On Mass Killings in Schools
I think the first thing we should do is recognize that we are not going to prevent every instance of mass killing in schools. It’s been going on for a long time. We can get them to be more rare (I actually think they are now), but we’ll never get them to 0.
Second, we should allow licensees to choose where they carry concealed handguns without any further restriction. I do not favor “arming teachers” and assigning them security duties. That just propagates a list of early targets and gives evil a tactical advantage. Instead, if you’re licensed to carry a concealed handgun, you should be able to do so at your place of work without statutory punishment. What this will do is insert the unknown element. One of the added benefits of concealed carry is that it makes the victim selection process more difficult. If a shooter is choosing classrooms to barge into, which one does he or she choose? It’s a literal game of Russian roulette.
In the event a shooter does come into contact with an armed individual, he or she will find a shift in the tactical advantage. How would yesterday have been different if that football coach who was shielding students was able to produce a tool of equal or greater force? We can’t say for sure, but the odds would’ve been better for the potential victims. In nearly every case of mass killings when the perpetrator is met with equal or greater force or the threat of it, he or she stops the attack. Shootouts in these scenarios are rare.
Third, we cannot forget the efforts we can make to prevent the proliferation of these events in the future. I think we need to take a very hard look at our psychotropic drug use in under developed brains. We also need to take a look at how we are desensitizing those same brains to killing. A child with an under developed psyche who is on meds to deal with mental/emotional issues while having unsupervised access to media and video games showing little to no negative consequence for killing is a recipe for disaster. I think as we investigate more of these cases, we will find these factors present in the perpetrators’ histories.
What it comes down to is personal responsibility. We need to remove restrictions that prohibit people from taking responsibility for their own safety (concealed carry). We also need to better supervise and teach those young people who can’t be expected to responsibly use psychotropic medications and practice unrestricted access to violent video games and movies that they are entertainment and that the actions portrayed in them have consequences.