In the wake of Newtown and the failure of Congress to “Do Something Do Anything” about gun laws, various people have suggested bulletproof backpacks or even uniforms for school children, saying “It’s no different to having a seatbelt in a car.”
No.
No, it’s very different from a seatbelt in a car.
First off, car crashes happen much more often than school shootings. If you live in a major metropolitan area, there was a car crash in your city today. I can almost promise that. I can also almost promise that there was not a school shooting in your city today. School shootings are rare; car crashes are not. It’s reasonable to take a routine precaution against injury for something that is unfortunately an everyday occurrence.
Further, I’d like to point out that we call them automobile accidents. Almost nobody intends to get into a car crash! While accidental shootings happen, nobody accidentally takes a loaded gun to a school. That’s premeditated. Always.
I might have bought “It’s no different from having a fire extinguisher.” After all, school fires are rare, but we’re awfully glad fire extinguishers are there if they happen. Oh, but we aren’t talking about equipping every student with a $269 fire extinguisher, now are we?
Don’t dare get on the “don’t you care about the safety of the children” high horse. If we really gave a darn about the children’s safety, we wouldn’t let schoolboys play football.
Speaking of schools and gun safety, I hope this disabuses anyone of the notion that armed teachers are an answer. I fully support your right to own a gun. I just don’t support your right to have it on campus.
In Closing: gee no kidding; speaking of job creation; To Big To Fail should be Too Big To Exist; empty calories; and Happy May Day.
There are degrees of truth and to the points for disagreement on your “fire extinguisher” analogy.
There are snakes in the grass. There are crazy folks. A lot of acreage and few snakes, but it is still prudent to wear long pants and heavy boots when walking in tall grass. As the population rises in a finite geographical area; while the percentage of mentally healthy/mentally ill may remain steady the result is still an increase in the absolute number of sick individuals. Would not the chances of encountering a mentally unbalanced (or criminal) person therefore increase?
The number of nails I’ve accurately shot from a nail-gun reduces the percentage of those which have struck my face to infinitesimal proportion, yet OSHA and common sense dictate that I wear safety glasses.
I posit that it all boils down to your level of comfort and your personal choices for living in a world fraught with peril and as a “free” person able to make one’s own choices..
Bullet resistant backpacks and carrying a firearm are positive steps one can take to enhance one’s own personal security. Outlawing guns eliminates that liberty and option.
That there are examples, some as recent as a few days, of police officers killing family members should remind us that personal security is exactly that.
And lastly, since we do employ FELLOW CITIZENS (who aren’t human beings with super-powers of ability or super-intellect) to police our streets in, hopefully, deterrence of crimes (but more so as responders TO crimes committed) why is the notion of an armed fellow-citizen-teacher so abhorrent?