SHOTGUN! YR TEACHER’S GOT ONE!

[defrog]

ITEM: Harrold Independent School District (of Harrold, TX) is set to become the first school district in the nation to allow teachers and staff to pack guns for protection when classes begin later this month.

Um, yay?

I predict disaster, personally.

To be fair, the school district has pretty strict rules on who gets to carry iron and who doesn’t. One requirement is that teachers must receive training in crisis management and hostile situations. They also can only use bullets designed to minimize the risk of ricochet in school halls.

However, human nature being what it is, the real question is to what extent anyone will bother to follow the rules, or how vigorously they’ll be enforced. More to the point, I expect that if any shooting does happen at these schools, it’s likely going to be the result of some student stealing a teacher’s gun.

Either way, I can’t really think of a good argument for allowing teachers to pack heat, as opposed to security guards (though I guess it's a money saver). This is the best argument Harrold Independent School District superintendent David Thweatt could come up with:

"When the federal government started making schools gun-free zones, that's when all of these shootings started. Why would you put it out there that a group of people can't defend themselves? That's like saying 'sic 'em' to a dog."

I’ve read that ten times and I still don’t know what the hell he’s talking about.

Whatever. It’s sad enough commentary that people have enough of The Fear to think they need teachers to be armed and be prepared to shoot one of their own students in self-defense.

RECOMMENDED READING: Bruce Schneier’s musings on how people tend to inflate risks, and why this is bad.

Schoolhouse lock’n’load,

This is dF

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