Improve the odds

In a letter to the Topeka Capital-Journal, Kansan Ken Smith says, and quite well, too...

I take issue with Pete Goering's comments in his column Feb. 17, which related a few of the recent killings on campus under the headline "Violence becoming way too common," then concluded that what really concerned students here was passing finals.

Pull your head out of the sand. Kansas has now and for the foreseeable future will have a significant population of potential active shooters. The headline might more accurately said "Violence becoming way too easy."

What can we do about increasing public safety given that the risk is common? The policy of creating "gun-free zones" to prevent concealed carry on campus increases the risk to students, staff and visitors. People who seek notoriety by mass killing want helpless victims and time to do their work. Gun-free zones dramatically increase both. It isn't by accident that these attacks occur most frequently in schools and malls, the preeminent gun-free zones.

Allowing people to carry concealed on college campuses won't stop attacks. It will, however, change the odds of surviving such an event.

We live in a world where bad people sometimes harm others, and a responsible government shouldn't actively assist the wolves by penning us like sheep. Gun-free zones on campus guarantee that some students will lose more than a final grade.

KEN SMITH, Hoyt