Skip to main content

It's Time We Armed School Children

Arming School Kids worked so
well in Tomorrow When
The War Began.
Not to make light of a tragic situation with the Newtown shooting incident or to discount the unnecessary loss of lives. However any incident that involves guns and innocent people being shot seems to spark debate online about gun control and, increasingly, mental health.

Clearly there is a mental health issue at stake. No rational person resorts to violence of any kind to resolve their issues. There's no real debate there other than what needs to be done to make it easier for anyone to get the help they need - before we see the next Newtown.

The gun control issue is a whole other discussion. Would disarming civilians or at least applying much stricter gun laws solve the problem?

In Australia, we have much stricter gun laws than the USA, and even had a gun amnesty where thousands of guns were handed in to police, it hasn't stopped supposedly outlaw motorcycle gangs from shooting each other (or not as the case may be - as they appear to have lousy aim). That problem appears to be escalating along with drive by shootings (often targeting the wrong house, apparently. Our criminals are just that dumb).

I don't have any precise figures on gun crimes in Australia, the above is just my general sense of the situation based on TV news reports. For all I know gun related crimes could have decreased since the amnesty - which was many years ago if memory serves me correctly.

So, back to the article's title. There is a general consensus on one side of the argument that tighter gun laws in the USA would make little or no difference. After all guns don't kill people, people kill people. Anyone wishing to get their hands on an assault rifle will find a way to make it happen legal or otherwise.

With that in mind, why not go the other way. Let's start arming our school children. Don't stop there either. Let's make gun ownership compulsory. Every individual should be packing heat!

Why? Because that's what governments and countries do. It's called an arms race. If one country has a nuclear missile then all countries potentially under the threat of being the target of such a weapon will make every attempt to arm themselves equal to or greater capacity. Thus ensuring that should a nuclear missile ever be fired at them you can be certain one or more will be fired back very quickly. This is known as Mutual Assured Destruction.

Now imagine one psychopath opens fire on a classroom of kids. A few may get hit but the rest could be shooting back. That gunman could be dead before he gets a chance to move to another room and open fire there. Knowing that the students are all guaranteed to be carrying a weapon would the gunman even try in the first place? That's how Mutual Assured Destruction works.

If you don't hunt for food, aren't a gun collector, sports shooter or work in a profession that requires you carry a gun, then isn't the only reason you buy a gun to protect yourself from other people who may be carrying weapons?

Then once you've got the gun you hide it away, just in case, when what you should be doing is putting up a great big sign in the front yard saying "I carry a gun and I will use it if necessary". Not letting people know you have a gun is like buying an attack dog then not putting up any warning signs. People need to know you have a deterrent that could get them killed. They need to be informed.

What we need is a return to the wild west where people could carry guns around openly and there was zero crime as a result... Yeah I probably don't have all the facts there but I seem to remember a lot of 'Wanted, Dead or Alive' posters from that era.

Look, I know the whole premise of arming children is absurd but the day is coming that someone somewhere is going to think it's a good idea to arm teachers and train them properly in gun use. So teachers can protect our children. Or that schools become even more like prisons with not just metal detectors at the gate but armed security staff making regular patrols.

If we go in that direction it will be a sad day indeed.

I am a supporter of tighter gun controls but I'm not stupid enough to think that's the answer. I could make that god awful statement of many bleeding heart liberals (of which I am proudly one) "If tighter gun laws saves even one life then it will be worth it". No it won't... if it only saves one life why did we even bother? The goal is to save everyone. One person isn't good enough!

As an observer and commentator I don't have the answers. People can snap for any number of reasons and no one will see it coming (but will probably be kicking themselves in hindsight). How do you even know if someone who is a 'loner' is likely to turn up at your place of business with an arsenal of weapons and a target body count? They're a loner. Who's going to see the signs?

Maybe there's just a need for building stronger more inclusive communities. A 'leave no one behind' approach where everyone looks out for everyone and all people can feel like they're making a valuable contribution to something bigger than themselves... kind of sounds like organised religion doesn't it?

Human nature is what it is. You don't have to go much further than the internet to see an endless stream of people who enjoy tearing others down with no thought to the consequences.

You can make access to mental health programs easier or more affordable. You can tighten gun laws and even improve on gun ownership education. All of which are worthwhile however, at the end of the day, you may decrease the incidents but the reality is, there's always a chance for 'shit to happen'.

You can't protect everyone from every eventuality. You'll go crazy if you try. You can only live positively and trust that others will too.

Comments

  1. Just five days after I posted this article the NRA proposes armed guards in every school. Mashable: NRA's Call for Armed Guards in Every School Prompts Immediate Backlash.

    It's just the way they think. Probably grabbing an opportunity to boost their membership rather than offering a sensible solution.

    Does anyone ever consider that police carry guns and that doesn't actually deter crime?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Considering in these cases the perpetrator has already made a decision to kill themselves because there is no way they want to face the consequences of their actions others carrying guns would not deter them. In fact it is more likely to aid them in their quest saving them the inconvenience of shooting themselves.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Good point. Though if they're planning on taking as many people as they can with them then they may also move on to a different and less likely to be armed target.

      Delete
  3. I saw this post on Facebook, and I'm glad I remembered that I wanted to read it. I personally tuned out to the whole tragedy after if occurred because the right answer, as I see it, you surmised in your final paragraph. Great article! Glad I remembered I wanted to read it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks for reading. These kind of events tend to initially turn people to paranoia. Whilst apathy isn't a good response either, something obviously needs to be done, paranoia can lead to some totally irrational solutions.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Comments are moderated by an actual human (me, TET) and may not publish right away. I do read all comments and only reject those not directly related to the post or are spam/scams (I'm looking at you Illuminati recruiters... I mean scammers. Stop commenting on my Illuminati post!).

Buy Gifts and Apparel featuring art by TET.

Popular posts from this blog

Movie Review: Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024) *No Spoilers*

T his is another film that I would have liked to have seen in a theatre but, for whatever reason, didn't get to. Having now seen  Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga  (2024) almost a year later I'm glad I didn't. Which is not to say it's bad. Like its predecessor Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), which I enjoyed in a cinema immensely, this film would definitely benefit from being on a big screen for the spectacle and epic visuals of it all.  However unlike its predecessor there is so much going on, with back and forth between the waring parties, and Furiosa's story as well, you can't just sit back and kind of enjoy the ride. It's like writer/director, George Miller, wanted to cram in as many of his ideas as possible for the post apocalyptic world of Mad Max, because it's not likely he'll make another one, but whoever does, has a rich, detailed world of on screen source material to draw upon. The story begins with young Furiosa (Alyla Browne) and her journey from the ...

I'm Confused About Why People Prefer to Say Discombobulated?

D iscombobulated. Is a word that I think someone rediscovered about three or four years ago (maybe more because the pandemic years have thrown out my sense of time) and now I hear it a lot. It's not a new word by any means, but when I started hearing multiple celebrities using it in everyday sentences, I actively had to look up what it meant. Define it with as many synonyms as you like but essentially it's just another word meaning 'confused'. Seinfeld Quotes: Quotes.net The words are pretty much interchangeable. He was discombobulated by too many choices. He was confused by too many choices.  My confusion is the length of the word. It's unnecessarily long with too many syllables. There are many other words that mean confused, and therefore also mean discombobulated. Most of them are shorter and easier to say. So why not just say 'confused'? Perhaps discombobulated sounds more intelligent, maybe?  Hawaii Five-0 Quotes: Quotes.net I've noticed it gets us...

Second Sunday Skateboard Session Episode 3, 4, and 5 - Definitely Seeing Progress

TET, Episode 5 Heelflip attempt. C ontinuing my ten part series of Second Sunday Skateboard sessions , the series where I'm attempting to master all seven basic skateboarding tricks in Braille Skateboarding's Skateboarding Made Simple Volume One , over twenty weeks (or ten fortnights).  Each episode is a short Sunday check in to show where I'm at after each two week period of practicing. Generally I aim for at least an hour practice session every second day if weather or my work schedule permits. These are the links to Episode One and Episode Two  should you feel the need to see where I started.  I'm not a complete newbie, having been a relatively hardcore skater through the late eighties and early nineties, however I was mostly a mini ramp and curb skater, and never really maintained my skills beyond riding and ollies.  The explosion of council built concrete parks came a decade too late for me to maintain my mini ramp skills. Once we closed our own skate park in ...

Movie Review: Thunderbolts* (2025) *No Spoilers*

G oing into  Thunderbolts*  I was a tiny bit concerned that not seeing the previous Marvel Movie, Captain America: Brave New World , might be a problem. Fortunately, if you've seen the trailer to that film, you mostly have all you need to understand the brief references to it here. The bigger issue you may bump up against is not really knowing who any of this team is, if you haven't been watching every Marvel movie or TV series. The movie is counting on you at least knowing who Yolena (Florence Pugh), Bucky (Sebastian Stan), and Red Guardian (David Harbour) is to draw you into seeing the film. It is kind of a better experience if you know who John Walker - Captain America Lite (Wyatt Russell), Ava Starr - Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), and Antonia Dreykov - Task Master (Olga Kurylenko) are but there is enough backstory given, to at least place them in context of the wider MCU as misfits. Having said that, the story really lends itself to filling in the backstory on almost all...

Australian Federal Election 2025 - World's Most Boring Government Re-elected by Landside - We're Even More Fine!

Anthony Albanese Victory by ChatGPT and TET. W hen I started writing about the 2025 Federal election the polls were suggesting the world's most boring government was crusing to a defeat . As it turns out, boring is good, and Australia wants more of it, handing the current government a landslide win with a majority vote. Anthony Albanese became the first PM since John Howard to win a consecutive term, and the first Labor PM since Bob Hawke to do so. Some of that comes down to the leadership revolving door both major parties had through the mid 2000s. Although Anthony is my preferred PM over Dutton the irony is Dutton sounds more like a leader with a fairly commanding voice and an ability to speak well, without sounding like he's waffling and dodging questions, even if he is. Anthony, on the other hand, does have the ability (and speech writer) to say a lot of inspiring things but it gets lost in the delivery. He doesn't seem to know when to emphasise a point for effect. In h...

Australian Federal Election 2025 - Highlighting Some Minor Parties and Independents

W hile I am all for voting for minor parties and independent candidates, it can be concerning if too many of them win their seats. When independents hold the balance of power it gives them a lot of leverage to get their own policy ideas inserted into the mix. This is not necessarily a good or bad thing but it can slow everything down, and even sabotage policies and promises, that the government won the election with. It requires the government to work harder, and possibly make compromises, to get their policies implemented. Essentially they do what Australian pollical legend, and founder of The Australian Democrats, Senator Don Chipp, expounded in such simple terms, "keep the bastards honest." While I can't list and write about every independent and minor party candidate I can highlight a few, who already hold seats in parliament, and will no doubt be looking to hold onto them in 2025. The Conservatives Bob Katter - Katter's Australian Party There's a joke in the ...

Boom Crash Opera Born Classic But Not Again

Boom Crash Opera are an Australian Band that reached the peak of their popularity in the mid to late nineteen eighties. They are a band that I knew about at that time but was never really excited by until they released their ill fated double album Born and Born Again in 1995 (Album cover pictured). At the time of its release I was very much into emerging Australian musical acts and was also looking out for new sounds that were different and had kind of a futuristic/electronic sound. Artists that I was buying at the time included; Swoop , Nine Inch Nails and Pop Will Eat Its Self . As well as a really interesting release by David Bowie, the concept album, Outside . Born was a fairly radical departure for Boom Crash Opera (BCO). The first single, Gimme , was often compared to the sounds of Gary Glitter, particularly his single, Rock n Roll part 2 , because of the pounding drum loops. Watch the video below. My favorite single from the album is dissemble which probably went now...