Texas Students protest guns laws with dildos
"Is that a gun in your pocket, or are you just pleased to see me?" In the US, it's probably a gun – but at the University of Texas in Austin, students who don't like weapons are planning a protest that is truly below-the-belt.
From August next year, a new law will allow Texas students to carry concealed handguns in classrooms, dormitories and other college buildings, as long as they hold the appropriate gun licence. The measure, known as the "campus carry law", was passed earlier this year.
By contrast, students who bring sex toys onto campus run the risk of being reprimanded for obscenity under the Texas Penal Code and the university's rules.
Student Jessica Jin created the Facebook event for the "Campus Dildo Carry", which has more than 2000 attendees. Photo: Facebook
So, on the first day of class next August, thousands of students will arm themselves with plastic penises to demonstrate their displeasure with the new laws.
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"We are strapping gigantic swinging dildos to our backpacks in protest of campus carry," wrote student Jessica Jin, who created the Facebook event "Campus DILDO Carry".
"Just about as effective at protecting us from sociopathic shooters, but much safer for recreational play."
The University of Texas held public forums to discuss how to implement the new 'campus carry' law. Photo: AP
On Monday the proposed protest spread rapidly around the internet, with more than 2000 people vowing to attend. The spirit of the event was succinctly captured in the hashtag #CocksNotGlocks, which became the subject of much discussion on Twitter.
It comes after another horrific fortnight in the US for gun violence; on Friday, one student was killed and another man was wounded in a shooting at Texas Southern University in Houston. The same day, a first year student at Northern Arizona University shot four people near a dormitory, killing one.
That followed the murder of nine people at a community college in Oregon on October 1, a massacre that once again prompted an outpouring of national grief led by President Barack Obama. It was his 15th response to a mass shooting since taking office in 2009, CNN reported.
The campus carry law in Texas will allow students to carry concealed handguns inside buildings, including in the classroom. The final version of the law allowed private colleges to opt out and gave universities the right to declare certain zones as "gun-free".
Republican parliamentarians who proposed the bill said it was necessary for people's protection, the Texas Tribune reported in May.
"Time has come for us to protect the men and women of Texas who are carrying concealed on our campuses," said Allen Fletcher, a member of the state's House of Representatives.
Brian Birdwell, a Republican state senator, said it was a matter of constitutional rights. "I am duty-bound to protect Second Amendment rights parallel to private property rights," he said.
The University of Texas at Austin was the site of one of the worst campus shootings in US history. In 1966, former US Marine Charles Joseph Whitman killed 14 people and wounded 30 others while shooting from a tower on the campus. He also murdered his wife and mother earlier in the day.
Last week, a professor at the same university announced he would withdraw from the college due to the looming campus carry law, and instead spend a semester teaching at the University of Sydney.
In a letter to the university's president, economics professor emeritus Daniel S. Hamermesh said he felt the law would endanger his safety on campus.
"With a huge group of students, my perception is that the risk that a disgruntled student might bring a gun into the classroom and start shooting at me has been substantially enhanced by the concealed-carry law," he wrote. "Out of self-protection I have chosen to spend part of next Fall [autumn] at the University of Sydney, where, among other things, this risk seems lower."
Data from the Pew Research Centre shows that over the past 15 years, a growing number of Americans believe it is more important to "protect the right of Americans to own guns" than to "control gun ownership".
At the turn of the century, 66 per cent thought it was more important to control ownership. That has fallen to 50 per cent, while the number of Americans advocating the importance of gun rights rose to 47 per cent from 29 per cent.
The vast majority (about 80 per cent) of both Republican- and Democrat-aligned voters favour expanded background checks to prevent people with a mental illness or other red flags from obtaining guns.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/world/cocks-not-glocks-university-of-texas-students-to-protest-gun-laws-with-dildos-20151011-gk6j8w.html#ixzz3oLdInvwo
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Student Jessica Jin created the Facebook event for the "Campus Dildo Carry", which has more than 2000 attendees. Photo: Facebook
"We are strapping gigantic swinging dildos to our backpacks in protest of campus carry," wrote student Jessica Jin, who created the Facebook event "Campus DILDO Carry".
The University of Texas held public forums to discuss how to implement the new 'campus carry' law. Photo: AP
Texas Students protest guns laws with dildos
It seems that students at the University of Texas,
have decided to protest by using porn
against all those murderous maniacs in excess,
more of whom each day seem to be born.
.
Thus, music major Jessica Jin
has written of "Cocks not Glocks"
which to some may be a great sin
especially, to those Second Amendment Jocks
who might point out while that our Constitution
may (or may not?) give individuals the right to bear arms*
it would probably be a kind of Prostitution
to think this gives them also the right to bare charms.
Still, it's far from new to have such cacophonies,
because it's happened many, many times before.
Even, millennia ago, in a play by Aristophanes,
Fighting men were given a choice between Love or War.
His "Lysistrata" presented a similar tale concerning passion
though it was, as you might suspect,
rather more circumspect
in its anatomic detail , than is the current Austin fashion.... .
HZL
10/12/15
* Right to keep and bear arms - Wikipedia, the free ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_keep_and_bear_arms
The right to keep and bear arms (often referred to as the right to bear arms or to have arms) is the people's right to have their own arms for their defense as ...
Wikipedia
Second Amendment to the United States Constitution ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/.../Second_Amendment_to_the_Unite...
The right to bear arms in English history is believed to have been regarded in English law as an auxiliary to the long-established natural right of self-defense, ...
Wikipedia
Lysistrata Study Guide - Cummings Study Guides
www.cummingsstudyguides.net/Lysistrata.html
Weary of the conflict, an Athens housewife, Lysistrata, invites women from the warring regions to assemble at the Acropolis in Athens for an urgent meeting.
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