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Comment by graemep | Hacker News Reader

Are Americans allowed to take guns to school? I would have thought most schools would ban guns?

On the other hand we did have guns in my school in the UK (only for use on the rifle range).

That said, I think it is very weird that Americans accept this level of regulation on what they do on their own property.

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By and large, no.

I’m not sure of any states / places that allow a student to bring a gun to school. A lot of schools have a police officer present, and I imagine they would typically be able to bring their gun. And some states are debating (or have authorized) allowing faculty to bring a gun to school; the caveat being (in most instances I have seen) said faculty would have to pass enhanced gun safety training.

HOAs serve a pretty useful purpose: to coarsely/imperfectly segregate people who want to live in an HOA away from people who would never want to live in an HOA and vice-versa.

Those two groups are somewhat prone to having conflicts with each other and HOAs let both be happier than if they were to be annoyed by living next to each other.

The only cases where students may possess firearms on school property of which I'm aware are when they are necessary for a school activity.

For example, my oldest daughter is involved on the trap team (a shotgun sport). Her firearm is cased and unloaded except on the shooting range itself, and practice is outside of normal school hours. In practice, that means she only has it in my vehicle when I'm taking her to practice or picking her up from practice. It's a non-issue.

As of about five years ago, when I went through instructor training for shooting sports, there had never been in an injury caused by youth shooting sports in our state in the ~100 year history of the program. Further, the group I was working with, 4-H, had a perfect safety record nation-wide. To muy knowledge that is still the case.

There’s plenty of places share there’s no restrictions like this. But people that live in communities have the right to regulate how community members use their property. It’s for the greater good.

I’d be fascinated to see the geographic and demographic distribution of HOAs. In American Suburbia basically every neighborhood I’ve seen has an HOA. But in some cities I’ve lived they seem completely absent.

I’m guessing there was a particular (white flighty) period of time and kind of people who really wanted these things. Neighborhoods built before this time don’t have them, and newer buildings (at least where I live) don’t seem to have them either. So these may be mostly phenomena of a specific period.

Every single condo or apartment also has a "HOA". They are just called something different.

When you buy a condo anywhere in the US, you also get a (sometimes huge) document of all the rules and regulations. You're also required to pay fees every month.

Nowadays you see them everywhere, but originally they were made popular with retirement communities (age restricted 55+) because the HOA is what is required to establish that restriction. Governments can't discriminate on age legally but an HOA gets an exception. In practice they often soft-discriminate in a plausibly deniable way on many other characteristics including SES, race, etc.

My parents are elderly and live in one. They have there share of stories, some of which are pretty bad. People have moved out solely due to conflicts. They kind of hate it actually. But I asked my dad if he agrees with all the enforcement and he said basically, well you don't want someone to paint their house purple. Which I think illustrates the preferences of people who seek these communities.

Students - generally, not allowed to bring guns to school (too young to legally own/carry).

Teachers/staff - depends on state/local laws.

I'm assuming the OP meant the lack of overall regulation that leads to be people illegally bringing guns to school (and using them).

A lot of them, yes. Half of U.S. states allow their schools or school districts to make their own rules regarding guns in schools. About a dozen states explicitly allow concealed firearms in schools.

Edit to help those confused about U.S. and states' laws: The 1990 Gun-free School Act doesn't apply to concealed firearms. 32 states allow teachers and school employees to bring guns to school (with some restrictions). States that explicitly allow concealed firearms in schools in some form or another are Alabama, Alaska, Idaho, Illinois, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah, and Wyoming.

... and none of them allow people <18 years old to carry a handgun on their person to school.

Armed (and trained) adults are very different from "gun-toting high-school students", which is what seems to be implied here.

An important distinction for sure, though I had assumed the opposite, which is that the GP was in disbelief that adults can bring guns to U.S. schools (and that it's totally obvious that children cannot).

When you're discussing our gun laws with foreigners, I guess you're right that it's always necessary to spell out the fine details, like the fact that we have separate rules for gun-toting people who are over 18 and gun-toting people who are under 18, because from their perspective it's almost certainly just one big jumble of insanity.

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