small improvement in safety. First, keep in mind that this assumes that CHL permit holders will themselves not commit crimes on campuses, which as my Robert Flores Jr. example proved, is empirically false (see previous round.) Moreover, the Harvard gun study that I cited explicitly notes that the individuals who own guns on campus are more likely to be involved in risky and criminal activity, meaning that permitting all students to hold guns will only facilitate crime because the people who will be impacted by the proposal, i.e. the students who are prone to risky behaviors, will be the ones purchasing the weapons. (As stated before, the same study notes that only 4.7% of students own guns, so most students are not even interested in the weapons.) Finally, keep in mind that he conceded that he would not expand the age at which students could obtain permits; he only wished to allow students over the age of 21 to use guns on campus. Given that the majority of college students are younger than 21, the CHL proposal will not actually benefit students because most of them will not be able to own guns. This was dropped in the last speech, so please extend this and vote negative based on this argument. Even if you ignore everything else I say, you cannot vote affirmative because his plan will not even achieve the ends that he hopes to obtain since students will still not be able to purchase the weapons. Next, he quotes the part of my analysis in which I stated that there were alternate means to promote security. The response to the "police" argument is that the police are not always nearby. This, however, can be fixed by increasing the number of policemen and security officials assigned to college campuses. Moreover, modern security systems on campus have rendered this obsolete because police can often respond within moments to distress signals sent out by students on blue boxes. Moreover, his taser analysis is irrelevant because I never mentioned specific non-lethal weapons, and he never cited any sources on his claims of ineffectiveness, so so his statistics are unbacked and unwarranted. Next, he attacks the David Hemenway analysis by claiming that it is just an unwarranted assertion. If he actually read the source, however, he would have realized that the analysis is from a book written by a Harvard professor who researched the problems and provided statistics to back up his claims. Moreover, the book was published in 2006, so it is more recent than his evidence and is thus more acceptable because it is more likely to represent the repercussions of guns in modern society. Our disaster statistics are a wash, at best, so neither side gains offense from them in this round. I gave you the study which explicitly proves that only 6.4% of males and 1.5% of females at college own guns; he claims that this is my burden, and I provided him the study. Second, he does not even bother to refute the study, so you can extend it through the round. He then claims that my assertion that most students own guns for nefarious purposes is dishonest, and he asserts in turn that students can own weapons for hunting, target shooting, and school competition teams. Keep in mind that most campuses do not have the facilities to promote these activities, and that only 47% of students own guns for self-protection. This means that at least a chunk, if not most of the remaining 53% use their guns for nefarious purposes. Ne next claims that people will break gun laws anyways, so there is no reason to actually have them. First, just because some people will not follow the law does not mean the restriction should not exist. Murderers have been violating laws against the slaughter of others since the dawn of civilization, but that does not justify eliminating murder laws. Second, the law will still act as a deterrent for most people, so even if some choose to break it, at least we maximize safety by minimizing the likelihood that people will actually purchase and use firearms. Next he claims that companies would raise the price of weapons to make a profit. That statement is ridiculous because companies would have to keep in mind that the students that they are targeting need cheaper prices; if they raise the prices, then students will not purchase guns and they will make less profits than if they make guns cheaper and target students. This means that according to "free market theory", more students will have guns because companies will target them in prices and advertising (guns are not essential items so they will not be able to increase prices without repercussion.) Finally, let's go to the massive concession that he made that proves that crimes on campus are rare and that is why they are sensationalized. Although he brings up a new response, which is illegal, I will refute it anyways. He claims that the shootings still happen and that they are avoidable by having CHL permits. First, remember that as I have proven, guns increase the amount of crime on campus and promote insecurity because people do not wish to have them around (he has no substantial response to this.) Moreover, keep in mind that the shootings are excessively rare because most students do not own guns, so a reverse in the trend would result if more students owned guns. Remember that I also gave examples of shooters who owned CHL permits; since shootings are excessively rare, and shooters own CHL permits, we can assume that the problems of campus shootings are caused by those individuals who own CHL permits. So, because there is no net benefit to having CHL on campus, and they decrease safety and increase anti-social behavior, I strongly urge a negation of today's resolution.