What good are 'weapon free zones'

[larryh1108]

I'd love to see a poll tomorrow of parents with school age kids who would favor some teachers carrying concealed at schools. Many of these tragedies are at schools because the shooters know there will be no resistance. I'd sleep better knowing that my kid's school encouraged concealed carry for the staff. Why are schools treated so reverently? Courtrooms make sense, but why schools? Don't our kids need the most protection? This is a stupid law that has proven, time and again, to encourage this type of violence, not discourage it.

 

[Isaac-1]

What we have to do is get our thoughts out there, buy advertising on billboards, etc. saying Gun Free Zones are Victim Disarmament Zones (reword as needed to sound catchy), get a slogan that people will remember and drill it into them. The truth of the statement is clear enough that once most people hear it then it will make sense, and every time they hear or see Gun Free Zone it will come back to mind. The problem is now people never hear that statement in the media and they don't tend to think of it themselves.

ps. I agree arm the teachers, better yet offer them continuing education credits for weapons training

 

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

Today's tragedy in CT show the uselessness of this "feel good" gun control activist favorite. Had one of the teachers or the principal (who was killed) had a CCW the carnage inflicted on the most innocent among us would have been greatly attenuated. Were else can a nut case inflict the most harm but a place they know there will be no other firearms but theirs.

And yet, if people on THR are to be believed, the only role that CCW carrier should have played is as a "good witness". We talk and talk about how a law abiding citizen with a gun could stop a shooting at a mall, school, theater, etc. as a great reason why guns should be allowed in those places. And yet the attitude of most people, at least on THR, who already do carry is that their gun is for "me and mine" and "a CPL doesn't make you a cop/come with a cape" etc.

I understand at the base of it, the only reason needed to carry in any of those places is that it's our right to do so. Nothing else is necessary.

But if we're going to keep trotting out the "a CCW holder could have prevented this" line, why do we then turn around and advise everyone to avoid actually using the CCW to protect other people? "Be a good witness" and so forth.

 

[harrygunner]

Logically and practically, they are the exact opposite of what should be done.

If a resource is precious enough to inspire thoughts of creating a "gun free zone", then that should trigger the action to have discrete armed personnel in that zone.

Look at how the safety of world leaders is guarded. No matter what measures are taken in a larger sense, leaders have armed guards nearby. Within secured areas behind metal detectors, they still have nearby defenders.

Enabling everyone to be able to be armed near their precious resources makes the same kind of sense.

 

[Warp]

"Gun free zones" are just another name for "criminal empowerment zones"

Unless every single person entering the facility/building/area has to go through security manned by armed sworn peace officers, it is not a gun free zone...it is an "armed law abiding citizen free" zone

 

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

Well, in a post apocalyptic world I plan to do all my food gathering in gun free zones...my neighbors house, for example.

I hope that was entirely a joke.

 

[larryh1108]

We are not cops. However, if you are in a school, every kid there is your family. Do you stay a witness until the gun sights are on you? Do you run out the back door and leave the kids to fend for themselves? This is up to the individual but I think a teacher or principal would see it as protecting family.

In a movie theatre with limited exits the guy could turn the sights on you in a heartbeat. You would be protecting yourself or family unless you were next to the exit. At that point you decide if you try to save lives or save your own life. We are not cops.

At a mall, if it's in the store you are and you are right there, you defend yourself. If it is happening in a store at the end of the mall you don't fly down there to be a hero unless you know your family is in that store or close by.

Carrying means carrying responsibilities. Nothing is cut and dried. However, if you are close enough to smell his breath then you need to do what you can to stop him, IMO.

 

[Shadow 7D]

Ragner, you have some ideas that go crosswise what many say,
you want to go off, OK, you have your own thread

But if we're going to keep trotting out the "a CCW holder could have prevented this" line, why do we then turn around and advise everyone to avoid actually using the CCW to protect other people? "Be a good witness" and so forth.

PLEASE DON'T DRIFT MINE
here is the short,
guy running with gun, kids being shot,
how many times do you shoot him
is he a cop, is he the BG
NO, he is YOU, your widow will likely get a condolence letter from the cops...
Real life isn't a video game, doesn't come with uniforms and the cops will shoot you just as quickly as the bad guy.
AND WOULD INTERVENE AT THE BEGINNING stopping the shooting, and therefore by the time the cops/other teachers (who would know who should and shouldn't be there MUCH better than you...) either only the BG would be standing or it would be over.

I'm for arming teachers, but the difference is, they are INSIDE, and likely to be much easier to identify/intervene than YOU.


Now, how you do convey that to the general public, that more guns, not less is the answer?

 

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

It's not thread drift. What good is having a weapon in a school if no one chooses to use it at the time it would be needed? What difference does it make if it's an armed teacher vs. an armed parent picking up a kid from school at the time of the shooting? Teachers aren't trained in shooting. They're not cops or soldiers. Their job is to teach. So shouldn't they also just use their gun, if allowed to have one, to protect themselves and their families, and be a good witness for everyone else?

 

[Shadow 7D]

AND WOULD INTERVENE AT THE BEGINNING

You say you are a cop, care to share Dep. policy on active shooters
bet you money that 'first officer responding run into building gun drawn' isn't on the top of the list of 'ideal' responses, you need to know where he is, where other people responding are etc. The difference between an immediate person who has witnessed what has happened responding and a bystander is UNDERSTANDING of what happened, and KNOWLEDGE of who is doing what.

If the teacher is shot down, and you see and know who to shoot at, that is different than running in from outside (your scenario and what the Anti's often portray)

See in the second, you don't know who, or where, or even exactly what happened
and this is flogged by anti's, you MUST make the dichotomy, and explain that if there were armed people there able to prevent or immediately intervene, what difference that would make, vs. waiting for SWAT and the hours of room by room...

 

[Sam1911]

A teacher in a school confronted by a mass killer invading his/her well-known, daily place of employment, and targeting his/her co-workers and students does not face very many of the uncertainties and risks of responding forcefully that we've so thoroughly explored in the other thread. The questions of what's going on, who's the bad guy, who are the innocents, and is this a mutual-combatant situation are utterly absent for the teacher.

Also greatly reduced is the issue of needing to go to the trouble -- the teacher is already THERE -- and the teacher's first responsibility is to get his/her students to safety before responding in any other way.

No-one in the other thread said that there could not be conditions which would make it necessary and proper and right to respond with force.

 

[Bohemus]

I spend four years carrying pistol (and sometimes SBR) at my university and I wasnt alone - yet we had not a single attempt of shooting spree.

Gun free zones are death traps.

 

[Sam1911]

You say you are a cop, care to share Dep. policy on active shooters
bet you money that 'first officer responding run into building gun drawn' isn't on the top of the list of 'ideal' responses, you need to know where he is, where other people responding are etc. The difference between an immediate person who has witnessed what has happened responding and a bystander is UNDERSTANDING of what happened, and KNOWLEDGE of who is doing what.

Actually, I have trained with officers who have responded to active shooter at a school situations, and I was told that they absolutely DID enter the building immediately and go hunting rather than waiting for the SWAT team to get suited up and arrive on site.

 

[Warp]

You say you are a cop, care to share Dep. policy on active shooters
bet you money that 'first officer responding run into building gun drawn' isn't on the top of the list of 'ideal' responses, you need to know where he is, where other people responding are etc. The difference between an immediate person who has witnessed what has happened responding and a bystander is UNDERSTANDING of what happened, and KNOWLEDGE of who is doing what.

If the teacher is shot down, and you see and know who to shoot at, that is different than running in from outside (your scenario and what the Anti's often portray)

See in the second, you don't know who, or where, or even exactly what happened
and this is flogged by anti's, you MUST make the dichotomy, and explain that if there were armed people there able to prevent or immediately intervene, what difference that would make, vs. waiting for SWAT and the hours of room by room...

At my local Police Department the standard procedure does indeed call for the first officer on scene going in by themselves, unless back up is extremely close. Immediate action is preferred, they are only to wait and go in as a group if their fellow officers are basically just around the corner.

I know this for a fact.

 

[Shadow 7D]

yeah, I understand Sam, but that isn't what's written a the top of the SOP, I'm pretty sure 'find out the shooters location and inform officers' and 'Provide safe exit to clear building of people' were suggested actions before hunting alone, and we know the reason why, but that doesn't stop it from happening, and usually they had and idea or knew exactly where they should go once they got there.

OK, Warp and thank God it's changed, but still a cop is going in with a UNIFORM, and an idea of what's happening, relayed to him/coordinated by dispatch, some guy off the street evokes pretty much all the problems of an armed response, and of questionably value, considering that once the cops see him, he will be subdued.

The value of the CCW is defensive, offensively using it, opens a whole new can of worms.

 

[Warp]

yeah, I understand Sam, but that isn't what's written a the top of the SOP, I'm pretty sure 'find out the shooters location and inform officers' and 'Provide safe exit to clear building of people' were suggested actions before hunting alone, and we know the reason why, but that doesn't stop it from happening, and usually they had and idea or knew exactly where they should go once they got there.

That is written in the SOP (They call it the GDM, or General Directive's Manual) of my local police department. You don't stand around. You don't wait for a tactical team. You get the heck in there and do everything you can to neutralize the threat RIGHT NOW before any other children are harmed.

Plenty of others are written that way, too, post-Columbine.

 

[Shadow 7D]

things change in 5 years

 

[Pete D.]

Sticky

Did you guys read the Sticky posted by Al?

 

[blarby]

What good are 'weapon free zones'

good-for-noth·ing (gdfr-nthng)
n.
A person of little worth or usefulness.
adj.
B.Having little worth; useless.

 

[Sam1911]

Did you guys read the Sticky posted by Al?

I just did. And I completely agree. Let's give it some time.