[Todd]

I'm not looking forward to the coming months. It's going to be a political circus, with each side clamoring to push or protect their already strongly held beliefs and positions.

I really wish we would have a meaningful debate over the best tools and strategies for protecting people in large groups in public places. Because of the delay of so-called first responders, it is really left to the people who are there to take action.

Outside of banning and confiscating all guns, gun control isn't going to solve the problem. People with criminal intent will always find a way to carry out their plans (c.f. the recent spate of knife attacks in China).

We need defensive and offensive measures to minimize harm. I believe the lockdown plan put into action at the school probably saved more lives than any other one thing, until the police arrived. So giving schools more tools for effective plans like this would probably help.

On the offensive side, teachers and staff were left to fight guns with their hands. If they had had a weapon of their own (tasers or guns with rubber bullets, for example), they would have stood a better chance of minimizing harm. We allow pilots to carry weapons if they so choose and it is probably at least somewhat effective as a random deterrent, in addition to providing some actual protection.

Sadly, I don't think this line of thinking will come up. This thing is going to be played out largely in Washington, where entrenched groups will be mostly pushing existing agendae, not thinking in new ways to actually minimize the problem.

[rictic]

Putting weapons in the hands of teachers and other school officials makes intuitive sense, however the case where it will need to be used is very rare, yet to be useful the weapons will need to be readily available at all times. As a result, it's plausible that the total magnitude of injury would be higher due to accident, misuse, etc.

[smacktoward]

Not to mention that the weapons stored in the schools would be a tempting target for theft, or for commandeered use by a hostile intruder.

After all, how elaborate are the protections they are stored behind likely to be? Not very, when you consider that (1) if the weapons are ever needed they'll need to be able to be gotten to fast, and (2) the people responsible for storing them are going to be middle school administrators, not military quartermasters.

[jack-r-abbit]

Exactly. I want teachers to focus on teaching our kids (and some can't even do that... 'nother topic). I would rather have the protection of our kids left to people who are trained and ready for that. One thing is securing entry to the school. It sounds like the CT school had measures in place to keep out the random creep that might wander in but that didn't stop a kid from blasting his way in. Would bullet-proof glass (or some other similar barrier) at his entry point have saved their lives?

[jwhitlark]

Fortresses, particularly those without an active defense, have a bad track record. Shields don't work without the ability to hit back. Or, as the saying goes, "It takes two sides to have a battle, but only one to have a massacre."

[jack-r-abbit]

Well, slowing a person down with a little harder to get through first barrier gives more time between first notice and first action. Some times just buying enough time to hide/flee can save lives.

[gonzo]

perhaps we could employ retired police officers as "school guards".

They have the training. Many of them are still in their 40s and 50s.

[bsg75]

In some states, non-active LEOs (Law Enforcement Officers) would be prevented by law from being armed, especially as private citizens on school property. H.R.218 is not widely accepted enough to provide for this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_Enforcement_Officers_Safety...)

In my state many middle and high schools have assigned SROs (School Resource Officers / Deputies), whose primary role is not protection, but to work with students. The secondary benefit is the presence an armed, actively trained LEO who could respond to an active shooter.

While many would decry the costs of adding these SROs to every Elementary - High School, the cost would likely be insignificant (in terms of money and effect) to turning schools into secured facilities (with prison like barriers).

http://www.tricities.com/news/local/article_a66f42d4-4806-11...

[bsg75]

Came across an article proposing this: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/breakingnews/os-or...

To which one of the first comments is "How are we going to pay for these SROs in Elemtary Schools now?"

My suggestion would be fewer police activities in other nations.

[jack-r-abbit]

just to clarify, I was not advocating prison like barriers. I don't know the name of the type glass that is not bullet proof, per se, but even when penetrated with a bullet it still would not allow entry. I've seen glass that has the criss-cross wires in it that is not bullet proof, but the wires make it very difficult to smash out/though. Obviously I don't know the specifics of exactly how he gained entry other than the reported "shot his way in". But if it had taken him 30-60 secs longer to get in... would some lives have been saved?

[bsg75]

> just to clarify, I was not advocating prison like barriers

Nor did I think you were, but added due to other comments I have seen in the media.

What I did not add / explain in my prior post is that one LEO salary per school (a M-F 7A-3P job) is both something that could be implemented very quickly, without the time and costs associated with reinforcing schools.

[hga]

It is plausible, but on the other hand, how rare are fires in schools? We extensively prepare for those (and as it goes, something like 19 out of the top 20 mass murders in the US were arsons).

"Readily available" can be addressed by concealed handguns that aren't too easy to get to; you might have to give an attacker a "first bite of the apple" in favor of making them too accessible. On the other hand, a few M4s in a quick to open safe in the principle's office ought to be doable, as long as the staffers there have the right attitudes, to "march towards the sound of canons".

And it's attitude above all that needs to be addressed, we don't take this threat seriously, perhaps in part because it's quite new as these things go (we'll ignore the far more deadly 1927 Bath school massacre done with explosives).

This school had a crust defense; once the perimeter was compromised by the attacker shooting out a window (according to the latest never very reliable reports) there was nothing left but for the teachers to interpose their bodies between the shooter and their charges. Which was no obstacle to him (one does wonder what it takes for someone who doesn't seem to have suffered from schizophrenia or mania to shoot a bunch of 5-6 year old children 3-11 times each ... I admit the existence of evil, won't claim to ever really understand it).

[Anechoic]

how rare are fires in schools? We extensively prepare for those

Teachers/staff prepare for those by knowing how to evacuate students from the schools and calling 911. They aren't expected to actually fight fires, aside from using a fire extinguisher.

"Readily available" can be addressed by concealed handguns that aren't too easy to get to; you might have to give an attacker a "first bite of the apple" in favor of making them too accessible. On the other hand, a few M4s in a quick to open safe in the principle's office ought to be doable, as long as the staffers there have the right attitudes, to "march towards the sound of canons".

In order for that to be effective and safe, those teachers/staffers will have to regularly train with those weapons in addition to their other duties. Look at the NYPD - we have a population (police) that are trained to use firearms and have to qualify at certain intervals and yet their rates of accidental firings were so high that they needed to have their handguns modified to reduce those accidents. Despite their training, their hitrate when they actually use their weapons on duty is abysmal.

Unless you have teachers/staff that are already firearms enthusiasts, they are probably going to be reluctant to add range time to their calendar, and putting a firearm in the hands of a poorly trained user will end badly.

[hga]

Surely the scale of a single active shooter matches something like using a fire extinguisher vs. "fighting a fire".

As for "effective and safe", so you'd think, and so did I (who started shooting in 1st grade in 1967 (sic)), but civilians with little or no training have demonstrated an amazing ability to responsibly use firearms in self-defense.

Police in general are not useful comparisons. They're required by their jobs to go in harm's way and frequently use their service handguns. The NYPD is a particularly poor example, they are run by people who don't understand guns and equip their men with ones that are particularly hard to shoot accurately---as you sort of note they prefer this vs. negligent discharges---and we learned after the recent debacle that their training, initial and continuing, is really subpar. And there are much better ways to avoid negligent discharges, the NYPD is the outlier here.

That's also why I suggested the option of M4 carbines. Long guns are a LOT easier to shoot correctly, skill with them doesn't seem to degrade like it's said to do with most people with handguns, with good choices of ammo they're more effective and less dangerous than handguns, etc.

[jbattle]

If the NYPD can't get it right, what's the chances of the Oswego IL school district getting it right? And each of the other ~100K public schools in the US?

[hga]

Much, much better. New York City is totally politicized, else they wouldn't have done something as insane as using FMJ ammo until too many innocent bystanders were hurt through over-penetration and ricochets. Places where this is too politicized won't even do this, otherwise there's a good chance that people with a clue will be involved. We do know how to do this correctly, and note again, the NYPD situation is with handguns, it doesn't apply to the M4s in a safe concept.

You know, people normally hold out New York City as an object lesson in how not to run one, I'm amazed by anyone who thinks otherwise.

[pbarnett]

I don't think that those of us who support teachers having firearms necessarily believe that every (or even most) teachers should have a firearm or be issued a firearm. I believe that carrying a firearm is a very personal choice and a very serious decision for an individual to make.

There currently exist laws that forbid law-abiding concealed carry permit holders from carrying firearms on school grounds. This law does not prevent dangerous people from bringing weapons into these zones and committing atrocities. Instead, I think we should really be encouraging teachers to make the commitment to go through the training process required for them to get their concealed handgun licenses and to regularly train to maintain safe gun-carrying habits. Perhaps teachers could receive some sort of compensation for having a concealed handgun license and engaging in regular firearms safety training.

I am sure that during the excruciatingly terrible events that took place in Newtown some teachers wished they had the means to defend the children and themselves. We should let teachers that want to legally and safely carry instruments of defense to do so. We shouldn't have laws that guarantee defenseless victims.

[tthomas48]

I concur. This is one of those cases where gut reaction proves to be a really bad idea after just a couple minutes of introspection.

[csense]

There are 20+ curious kids around; the teacher can't always watch everyone all the time.

The classroom presents special challenges not present in other situations when it comes to arming civilians.

[platform]

It is unlikely though. Basically if this logic have worked -- airline pilots would not have been armed (after 9/11). However many are, and many plain-dressed armed security agents board planes.

Schools, summer camps, sporting events, theaters, amusement parks, universities and other so-called gun-free zones -- are soft targets that are going to be exploited by criminals/terrorists (one just has to look at where those horrible acts were comitted in Russia (Beslan), Norway, US)

Just like the planes where in 9/11.

so training and arming a portion of the staff that is operating the facilities, as well as securing access -- is essential

Praying, reading books, closing doors and closets -- are not effective measures against evil-souled animals who are there to end their lives and to take as many people with them as possible.

There are schools that have been taking steps in this direction.

http://www.sacbee.com/2012/12/15/5056005/one-texas-school-le...

I would also venture to say that media coverage must change the protocol in cover this kinds of events things like a) name of the criminal must not be announced b) reasons/intent must not be announced/mentioned/discussed on broadcast networks c) number of victims

so that the media does not feed the possible copy cats.

[amckenna]

You can't say arming pilots and air-martials is the same as arming teachers and faculty. Arming a pilot who sits in a locked cockpit while they fly a plane for 3-12 hours, or a trained undercover officer is in a whole different league than arming teachers who interact with students for 7+ hours a day. Would you arm flight attendants?

[Todd]

I agree with you. It's not a clear-cut answer. I'm just hoping that we think more broadly about how to actually minimize harm.

If it were left to school boards, they could do things like require a stringent process to certify particular staff who have access to a cabinet, for example (this could include safety training, a background check, and psychological testing). Unfortunately, we have a zero tolerance position in most school systems (which makes sense for students, obviously). It will probably not even be considered due to existing bias.

[RyanMcGreal]

America has got to be the only country in the industrialized world where it seems reasonable to respond to mass shootings (and shootings in general) by suggesting that more people should have guns.

Here's a scatter plot of firearms per 100,000 and gun homocides per 100 for OECD countries:

http://i.imgur.com/ZAI3T.png

Needless to say, the dot in the top right corner is the USA>

Data is from here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2012/jul/22/gun-homi...

(Note: Mexico is excluded because its rate of gun violence is such a startling outlier that it squashes all the other values.)

[GVIrish]

Excluding Mexico is a huge disservice because Mexico actually has stricter gun laws than the US. Mexico's gun murder rate is over 3 times greater than that in the US.

I feel this is instructive because with all of the guns already in private hands in the US if they were banned outright today you'd end up with an enormous and uncontrollable black market. The same type of black market that exists in Mexico.

Even in the US now, the vast majority of gun crimes are committed with illegally obtained guns. Something on the order of greater than 90%.

[RyanMcGreal]

> Excluding Mexico is a huge disservice

Fair enough - the only reason I took it out was because it squashed all the other values into the bottom left corner so that you could no longer distinguish their relative positions. I still made sure to mention it because Mexico's case is instructive.

[jack-r-abbit]

The scale on that graphic is a little misleading. The spacing on the "gun homicides per 100K citizens" compared to the "firearms per 100 citizens" makes it look like the US has twice an many deaths as the next lowest just like they have twice as many guns. I don't know who is represented by the dot at 2.25 "gun homicides per 100K citizens" but the statistical difference between 2.25 and 3 when compared to 100K is not much. While that same dot represents 10 "firearms per 100 citizens". THAT dot seems to have a horrific kill rate. The US has 9 times more "firearms per 100 citizens" yet less than 1 additional "gun homicides per 100K citizens". Who is that dot?

Edit: Not saying the scale is misleading on purpose... just that it is misleading.

[grecy]

I believe this is because America was founded by violence, and the "I'll shoot you if you try to take what's mine" mentality that continues to this day.

It's not a peaceful place.

[jbattle]

Sorry - that's a pretty silly argument. Countries that formed through some form of peaceful negotiated settlement exist, but most formed either through conquest, revolution, or through an imposed partition. I don't have numbers on this, but running through examples in my head, especially for the developed countries I'm familiar with, I can only think of a handful.

I'm not sure what you have in mind when you say "founded by violence"...

Australia was at least as wicked with their aboriginal populations - and has a vastly lower level of gun violence.

The Netherlands was birthed in a revolution lasting 8 decades, and also has negligible gun violence.

[grecy]

Australia had neither a War of Independence, nor a Civil War.

Fun Fact: Most Australian's don't know the name of the first Prime Minister because it was so uneventful. A bunch of people sat down, signed some papers, and Australia was founded as a country.

[RyanMcGreal]

Lots of countries were founded by violence. Europe, for example, was convulsed by violence for most of the past thousand years leading right up to the middle of the last century.

One big difference in the USA is that the right to own guns was somehow inserted into its Constitution among the rights to expression, assembly, fair trial and so on. I can't think of any other countries in which owning a gun is explicitly listed among the set of human rights.

[hga]

It starts from the foundational document, the Declaration of Independence:

We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness

We have rights to life and liberty, and the right to private ownership of weapons acknowledged in the 2nd Amendment is an instrumentality to help ensure that. It should also be noted that the Bill of Rights (1st though 10 Amendments) were a price demanded by the Anti-Federalists for accepting the Constitution.

[csense]

> tasers

A melee weapon versus a deadly ranged weapon is going to be a poor matchup.

> guns with rubber bullets

If you're the good guy who's doing the most damage, but it's non-lethal, non-debilitating damage, you'd better be prepared to draw aggro.

My guess is that only a teacher with a gun would have had a decent chance of ending the massacre early.

My understanding of tactics is largely based on video games. Anyone with any training/experience in real-life tactics is welcome to comment on my comment.

[hga]

You're absolutely right; I have done a fair amount of tactical learning and training and have been shooting since 1st grade or so in 1967 (sic). Tasers can be ignored by many people and defeated by thick clothing and perhaps leather jackets.

If you desperately need to stop someone ASAP, rubber bullets are subpar unless they approach lethal energies, for obvious reasons, and a lot of school teacher types wouldn't be able to wield such weapons effectively. Your guess is correct.

[Todd]

The taser and rubber bullet example was just an example. They could also have a cabinet with three M4s. The point is that it would be great if we could discuss defensive and offensive measures. There are many teachers who have concealed permits (and thus the FBI background check) who are forced to leave their weapon at home. Many of them would be perfectly capable of wielding a weapon and it would cost schools next to nothing. Again, just examples. It's great to see the point being discussed.

[nollidge]

Hey quick question: how many people died in those knife attacks?

[ttrt]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_attacks_in_China_(2010–2...

[harlanlewis]

Arming classrooms is a direct solution to only the most visible problem. This is like doing the 5 Whys (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5_Whys), but stopping after the first one. Underlying causes will continue, requiring increasingly drastic counter measures at superficial levels.

[ranjeetbhatia]

Completely agree, Arming everyone with bigger and better weapons is not the solution. it is an arms race within the society.

[13rules]

"I'm not looking forward to the coming months. It's going to be a political circus, with each side clamoring to push or protect their already strongly held beliefs and positions."

I think regardless of your position we can all agree on this.

It would be useful if we could all see that we really are on the same side of this — everyone wants to prevent another tragedy like this. We just have very different beliefs about how best to go about that.

[hga]

"everyone wants to prevent another tragedy like this"

If that were true, wouldn't we'd only be seeing gun control proposals that directly flow from this event, not all the "usual suspects" that are also being proposed again? E.g. the "gun show loophole", which has not been implicated in any of these events to my knowledge. But it turns out gun shows are a vital part of the US gun culture and shutting them down, as the fine print of these proposals would do, would do it grave damage.

We're seeing a whole lot of what some people define as insanity, doing (recommending) the same thing over and over again, regardless of results. That doesn't strike me as a response to this event, but opportunism in using it.

[13rules]

I'm with you — and probably agree with your political views 100% if I had to guess. I think that most of those people do want to prevent these tragedies — I think that everyone does. I do not agree with their methods (as misguided as they may be), but that doesn't discount their motivation.

[hga]

"I think that most of those people do want to prevent these tragedies...."

Well of course. But wanting that is not exactly out of the mainstream, is it? Who doesn't, besides the fantasies of NRA members and/or gun owners that too many gun grabbers hold in their minds?

[13rules]

It's not out of the mainstream, but I think that some on the gun control side really believe that gun owners don't care that these shootings happen. They basically opine that if you don't agree with their proposals then you must not care about preventing the tragedies from occurring again.

Piers Morgan is a good example (http://bit.ly/12q3n4q) -- he contributes nothing to the conversation or debate because he insults anyone that has a view opposing his.