Remember the tragedy that befell the Elementary School of Sandy Hook a couple months ago? And remember the ridiculous notion that the NRA came up with to put more guns in schools to "protect" kids? As a part of the efforts to increase school safety after the shooting, schools in New York put out a program that places an armed police officer in the school. Keep in mind, this was a police officer, trained for using a weapon and authorized to have a gun legally.
At 1:38 on Tuesday in the hallway of Highland High School Officer Sean McCutcheon's gun discharged, apparently by accident. No one was hurt, this time. The question that sticks in my mind, however is, if an armed, licensed police officer, who's legitimate full time occupation is to handle a gun and keep the people around him safe, cannot handle a gun, who really can?
There have been reports of volunteers in other states that are marching around schools with guns as a part of a volunteer effort to accomplish the same thing, which in my mind cannot possibly be in any way safe. Those same volunteers, when investigated thoroughly, were found to be convicted criminals who didn't have anything better to do during the working hours of the day than to stand around an elementary, middle, or high school campus and "guard" the children that they had been convicted of committing crimes against. And again I ask the question, if a police officer cannot handle a gun properly, how can people like this, who are not professionally trained or paid to do their job?
I have an inkling of a feeling that, they can't. The only way to figure out how to keep kids in a safe environment so that learning can really take place is to ensure that the laws we have against guns are being followed through and if those laws aren't working, to legislate new ones, that will.
Works Cited:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=El3NwLVYHmY
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/06/sean-mccutcheon-gun-school-highland_n_2819273.html
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/03/07/guns-school-officer-shoots/1970017/
Ria, gun laws are and will remain a problem. When a national event causes a national outcry, and something significant isn't done about it within two weeks, just forget the issue, because nothing will ever be done about it. The media have forgotten Sandy Hook already. Soon, they will stop talking about gun rights and legislation, so the public will forget about it, and the pressure to act that is currently looming over lawmakers will vanish. I think, though, that we cannot expect our lawmakers to do anything. We must first change ourselves and thus change the world - we cannot accept the hype about how all our guns will be taken away by our "tyrannical" government, we must take a firm stand and not follow the example of the many women who are going out and buying guns, afraid of an unknown entity that doesn't exist at all, but will manifest if we continue to perpetuate this gun culture.
ReplyDeleteI don't see who in their right mind would employ armed volunteers to guard a school. The way you mentioned that, upon further investigation, many of these so-called "volunteers" were criminals, it seems as if no background check was done on these individuals in the first place. This is extremely risky and may result in the very thing schools were hoping to avoid: violence.
ReplyDeleteThat's insane how there was no back round check on the the volunteers in the first place, but I don't think it's fair to say that all the volunteers were convicted criminals. Unlike you, I believe that having an extra police officer at each school is a wise decision, and can only help the safety of the children. Yes, there is always going to be that possibility that an officer's gun gets in the hand of the wrong person, but this chance is quite small, and officers are well-trained to protect their weapons. In my opinion, I believe more strict gun laws need to be in place when people buy a weapon, since anyone could easily obtain one from the internet.
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