Everyone wants to “do something” to help another human being, especially in an emergency, like an active killer in a school or other public venue. Good people want to help.
While we teach CPR, first aid, how to use a fire extinguisher if conditions permit, etc., we can also teach non-cops how to use a gun in a defensive use of force situation. Like the first aid kit, the gun in this context is a life safety rescue tool. Like cops, citizens using guns in such situations, most often without firing a shot, deter crime and attacks far more often than with shots fired. Millions of people have been so trained over the last decades. A gun is not a “good” or “bad” talisman of some sort, it is just a tool. There are no “good” or “bad” knives, they all cut. I am reminded of seeing retired, now deceased Chief of Spokane Police Terry Mangan, holding up two identical Glock pistols on TV. One was his duty pistol and the other was just taken from a criminal at a drug house. He asked, “Which is the ‘bad’ gun?”
When those of us who have knowledge of what constitutes real security watch talking heads and politicians test the political winds as they have a “discussion” we commonly think, “What the hell is this guy talking about?” In this instance, it is because we know that they DON’T know what they are talking about. We wouldn’t stand for ignorance in life and death matters from a doctor, nurse, or paramedic. Why do we listen to ignorant (not necessarily stupid) people when it comes to school and other public venue security?
We let the ignorant, or worse, the political ideologue with an agenda dictate policy that gets people killed. But, hey, they have good intentions, right? Well, as history shows, the road to Hell is often paved with good intentions. This is what “gun free” zones do, get innocents killed. Why don’t we learn from the surviving killers who tell us that they picked such locations because they knew they would not face opposition and could kill feely?
We know that in the majority of these events that when faced by a cop, security officer, citizen, school principal, or teacher who is armed, that they will kill themselves or stop killing and surrender. This has occurred countless times and is not theory. Why can’t we acknowledge this?
Regardless of how we got here today, and whether one believes it is mental illness, psychotropic drugs, of which the MAJORITY, if not all, killers were on, the breakdown of the family, social disconnect, availability of guns, lack of compassion for others, or any combination of these and more, the fact is that the genie is out of the bottle. We need a practical solution for now, which should include allowing those school personnel so inclined, to be allowed to discreetly carry a firearm.
The utility of firearms far outweighs their criminal misuse or abuse in this country. Yes, a gun can be used to kill, just as a knife can be used to cut. Therein lies the utility. They are both tools that can and are used by criminals and the law abiding. The smaller, aberrant, misuse of a tool by a criminal minority does not result in a hue and cry to ban knives, cars, baseball bats, rocks, sticks, gasoline, etc., so why only guns? Perhaps everything is not as it appears and warrants more scrutiny from us all?
Recently we have seen school children paraded before the camera because they were victims. With all due respect and love to them, having suffered a frightening and traumatic event, they haven’t been on the planet long enough to have an opinion. Most are barely early teenagers, aren’t even old enough to drive, and have no knowledge of what constitutes real security.
Do you let your child run your house? Do they run your finances? Do they tell you when they get to come and go? Do they do your job or run your business? It is our job to make sure our kids are safe. I don’t want security theater, so my kid can FEEL safe. I want what I know works so that they can BE safe and STAY safe.
Political opportunists will use frightened and vulnerable children to advance their agenda. The ignorant but well-intentioned will continue to do the “opposite of right something” in many cases. Why do we allow either to aid and abet in the killing of our kids?
Many people, based on years of experience, believe that “gun control” is code for “gun prohibition.” Perhaps they have come to this conclusion because many politicians openly espouse this, and history supports this, so can one be blamed for believing them?
So, do we all “do something” that is right, and demand that politicians listen to INFORMED opinions, or do we continue to let them get us killed? If someone accidentally backs over you in the driveway or runs you over with malice and forethought, you are equally dead.
