The Dresden School Board is “considering” the adoption of a gun policy. Rivendell Superintendent Mike Harris said the district’s attorney is “researching” the issue and preparing to draft a similar policy. According to a Valley News report last week, “He said he isn’t sure how far the policy will go or how enforcement of such a policy would work.” The same article reported, “Hanover Police Chief Charlie Dennis said his agency wouldn’t be able to enforce the (Dresden) policy because police departments can only enforce state laws.”

This equivocating language and cautious approach is infuriating. At times, and this is one of them, I think we have lost our collective minds. Millions of dollars of propaganda, particularly from the NRA, has created a climate where lethal weapons have a sacred place in our society despite prohibitions of all sorts of things and behaviors that represent no threat to anyone.

Here are some things that are prohibited in certain schools:

Spaghetti straps on a gown

Mid-thigh dress length

An exposed collarbone

A skirt falling above the knee

The “wrong” shade of green

A sleeveless top under a sweater

Leggings

Natural, curly hair of a girl of color

Darwin T-shirts

Chewing gum

Cheetos

Dancing

Hugging

But guns? Not so fast. We have to be extra cautious not to violate the tender sensibilities of gun owners. And things are getting worse, not better.

The Trump administration has promised to gut the 1990 Gun-Free School Zones Act. Sixty-four percent of Republicans support armed teachers. Ten states have passed laws allowing armed students and faculty members on college and university campuses. The unsupportable, unconscionable, inaccurate and offensive notion that an armed nation is a safe nation seems to dominate the propaganda. Twenty-eight dead bodies at Sandy Hook Elementary School had no effect on our collective conscience. If only the teachers had been armed, the gun advocates say.

This national disease has persisted because of the Second Amendment. The vague language therein was interpreted by the Supreme Court to give individuals the constitutional right to bear arms. It was a misguided and extraordinarily dangerous decision. Arcane language and case law aside, the judgment provided cover for every individual and every organization that presses for more guns. More guns. And more guns. Every tragedy sparks a surge in gun sales. Americans now own an estimated 270 million guns. Because of the supposedly sacred Second Amendment, relentless propaganda and cowardly politicians, guns are becoming the only thing in America that may not be prohibited. You can’t enter a restaurant without shirt and shoes, but your .44 magnum is more than welcome. The bare chest and feet are, of course, considered health hazards.

Is not something profoundly crazy in America when a student who shows a spaghetti strap has no rights and gun-toting teachers or (on a college campus) students have the weight of the Supreme Court behind their aggressive, intimidating, anti-social choice?

Shouldn’t a civilized society be free to craft any law or regulation that disallows the possession of an object designed to kill? I’ve written about guns many times in the Valley News and on Huffington Post. I’ve been invited to “pry guns from cold, dead hands.” I’ve been dared to “try to take my gun away, you pathetic snowflake.” I suppose I’ll get a few similar responses to this column.

I say the hell with the Second Amendment or the cowardly legislators who have enabled an epidemic of guns and self-righteous displays of power. This issue needs civil disobedience and moral courage. A school board should not cautiously deliberate a “no-gun policy.” They should do it, do it now, and let the legal challenges come if they must. If I were a principal of a public school or the president of a college in a state where concealed carry was legal, I’d stand in the doorway and say, “Not in my school,” or “Not on my campus.” Arrest me if you must.

We are willing to restrict women and girls from coloring their hair, or showing a collarbone, or a portion of a breast. We don’t want our boys to wear sagging pants or, for goodness sake, a collarless shirt. But we will rub our chins judiciously and contemplate whether we have the legal right or moral authority to keep deadly weapons out of and away from our schools.

The examples I gave above are real — and silly — but the point is germane. We should be reluctant to prohibit individual expression or behavior that harms no other person. But in America we have it upside down. You can’t expose your thigh, but you can carry a gun on it.

I’d rather live in a society where it is legal to bare breasts and illegal to bear arms.

Steve Nelson lives in Sharon and New York City, where he is the head of the Calhoun School, a private school. He can be reached at steve.nelson@calhoun.org.