Headline: Outnumbered 29 to 2, student senator defends gun rights against steep peer pressure

TheCollegeFix.com recently highlighted the work of a student at The Ohio State University to stand up for the Second Amendment in the face of steep opposition from his classmates.

According to the article, Ohio State’s Undergraduate Student Government chose to voice their opinion on newly-passed legislation that provides colleges and universities the option to allow concealed carry on campus (open carry is already legal). The group passed a resolution to oppose concealed carry on campus in a vote of 29 for, two against, and two abstentions. RJ Martin was one of the two votes against the measure.

From the article:

In an interview with The College Fix, the student senator said he sees himself as having a common sense approach to gun issues, and that peers misunderstand concealed carry.

Calling himself a “believer in the Second Amendment,” he said he did not think his fellow senators “understood the definition of concealed and how that means you cannot walk around with a weapon in plain sight.”

...

Martin, who voted to defend campus carry, said he does not believe that having concealed carry on campus increases the likelihood of a violent attack, as some of his peers suggest. He told The Fix that the likelihood of an attack occurring on campus is “equal in an environment where concealed carry is not allowed.”

Martin said he also disagrees with the notion pushed by some students that they’re fearful at the thought of a weapon nearby and that it inhibits learning.

“If mentally stable students are able to conceal a personal weapon (which they are constitutionally granted the right to) there is absolutely no reason to think that they would use that weapon to harm someone over a contentious topic in class,” he said in an email to The Fix.

The article highlights two high-profile incidents that have cost students of The Ohio State University their very lives.

[T]he recent loss of two students’ lives has shaken the Ohio State community and continues to keep the gun rights topic alive on campus.

Tarak Underiner, a 20-year-old student and member of Buckeyes for Concealed Carry on Campus, was murdered at a residence near campus in early January. Last week, student Reagan Tokes, 21, was kidnapped, raped and murdered.

“In a just and sane world, Reagan Tokes would have been taught not to fear firearms, but to accept them as tools for her defense,” Buckeyes for Concealed Carry on Campus posted on Facebook in response to her death. “In a just and sane world, Reagan Tokes would have grown up in a culture that supported her right to self-defense and a culture that promoted such.”

Underiner had testified at the Ohio Statehouse in December for the right to allow concealed carry at public universities. During his testimony, he stated that “college campuses and the areas surrounding them present environments rich with potential victims. They’re willing to gamble we’re unarmed and it pays off.”

RJ Martin may be a minority on Ohio State’s Undergraduate Student Government, but he's part of a growing majority of Americans who know the truth: the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. And the only thing the school is accomplishing by prohibiting students their right to chose to bear arms for self-defense is ensuring that there are tens of thousands of defenseless targets on campus, and delaying the time until help arrives when an attack occurs.

Chad D. Baus is the Buckeye Firearms Association Secretary, BFA PAC Vice Chairman, and an NRA-certified firearms instructor. He is the editor of BuckeyeFirearms.org, which received the Outdoor Writers of Ohio 2013 Supporting Member Award for Best Website.