Every week the editorial board reflects on a current issue in Our View. The position taken does not reflect the opinons of everyone on the Hilltop Views staff.

On Sept. 16, Aaron Alexis, 34, a man with an evident history of schizophrenia, shot and killed 12 people on the Washington Navy Yard. Alexis had full clearance to enter the Navy Yard, guns in tow. Alexis had a history of mental health problems which ultimately drove him to the extreme point of murder. The laws that prohibit gun purchases are too relaxed when anybody, even those with a history of mental health issues, can buy a gun.

As college students who congregate on a college campus, we should be concerned about guns here at St. Edward’s. The question is whether we should permit guns for the sake of self-defense.

In the case that a mentally ill person walks onto our campus and starts indiscriminately shooting students, in theory, the students should not be helpless because they are toting their own weapons. Say this was the case, then any student with a gun that happen to be at eyeshot of the deranged shooter, could freely shoot back at them. Here, we would risk rogue shots from all potential directions. Surely, it would be better to have stricter regulations than to have a huge number of students walking freely with their concealed or unconcealed weapons.

This is the school’s current stance on guns: “Bringing of weapons or firearms of any kind on university premises, in university parking lots, or while conducting university business (except by law enforcement personnel or by others storage or transportation in a locked vehicle in full compliance with Section 411.2032 of the Texas Government Code); and possession of firearms is prohibited while on campus.”

So, while our country struggles to find the resolution to end gun violence, or at least, limit the unnecessary shootings, we must hold true to this stance. As a community, we have a social contract with law protection. For us UPD currently maintains this contract. They are few and vigilant, and we continue to trust them. Permitting policemen to carry guns while the majority of us do not does not turn this school into a police state, it should be argued.

The shooting at the Navy Yard is not the first instance of a person with mental health problems— Adam Lanza also had mental heath issues. After the Sandy Hook shooting on Dec. 12, Obama’s effort to restrict the nation’s ability to access violent weapons failed.

Obama has spoken on the behalf of shootings five vtimes, a national statistic of horrid proportions. A gun control bill was in Congress, but it failed due to the National Rifle Association threatening some members of Congress. Putting more guns in the hands of college students and faculty is not the solution to stopping these mass shooting rampages.