Editorial: New gun law may promote more violence

Editorial Board

As of July 1, 2015 Kansas gun owners will no longer be required to have a permit for concealed carry.

They will still be required to go through the previous measures to obtain the weapon, but will no longer need any type of certification or training to carry concealed firearms. Kansas Governor Sam Brownback claimed that gun owners have proven that they’re responsible, therefore no longer needing to take the eight hour course before being allowed to concealed carry. With the signing of this law the Mentor editorial board met to discuss possible repercussions and whether or not the law is justified.

The first concern raised was that the new law may increase the number of homicides and just lead to less public safety in general, which is the opposite of the reasoning given as to why guns should be carried in the first place. When you make weapons more available, in a sense of there and ready, you increase the chance that someone is going to act impulsively or out of anger and harm another person. In a society where people are running around armed, and with nobody knowing who’s packing and who isn’t, you create two things — paranoia and opportunity. In an instance where the average citizen would usually be satisfied to flip someone the bird or scream into their steering wheel, we now have the possibility that they’ll pull the handgun out from under their seat and fire. Plus, if people feel that more individuals are armed in public they may feel the need to purchase a gun to make them feel secure, even if they don’t know how to properly use it.

Another issue is that if we’re no longer requiring permits it’s just going to become more difficult to keep track of who should and shouldn’t be carrying concealed weapons. While it’s understandable that we have the right to bare arms and should be allowed to exercise this right, there still needs to be some control and regulations to protect Kansans from themselves and each other. Officers will probably become less and less likely to those carrying weapons when there is no longer a permit gun owners carrying concealed weapons are required to have.