By Mitch Berg
Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:
The Constitution sets an age limit for Congress – must be 25 years old – and for President – must be 35 years old. Why? Because we want national leaders to have acquired the wisdom which comes from maturity, so they make responsible decisions. It’s hard to test for wisdom so we use age as a proxy. We do it for lots of important activities – sex, voting, alcohol, enlistment, marriage, contract – restricting people from engaging in those activities until they are wise enough to do them responsibly.
Lots of angry tweets about the Texas school shooter being able to buy AR-15 rifles within days after his 18th birthday. Why? Do they think 18-year-olds lack the wisdom and maturity to use rifles responsibly? Millions of responsible hunters and military service members cast doubt on that conclusion. What additional life lessons would the Texas shooter have learned between 18 and 21 which would have taught him it was wrong to kill his grandmother and then shoot up the grade school?
It’s not an age issue. It’s not a wisdom or maturity issue. He knew damned well what he did was wrong. He even told people on social media that he was going to do it. He did it anyway. What law can we pass, what age can we set, which will stop wicked people from committing evil? None.
So what can we do?
First, stop making soft targets. Gun Free zones sound good but a sign at the door doesn’t keep criminals out, it simply notifies criminals where the soft targets are.
Second, harden soft targets. Liquor stores hire off-duty cops. Pawn shops use two-room man-traps at the front door (they operate like airlocks on a space ship – second door doesn’t open until the first one is closed and somebody inside confirms it’s safe to open the second door). Why don’t schools have better security? Is gin more valuable than Jimmy? Is jewelry more valuable than Julie? Fire a Diversity Counselor and use the savings for structural improvements.
Third, harden staff. The qualities which make a great teacher – compassionate, empathetic, caring – are not the qualities which make a great protector. The guy guarding the door must be armed, trained, and mentally capable of opening fire on an armed intruder. S/He must instinctively run Toward the sound of trouble. There must be a few retired cops or Fallujah vets who could fill that role (or train others to do it).
Fourth, stop making soft-target-seekers by hardening police spokes-persons. After a mass shooting, the official response should be, “We have no comment because we won’t glorify the killer and inspire others to copycat. We implore the media not to do it, either.”
These are short-term responses. The long-term solution involves a change in societal attitudes. When I was a kid, every pickup in the school parking lot had a shotgun, for pheasant hunting before and after school. School was cancelled for Opening Deer Season because nobody would be there anyway, we were all out in the fields with guns. And there were never any school shootings, despite young people having guns, because we were raised differently, society was different then. I know what you’re thinking – okay, Boomer – but look at those tiny bodies in Texas and tell my why society today is so much better than in my day. I genuinely want to know.
Joe Doakes
Much more to come on this…
…but you knew this.
May 27th, 2022 at 5:18 am
There are several school districts in Texas that have trained, armed security officers or teachers on staff. The sign outside of their schools, say, essentially, if you come in here to do harm, we will kill you. Uvalde is not one of them. Friends in Texas tell me that their are state funds available to ensure school security, but too many schools still have not used them.
All of the gun grabbing DemoCommies and their associated ilk, all have armed guards around them at all times, but they don’t want us serfs to be able to defend ourselves. The day one of these low life scum say that they are so committed to gun control that they are dismissing their security detail, then maybe they’ll be worth listening to.
May 27th, 2022 at 6:50 am
There’s an old joke about how if you and your friend are being chased by a bear, you don’t have to out run the bear, you have to out run your friend.
Something like this is happening with the most devastating mass shootings. It would be difficult to imagine a softer target than an elementary school. The kids aren’t going to stop you, the instructors aren’t going to stop you.
What’s more, armed security has a very spotty record on this. So if you harden public schools, well, what then becomes the softest target? A crowded play ground? A school bus? A crowded restaurant during the lunch hour?
And, let’s face it, a furious, suicidal 18 year old male with a couple of semi-automatic rifles has pretty good odds vs a middle aged security guard or CC instructor with a 9.
What’s the solution? Maybe there is none. Not all social problems have government solutions, because, for good reason, we place hard limits on the power of government.
The federal government claims oversight of virtually all law enforcement, and it is the level of government least accountable to the people. The feds should be afraid of the people, not the other way around.
May 27th, 2022 at 7:36 am
MP, that’s a legitimate concern. If we harden elementary schools, the criminals will simply go somewhere else.
But if the ‘somewhere else’ is full of adults, some of whom might be lawfully carrying, the odds of a speedy resolution go way up. Imagine wearing your Army surplus fatigues, ammo jacket, helmet, and carrying your brand-new AR-16 into a cop bar.
Failing to protect the most vulnerable on the grounds the criminals may attack the less vulnerable, still leaves the most vulnerable as sitting ducks. Stop that.
May 27th, 2022 at 7:53 am
I’m just pointing out that hardening schools won’t stop mass shootings, just as banning assault rifles or hi capacity magazines won’t stop mass shootings. The idea that either would lower the body count is ludicrous, left alone with a school room full of fourth graders and a couple of middle aged female teachers for an hour, a kitchen knife would do the trick.
I’m not being ludicrous. Jung has several ideas that are helpful in contemplating the source of evil in the human psyche (putting aside religious explanations for the existence of evil). Jung believes in a thing present in every human mind he calls the shadow. The shadow is defined as everything you could potentially do if you had not been socialized out of consciously thinking that it was a possible course of action. Every human being is as capable of pushing an old lady into the path of a bus as they are capable of pushing the old lady out of the path of the bus.
If you want to kill a school full of helpless kids, and your shadow is out walking, there are ways to do it that are more deadly than an AR 15 and a few hundred rounds of ammunition.
May 27th, 2022 at 8:21 am
JD, you overlooked the most important way to prevent most mass shootings, especially by the teens – education and parental involvenment. Am I wrong to presume that before libturds turned schools into screwls and de-emphasized reading, writing, math and science in favor of soci@al studies that we had a lot less shootings? Am I wrong to presume that before “it takes a village” libturds took control of the not just educating, but raising and indoctrinating K-12 darlings that we had less shootings? Am I wrong to presume that when a tw0-parent nuclear family in the Cleaver mold was prevalent that we had less shootings?
Wonder if a Studies major could put a study like this together, I am sure we will see some fascinating findings. Or not, I do not know, I am just a dumb scientist.
May 27th, 2022 at 9:02 am
Why is it that whenever libturd reprobates point out that mass shooting only happen in America and guns on their own kill people, that they never mention how the countries where they purport mass shootings never happen ALL have armed swat team patrol all major pedestrian areas and most government and official buildings have swat teams at entrances (behind the barricades) with MP5s and SCARs on the ready? How’s that for a run-on sentence? Why is that OK in France and not in the US? What do you think would happen if we had the same in the US – WHILE a republican president was in the WH? I am sure it would be A-OK for them right now, as a matter of fact I bet this is what they want.
May 27th, 2022 at 9:02 am
There must be a few retired cops or Fallujah vets who could fill that role (or train others to do it).
Wait, aren’t all those former military members really just ticking time-bombs, ready to snap? How come no one’s talking about putting “Violence Interrupters” at the school doors?
May 27th, 2022 at 9:51 am
NW, school is run by and staffed by 100% “violence interruptors” already. So this even never happened. How could it?