What building a wall around a college after a shooting represents

3 min readOct 28, 2023

On the night of Tuesday, October 3rd, gunfire rang out on the campus of Morgan State University in Baltimore. Five people suffered non-life threatening injuries. The victims are four men and one woman. Their ages are 18–22. One of the victims is not a student of the school. The shooting took place outside of one of the school’s dorms during homecoming week.

An unnamed 17-year-old was apprehended in Washington, D.C., and charged with multiple counts of attempted murder. Still at large is 18-year-old Jovan Williams. Williams is considered armed and dangerous, and has an attempted murder warrant out for his arrest. Investigators believe the victims were not the intended targets. Instead, one person was said to be the target of both suspects. Williams is also wanted by US Marshals for an unrelated investigation into drugs and guns.

Now, some people may consider this a ‘minor’ shooting. After all, no one died in this shooting. But think about this. Five people had bullets pierce their flesh and potentially punch holes in their internal organs. Non-life threatening injuries could consist of conditions like paralysis. Organ wounds could require years of surgeries that could greatly diminish the victim’s quality of life. And it’s not like there’s a special fund to pay for the medical care of the victims. Just being the victim of a shooting can bankrupt a family due to the medical costs. So, please do not call this a minor shooting.

But what I really want to talk about is what the school intends to do in the aftermath of the shooting. The school has stated they plan to build a wall around the campus. To be fair, this isn’t a bad idea. The campus is in Baltimore, after all.

I’m more opposed to what the wall represents. Like most security upgrades to schools, it represents money that could be better well spent on education. Also, like most school security upgrades, this feels more like security theater than actual security.

A wall could also give the school an image of a campus that is not inviting for learning, and makes it look more like a prison. And since we’re talking about a Historically Black College and University (HBCU), that connotates an even more sinister image.

But what it really represents, at least to me, is that it doesn’t address the major root of the problem, and that’s the ease of access to guns. Schools shouldn’t be the ones who are addressing the problem, yet, here we are.

Don’t forget, we’re talking about a 17-year-old and an 18-year-old with guns. Under Maryland law, you have to be 21-years-old to legally own a handgun. While Maryland does have some pretty decent gun laws, It’s almost surrounded by states with lax gun laws. I’m looking at you, Virginia. And again, this isn’t even considering the gun show loophole and living room gun dealers. These are just some of the reasons why we need more stringent federal gun control laws.

The gun nerds love to bring up Chicago as an example of why gun control doesn’t work. They say gun violence is still prevalent in Chicago even though they banned gun sales within city limits. First of all, that hasn’t been true since 2014 when the law was struck down for being unconstitutional. And secondly, that never stopped anyone from going to Kentucky, or Missouri, or Iowa, etc. from getting guns there.

Then they’ll say the guns used in the Morgan State shooting were probably street guns. And they would probably be right. But what they’re forgetting is the majority of street guns used to belong to ‘responsible gun owners™’ who couldn’t keep their freedom toys secured.

(Sources)

What building a wall around a college after a shooting represents

Written by Trench Reynolds

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