“Everyone gets distracted by the anti-protesters talking about emotions and how guns make them feel, at the same moment, two blocks away where there was supposed to be a mock mass shooting”.
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AUSTIN, Texas (AP) _ Concealed handguns would be mostly barred from University of Texas dormitories but not from classrooms under recommendations presented to the school president.
Initially, the group, which is comprised of over 100 activists from Come and Take It Texas and DontComply.com, had planned “mock shooting” to take place on the UT campus December 12, but after the administration threatened possible arrests, they’ve announced they are moving it across the street. “So it happened exactly in the right way”.
About a dozen gun rights activists staged an open carry march and mock mass shooting near the University of Texas.
But a spokesman for the event’s sponsors defended it as an effort to draw attention to what he said was a need for increased protection in a world growing more unsafe.
The weird plan comes ten days after the deadly mass shooting in San Bernardino, one month after the Paris terrorist attacks, and one day shy of the third anniversary of the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting where 20 children and six adults were gun down by a 20-year-old shooter.
“People have a vigilante complex and think they can shoot their way out of a situation”, he said, calling Saturday’s gathering “in incredibly poor taste, especially given the history of mass shootings on this campus”. “We have to protest idiocy with idiocy”.
Those in favor of campus carry say opponents at UT are overreacting, and they point to universities that have already complied with similar laws as proof.
“Those areas might as well be marked “killing zones”, said Tammy Coontz, a protester who drove three hours from Lewisville to attend”.
Murdoch Pizgatti, the president of Come and Take it Texas, called the fake shooting a “theatrical performance” to demonstrate the difference between a “gun-free zone where a criminal that wants to do harm confronts an unarmed population, as opposed to one where the criminal is stopped by handgun owners”.
“We’re not necessarily taking a stand on gun rights”. “If they’re telling me my life isn’t worth saving, why should I give them my money?”
Texans who meet the state’s requirements to carry concealed handguns long have been permitted to carry firearms on campus grounds; the new law allows gun permit holders who are at least 21 to carry the weapons inside college buildings.
Dawson Weehunt, a sophomore at Austin Community College, came to protest the demonstration.
When asked about statistics showing a correlation between more restrictions on gun laws and fewer number of gun deaths, Wilson said she disagreed with the data.
“Walking around here trying to scare everybody – that’s like, the definition of terrorism”, Weehunt said.
The group was far outnumbered by media, police and students in the middle of final exams, many wondering what the small group of flag-waving, gun-toting people was doing. Morgan Stevens, a UT junior, was eating and studying at the Chipotle on Guadalupe when the gun-toting crowd walked by.
“The fact is, we could’ve gone the presentation at that location, but all of the students made it clear they were not going to give us a space and time to voice our opinions in that particular location”, Pizgatti said.
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However, he told LifeZette: “It might have more impact if they decided not to do it. Just the idea of it happening has people talking”.
