And now it's the repeats

[akiva]

School shooting in St Mary's County, MD (about 45 minutes south of me).

[Walrus]

This is what I look like biting my tongue ... hard.

[Phoebe]

It's just a normal thing we accept now. But haven't you heard? So many fewer kids die this way than all the other leading causes of teen deaths! So why do those pesky teenagers care so much, just because they lived through one of the most harrowing experiences imaginable? Those mouthy kids are puppets of the Libruls, the Deep State, and the lizard people. This murdering at school thing is a minor problem like a weird form of childhood cancer, and heaven knows we wouldn't put resources into defending ourselves against something like that. Because when the Chinese invade or a moose crashes into my home, all of which contingencies are far more likely than being proximate to a school shooting, I'm going to need that special gun.

[Walrus]

To the view of many of us non americans, it seems pantently obvious that having access to toys is more important to the american voting public than keeping kids safe.

And we scratch our heads in wonder.

[mimekiller]

ZERO non shooter fatalities? Anything different about this shooting than Parkland?

[Phoebe]

Misogynist violence bullshit apparently part of the motive in both, so...

I love that the same people I see calling for teachers to be armed are now crowing about how the shooter was shot before he could kill more people. These are the same ones who get tetchy with people they think have less gun expertise than they do.

[Bonefish]

Turns out that doing what the FBI recommends... Works.

[mimekiller]

Curious how long it took police to roll up, would be pretty easy to extrapolate how many more dead kids we would have if a GOOD GUY WITH A GUN didn't pull the trigger.

[Phoebe]

He wasn't a random teacher or student with a gun. Can you extrapolate thru the crossfire battle of armed teachers when you do those calculations?

[Mike]

Here's yet another reason why allowing teachers to carry firearms in the schools is a bad idea. Once you have teachers carrying in school, no matter how well-trained and prepared they are, we are guaranteed to see a scenario (and soon) in which a teacher from a mostly minority school has to testify in court and say, "DeShawn seemed agitated by my question, and when he suddenly reached into his bag, I felt threatened." And the jury is going to let them off for shooting an unarmed student in school. After all, the teacher went through the whole 140 hours of school security training and had a conceal-carry permit. And DeShawn DID have a juvenile record... Sure we have metal detectors and all, and there was nothing in the bag but books and pencils, but the teacher had no way of knowing for sure and the student's behavior seemed aggressive.

I heard a woman describe this scenario on a podcast, and it rang so true for me. You arm teachers, and the above scenario will become common enough to simply be accepted as the way things have to be in "difficult" schools.

Only vaguely related. All domestic government employees who carry firearms as part of their jobs should be required to have body-cams on and recording at all times while they are active in the field. This goes for cops, teachers, air marshals, FBI, ATF, prison guards, etc etc. In fact, I might even remove the word "domestic". If we need to investigate for any reason, and your body-cam wasn't on and running, then you're subject to disciplinary action, up to and including termination of employment.

[Phoebe]

Mrs. Wilson was going off at everyone about how she wasn't going to tolerate our rude, disrespectful crap anymore, and she started writing out a detention slip for Dave when he called her a mean old bitch. Everyone froze while she stomped over to her desk drawer and pulled out a hunk of metal... Dave pulled out his gun and then, there she was, a bloody mess on the ground still holding the stapler...

It will be like paranoia the school edition!

[mimekiller]

If you guys are arguing that teachers are so racist and mentally unstable that they will execute children coast to coast for trivial punishment issues(minority children will be killed more of course) than you guys have a even lesser view of teachers then I do!

[mimekiller]

YO DMARC, any inspirational poetry slams about how you're going to make a back talking student suck on a barrel of a colt 45? That might even bring a tear to my eye!

[Phoebe]

PSA: 15 states still explicitly allow corporal punishment in schools, and several others permit it. This is a good reason imo not to even live in those states, but for many people it's not a choice.

[mimekiller]

so ya think those rules about kids getting a paddle or something will escalate to full on executions? What can we do about these obvious dangerous individuals we have teaching our children?

[Mike]

If a person is in a situation where they FEEL threatened, being armed makes it more likely that they will try to defend themselves from this perceived threat with potentially deadly force.

[mimekiller]

Well I'm still left aghast that we have such a mentally unstable teaching force that the only thing stopping them from murdering students is the lack of the tools to do so. Whose in charge of the teachers union? The KKK?

[akiva]

The parents of the girl victim from the shooting are taking her off life support tonight.

[bralbovsky]

Do we want to talk about the mostly mushy statistics about police shootings?
While there are a number of police forces around the country cited specifically for racism and violent follow-up to racist internal cultures, I'm not certain any city escapes it entirely.

This is a group of people for whom weapon training is an integral part of the job, where there is ostensibly time set aside for practice. Decades ago, a Nigerian man named A. Diallo, I believe, was shot by police. They fired 41 verified rounds, hitting him 19 times (Let's perhaps not discuss their accuracy or the magnitude of their response as separate issues) He was unarmed.

How many people in any of our industries, suck at their jobs, aren't really interested in being the except that it pays the rent, or take on extra duties only because there's some remuneration? Teachers and police aren't immune, they just deal with more vulnerable populations more often, and are (rightfully, in my opinion) or should be, held to higher standards.

Again, motive, opportunity, means. To pretend we can't impact every leg of the violence cycle is to normalize and accept violence. We may never get to zero, but we should want to, and thoughts and prayers aren't apparently moving the needle.

[Mike]

You're one of my favorite people, Bill. I wish I could cut to the heart of stuff even half as well.