I respect Andrew Sugg’s interest in the safety of his fellow Baylor University students. He seems capable and wholly responsible.

When he talks about college students arming themselves, though, I’m sorry: I can only think of my one-time neighbor Cletus — shirtless, shoeless and armed to kill.

We’ll talk about Cletus in a moment, but first young Andrew. He’s formed a Baylor chapter of Students for Concealed Carry on Campus.

As has happened at several other venues, the Baylor group wants to arm students to avert such events as befell Virginia Tech University and Columbine High School.

This is part and parcel of a mini backlash against gun-free zones. It brought Texas Gov. Rick Perry into the fray to say that no place should be off-limits for a firearm in licensed hands.

If we take a deep breath we all, or most of us, know why guns are kept off campuses and in various public and private venues. It’s because we don’t want civilians taking the law into their own hands in these venues. It’s because of the potential for accidents, miscalculations and presumptive vigilante justice.

The fear that lots and lots of guns make things less safe is not an irrational one. It’s a mathematical one. Count the number of accidental gun deaths in your community. Now count the number of school massacres in your community.

Ah, but those Andrew Sugg has in mind are licensed concealed-gun carriers, you see. So, relax. They’re packing for you.

Sorry if I feel ill at ease.

My predisposition about this has to do with the predispositions of many who go out to get that gun and the license to haul it.

Put maybe too indelicately, that condition is paranoia. Fear. A grudge. A world-view that “they” are out to get “us.” A personal or figurative score to settle.

This brings us back to Cletus, which is not his real name.

He was licensed to carry before Texans had a license to carry. He’d been deputized once. Far be it from me to cast aspersions about southern deputies, but having him armed and nearby did not make me feel safer.

One day there was a disturbance down the block. I don’t remember what. I just remember Cletus, shirtless, much of him hanging out over the elastic of his pajama bottoms, chugging down the street with a revolver in hand. He was going to keep the peace.

Thank God no shots were fired. He had no business, deputy or not, adjudicating whatever was happening down the street.

As for college students packing heat, even with licenses and the proper training, I remember being a college student. I remember college students.

I think of a college student who once wobbled down to the dorm cafeteria for breakfast, tried to sit in the chair he chose and missed.

The term “freshman 15” refers to the weight most new college students pack on through starchy dorm food. They don’t need to pack anything else.

It’s true that people of college age are enlisted and conscripted to tote weapons and fight wars. But someone drills them into submission and puts the “we” before the “I” in their heads.

Sorry, but when I think of armed civilians, for some reason I don’t picture them thinking “we.”

I picture them thinking “me.”

That’s OK. Self-defense is everyone’s right and obligation. But when it comes to defending the rest of us in public venues, I prefer to put matters in the hands of professionals who keep their shirts on.

John Young’s column appears Thursday and Sunday. E-mail: jyoung@wacotrib.com.