Would More Gun Training Have Helped at VT?

Status
Not open for further replies.
R

ReadyontheRight

Member
Joined
Dec 28, 2002
Messages
4,337
Location
Minnesota - nine months of ice and snow...three mo
The idiot murderer at VT stopped to reload many times.

In your opinion, would more training on gun safety for those he was targeting have stopped the killings sooner? I am not talking about someone with a CCW, but someone who knows guns who could have shouted "let's get him, he's reloading".

It seems to me that many who have zero gun experience seem to think it's some sort of magic wand and gives the "gunman":rolleyes: some sort of unlimited power.
 
I believe that would be the case as a similar incident at the White House years ago (pause to reload a semi-AK) allowed a couple of people who knew adequate time to tackle that guy (shooter was from CO IIRC) and the incident in a Seattle H.S. (?) about 10 years ago when a couple of other students recognized the reload pause and came down hard on him (didn't that shooter also kill his parent's before his school shootup?).
 
It depended on the exact circumstance. In a close quarters room, you have a chance to get to him. In the LIRR shooting and the OR classroom, that was done.

In a lecture class like I use, if the shooter had a 33 round mag or even 15s, the distances and lack of mobility to get out of the rows, would make a charge very difficult against a decent shooter.

We tried a simulation in this later case the other day, just airgunning for a quick test. No could get near me without being shot or at least me getting a sight picture with me finger (remember this was a spur of the moment test - not some NTI simulation) get a finger sight picture and going bang at a speed of spots similar to my IDPA rate.

In that room, there was nothing you could overturn or reasonable throw if faced with a surprise shooter.

If you had warning, that's different - you might barricade or set up an ambush rush at the door (given the first ones will take a round).

This little experiment started quite an argument on the Insights list as some took offense to demonstrating that in some situations the 'proposed charge of warriors' probably would work.

So, it depends on the room and time. I suggest one goes to a standard set of college classrooms and play shooter or defender before blithely suggesting the charge of folks carrying staples, tossing books, frisbeeing laptops as guaranteed method of carrying the day, except if you were a 'sheeple'.

It depends.

A more reasonable approach to the problem is:

1. Get schools and other institutions to switch from their fear of being sued by the potential violent who is excluded from their joint, to worrying more about the victim. I have some experience in this area and administrators are MORE worried that a kid or worker thrown off campus for being seen as a threat will sue them as compared to having to pay off your family when you are dead. Change the laws if need be so that no person excluded from an institution for demonstrated threats of violence, stalking, violent acts or the like can sue that institution if the case made against them is true.

2. Have state legislatures mandate that carry is allowed at all state and private institutions unless their is a technical reason (no guns by the MRI). The private part is interesting as conservatives who prattle about carry also sometimes prattle about private rights being more important. I've said before that this is some archaic social crap. If you open yourself to the public as a business or school, then you give up your ability to make me not able to defend myself.

If your place is your castle, then get off the public dole of fire and police protection. Have your serfs and lords defend you and don't call 911 ever.

1 and 2 are more important than plans to kung fu a laptop freebee across a giant classroom.

Like I said, check out rooms - if you are close - go for it. It most classrooms I work in - it is bulldoody to suggest the kids had an easy charge route to the shooter.

PS - the simulation was carried out after a student raised the issue that some folks were saying that the students could have charged the shooter. Since this was a research design class - I posed this was an empirical question and we could design a test. The students agreed to the test. It was not designed before class as a political statement.
 
Last edited:
In my mind, the training is secondary. The most important thing is to have an apprecation that these kinds of things happen, and that you can't protect yourself by sitting there, waiting to be shot. Even at the most rudimentary level, that keeps your brain from saying "What's happening?" and just sitting there, and actually taking some action, any action.

Training would absolutely help, but how many people are going to practice disarming an active shooter? But everyone can consider what the possible threats are and what they might do.

Of course, the best defense would be to allow CC on campus.
 
In any event where you cannot exit fighting back is a better option,
self-preservation has kept many soldiers alive. The idea of sitting still
while someone shoots me is like cutting my own finger off and not pulling back
my hand as the axe falls..
 
I think everyone has seen enough tv and movies to know what a reload is. If you have people on the floor under desks or otherwise seeking some sort of cover I dont know that you can expect them to cover enough ground in the small amount of time a reload take. Plus the shooter has 2 guns. Thats assuming he shot to slide lock too.
 
The only thing that might have helped would have been permitting CCW on campus. That is not prevention, it's a possible cure. And frankly if CCW had been permitted, I don't think the chances of an armed person willing to act being on scene would have been much greater then the chance of a police officer being on scene. But it's a chance when before there was none.

Jeff
 
i think it would be something good to hold Active Shooter classes for CCWers as well. currently almost all Active Shooter courses are reserved for mil/LE guys. there is a class here in TX but it is only for mil/LE.

any thoughts on this? i could throw one together if there was any interest.
 
Another Thought

Dr. Laura touched on this ...

Kids are not being raised right.
Not all, still way too many of the past decades of kids being raised , are not being exposed and parented in the realities of Life.

Parents are
(1) letting others Indoctrinate their kids, through school, TV and and other sensory input means.
(2) not being involved and/or do not have any idea what brainwashing, propaganda or indoctrinations their kids are being exposed to.


Firearms were part of growing up and the Life Lessons of being a Responsible Person.

Free thinkers, Problem solving, Self Sufficient, Prepared, Adapt Improvise Overcome...

No 911 , no cell phones , no...

In my day, we had as many if not more Civil Defense Drills as we did Fire Drills.
Oh - blasting caps.
As the kids say we had umpteen bazillion lectures, films , pamphlets presented by Police, Fire Dept, Construction Crews about blasting caps.

"Just like the Firearm Safety you guys and gals were raised with" - These Professionals shared.

Being raised with Firearms, and other Life Lessons - when Riots broke out, we all knew - even kids - what gunshots sounded like.

We knew best we could at whatever our ages were to take cover and what was cover, and what was concealment .

We knew a revolver held 5 or 6 shots, and had to be reloaded.
We knew a 1911 held 7 rounds in a USGI/ Colt magazine...
WE knew...firearms as we were around firearms, and shot firearms.

Oh, we learned this from Black and White TV shows about Cowboys, Army and other stuff too.

Parents are not raising kids, and kids grow up and desperately want to be matriculated into so many things like fishing, hunting and firearms.

TV and movies are computer graphic enhanced, the Ethics, Morals are not in these mediums - quite a bit of Indoctrination is.

Blasting caps were not evil, just a dangerous tool used in construction. Just something that required Responsible Handling and Respect.

These were not banned, just everyone was educated. So when we kids found one, some of us gathered around to keep others away, and two other kids went to a pay phone, used the dime "for emergencies only" and called the Police.

"Yes, we found a blasting cap at....".

Police and Fire Dept arrived first, then a guy from a Construction Company [Demo guy] and all was good.

They even gave the kid a dime back for the one used, and made sure the rest of us had our "emergency dimes".


How raised - what you do.

Not long ago I overhead a person call 911 to ask how long to set a microwave for a "nuked" potato.

Not how raised - or what you do.

--
Being raised with Firearms in the home - I do feel is "gun training" if you will.
So yes. being raised right with "gun training" very well could have assisted in this tragedy.
 
Personally, I'd say that more training may well have helped, but combining more training with someone armed and able to defend themselves = home run.

I personally believe it takes both, and that those of us who practice both, have better odds than those missing one or the other (or both).

Just my .01 of course
 
He shouldn't have been able to buy in the first place. That would have helped. More training about guns? I think it's human nature to run from a gunman. Most people won't even call the police when someone is being attacked or raped or something because they think someone else will call the police/do something.
 
chabanais -- It's human nature to run from a gunman, as it should be. Running away should be the first thing the schools do in these situations.

The thing is...so often these murdering idiots line up people and start shooting them. My point is, with ZERO knowledge of firearms, except from TV and games, most folks do not realize how difficult it is to actually hit your target. (And they think you reload by shooting off screen.)
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top