Gun rights advocates are staging a mock mass shooting at the University of Texas campus this weekend in an alleged attempt to illustrate the importance of arming civilians, according to the Austin Statesman. 

The advocacy groups Come and Take It Texas and DontComply.com have hired actors who will apparently portray a mass shooting with cardboard guns, fake blood, and the sound of gunfire amplified over a stereo on Saturday.

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These groups, as many gun advocacy groups often allege, believe that the recent massacres in Paris, Colorado Springs and San Bernardino occurred because no one was able to defend themselves, Think Progress reports.

“People were able to be murdered because no one was armed,” Matthew Short, a representative for the groups, told the Austin Statesman. 

Prior to the mock mass shooting, the groups have organized and “Open Carry Walk to End Gun Free Zones in Texas.” The advocates plan to walk with their “rifles and legal pistols” down Guadalupe St next to UT's campus.

DontComply.com - dontcomply.com

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DontComply argues that arming people can help prevent mass shootings. They wrote the following on their event page:

“Gun Free Zones are killing us. These target rich environments are letting our children be murdered by evil people. Now is the time to stand up, take a walk, and put pressure on politicians to ban Gun Free Zones.

Open carry on campus

The gun advocacy groups in Texas believe that allowing people to bring concealed weapons onto school campuses is better for safety. 

“We want criminals to fear the public being armed,” Short told the Austin Statesman. “An armed society is a polite society.”

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Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) signed legislation in June 2015 that allowed people to carry concealed firearms at public colleges and universities in the state, according to a Texas NBC affiliate. The law allows for college presidents to designate “gun-free zones,” which is what the guns rights groups are protesting. 

Does arming civilians actually stop mass shootings?

Flickr/gcfairch - flic.kr

According to the Trace, research has been conducted that looks into whether or not gun-free zones attract shooters.

The best current statistical model, the Trace cites, suggests that concealed-carry laws actually increase the rate of aggravated assaults. Furthermore, an in-depth investigation led by Mother Jones found that not one of 62 mass shootings in the U.S. in the past 30 years has been stopped by gun-touting vigilantes.

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Two people who tried to intervene in mass shootings in recent years were gravely wounded or killed, Mother Jones reports.

The campus carry law is set to take effect on Jan. 1, 2016, according to ThinkProgress.