Last Wednesday, Feb. 18, despite the dreary and damp conditions, the LONGWOOD 32 held a lie-in behind the student union. The lie-in is a form of peaceful protest that the group, which was founded last semester by freshman Courtney Edwards, uses to protest easy-access gun laws and inform the public of the presence of gun show loopholes. On Wednesday, the group was filmed as part of a documentary on the fight for better gun laws in America. The group lay on the ground for three minutes to signify the amount of time it took for Virginia Tech shooter Seung-Hui Cho and others like him to purchase a firearm with the current gun show loophole.
The purpose of LONGWOOD 32 is to promote awareness on campus about gun violence and the lack of gun laws in Virginia. This was the second lie-in that the LONGWOOD 32 has participated in. There were 27 people who attended the protest. In addition to Edwards and other members of LONGWOOD 32, Lily Habtu also attended. Habtu is a survivor of the Virginia Tech shooting who was in a German classroom and was shot in the face and wrist when Cho went on his rampage. Abby Spangler, the founder of ProtestEasyGuns.com was also at the protest. Each of the women made speeches, all driving one point home: close gun-show loopholes.
The gun-show loophole that Edwards and other groups like LONGWOOD 32 are trying to close allows buyers to go to a gun show and buy a weapon from a private unlicensed dealer without getting a background check prior to purchasing the weapon. This is how Cho purchased his gun. Every year, hundreds of people are able to purchase guns without getting background checks. According to ProtestEasyGuns.com, there are approximately 5,000 gun shows a year, and about half of the weapons sold are by unlicensed dealers who do not perform background checks on their customers.
Edwards said she began the group last semester as part of an assignment in a leadership class. "We were given a civic agency project to choose some organization or group we felt strongly about and try to make a change in the world with that group." Edwards' friend, Nicole Regina White, was killed in the Virginia Tech massacre almost two years ago, and that pushed her to create this group. "Losing someone that close to me die to gun violence really affected me in ways I never thought possible."
The protest that the LONGWOOD 32 participated in behind the student union wasn't the first one that the group has done. One of the main goals of the LONGWOOD 32 and ProtestEasyGuns.com is to have a lie-in in every city in Virginia in order to try and close gun-show loopholes. Earlier this year, they did a protest on Richmond, Va., when the Crime Commission voted on whether or not to close the gun show loophole. The group was able to talk to legislators and then had a lie-in protest on the Capital lawn. "In our protests we have 32 individuals symbolizing the 32 students and teachers murdered at Virginia Tech, and the 32 Americans murdered by guns EVERY DAY in the United States," Edwards said.Sophomore Amanda Buckley, a member of LONGWOOD 32, said, "We are not against the purchasing and possession of firearms. We only want to make sure that guns are not getting into the hands of the wrong people." Edwards echoed her sentiments, saying, "We are not against hunters, guns for private protection or collectors of guns. We are for background checks."
The protest that was held Wednesday on campus was the 111th lie-in nationwide, with over 30 happening on April 16, 2008, which was the first anniversary of the Virginia Tech massacre. Virginia is one of 31 states including Washington, D.C. that has seen this type of protest about gun-show loopholes.
