When tragedies occur like those in Laguna Woods, California, Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas, anti-gun control advocates have ready-made responses prepared.
No matter the tears, anguish, and distress these event cause, instituting sensible gun control laws is never on the agenda.
It’s always the same responses on repeat:
· Thoughts and prayers
· The shooter had mental health issues
· Teachers and school personnel should be armed
More guns, not less, are always part of the solution.
The thoughts and prayers debate will linger with no definitive conclusion.
Mental health issues are a given when it comes to mass shootings. It never occurs to sane people to buy high-powered weapons to shoot people.
Especially children. That’s a particularly malignant mental illness.
The discussion about arming teachers and school workers bears lots of further discussion.
When a number of other countries have greatly reduced their gun violence numbers, most to zero, there is ample evidence that gun control laws work extremely well.
But enacting gun control laws like background checks, which an overwhelming majority of Americans support, is never on the NRA’s or its supporters’ agenda.
Singer Larry Gatlin, who canceled his appearance at this weekend’s NRA 150th birthday celebration, is typical of most NRA members. In his statement announcing his concert cancellation, he voiced support for background checks, which is anathema to gun control enthusiasts. But he also stated:
“I am a ‘what if guy’ and I can’t help but ask the question, ‘What if the teachers had been proficient in the use of firearms and had, in fact been armed this week? My answer is that there would not be 21 freshly dug graves for 21 of GOD’s precious children.”
As if teachers and school personnel don’t have enough to deal with on a regular basis, some are expecting them to become Rambo and kill the bad guys when they attack.
This argument never has had any validity, especially given the law enforcement response at the Uvalde shooting as well as the shooting at Parkland, Florida in 2018.
The events of this week in Uvalde are still under investigation, but law enforcement spokespeople have amended their initial statement that a school resource officer engaged the shooter when he arrived at Robb Elementary School. It has also been stated that seven police officers arrived at the school within four minutes of his arrival at the school.
What has not been, nor likely will be adequately explained is why it took another hour for the killer to be killed, apparently by a Border and Custom Patrol SWAT team.
What branches of law enforcement were on the scene, when they were on the scene, and what exactly did they do at the scene are still being discussed and evaluated, although video evidence of parents begging to be armed and to go into the school suggests professional negligence.
It is clear that there was a substantial gap between the time the shooter stormed the school and when he was killed.
Law enforcement’s actions at Stoneman High School in Parkland were similarly suspect.
There, a School Resource Officer who was an armed Broward County sheriff’s deputy remained outside of the school during the shooting, which killed seventeen people and wounded seventeen others. He was suspended without pay and subsequently retired. He is still facing criminal charges related to his inaction.
Three other Broward County deputies arrived but were ordered by their captain to form a perimeter outside of the school instead of confronting the shooter. Nine months after the shooting, the captain resigned citing personal reasons.
In both the Uvalde and Parkland school shooting, highly trained, armed personnel failed to fulfil their duties.
I’m not in law enforcement. I can’t pretend to understand or comprehend the levels of stress and pressure they are under on a regular basis, much less during an active shooter situation.
But the fact is that these officers could not, did not discharge the duties that they are trained and paid to perform, yet there are gun enthusiasts who believe that educators can be sufficiently trained and have the wherewithal to confront and stop psychopaths bent on killing children.
There is not a high enough salary that can be paid to either teachers or law enforcement personnel for the work they do.
But we should never think that their jobs are interchangeable.
Teachers are supposed to educate and nurture.
Law enforcement is supposed to protect and serve.
Never the twain shall meet.