To the editor:

Wednesday's editorial "Vandy students need guns" represents a new low in Hustler editorial content in the few years I've been here. I imagine some Vanderbilt veterans have rarely seen worse in careers much longer than mine.

I was a tour guide during my undergraduate years here, and the tours I led after the Virginia Tech tragedy certainly saw an increase in safety-related questions from prospective students and their parents. I confess that my thorough descriptions of Vandy Vans, walking escorts and AlertVU to these visitors likely failed to be the reactionary heroism we so often crave when faced with tragedy. But there is not an ounce of me that would rather have told these students and parents that our response had been to seek eased restrictions on gun availability for members of the Vanderbilt community.

We are students on a campus where shots were fired in a residence hall three years ago. Our nation and world are still reeling, a year and a half later, from the unbelievable events at Virginia Tech. In the wake of these tragedies (and others like them), I am astounded and confused by the belief that guns are, in fact, part of the solution. That bright students at a leading university would publish an editorial affirming this belief is equally perplexing.

Stuart Hill

Graduate Student

Peabody College