End Gun Free Zones. They Don't Work As Advertised

Today, there are many good articles looking at the Uvalde shooting in particular, and the general issue of the role of guns in society.  I would note, and you can read about it elsewhere, that Canada seems to be going for the banning of all handguns, and of course heavily restricting long guns.  Canada's Prime Minister plans to bring the Great Reset to his country, handing control to that German Dr. Evil wannabe.

I intend to highlight two articles, both from the American Thinker. The first article, by Brian C. Joondeph, entitled School Shootings - Beyond the Hype and Spin takes a look at the many failures, none of which have anything to do with guns themselves. Rather, society's treatment, or lack thereof of mental health and of course the fact that schools are a target rich killing zone for a mass shooter. The other article, by Patrick J. Gibbs entitled It's Time to Bring an End to 'Gun Free Zones' deals specifically with the fact that schools in particular, but in reality, all so-called 'gun free zones,' are automatically soft targets. If someone intends to kill someone in a gun free zone, will he be deterred by a law against carrying a gun there?

Taking the first article first, Joondeph quickly debunks some misinformation currently circulating on the Left. For example:

Start with the spin. President Joe Biden, in prepared remarks after the Uvalde shooting, asked, “But these kinds of mass shootings never happen with the kind of frequency that they happen in America.” Actually, the opposite. The five worst mass shootings worldwide occurred outside the U.S. as did 32 of the top 50, contradicting Biden’s assertion.

Or this:

President Biden claimed, “When we passed the assault weapons ban, mass shootings went down. When the law expired, mass shootings tripled.” Yet a Department of Justice-funded study reported: “The decline in assault weapon use was offset throughout at least the late 1990s by steady or rising use of other guns equipped with large capacity magazines in jurisdictions studied.”

In other words, ban one type of gun and a different one will fill the void. After all, it’s not the gun itself that chooses to murder people but the person holding the gun, knife, bat, or other lethal weapon of choice.

Joondeph devotes a substantial amount of his article to the lack of mental health treatment in our country. It is true that some of our past practices in mental health seem barbaric to people today. But we have gone too far the other way, attempting to "mainstream" people whose behavior is decidedly antisocial. I am no expert on the treatment of mental health, but too many times the police find themselves shooting someone who is threatening them, and endangering the public, only to discover that his family claims mental health issues. How are the police to know that, or to know what they perhaps should have done?

How many mass shooters are mentally ill, untreated, or inadequately treated, due to deficiencies in our mental health care system? A Stanford University team: “Studied 35 mass shooting cases that occurred in the United States between 1982 and 2019 and involved shooters who survived and were brought to trial.” They discovered that “28 had mental illness diagnoses. Eighteen had schizophrenia, and 10 had other diagnoses including bipolar disorder, delusional disorder, personality disorders and substance-related disorders.” America’s mental health system is fragmented due to politics and money. For some administrations, mental health is a priority and for others a pot of money that can be spent on other initiatives. Inpatient hospitalization has given way to outpatient therapy, which may not be enough for some. Clearly, those that need help are not getting it.

Meanwhile, Patrick J. Gibbs discusses the abject failure that 'Gun Free School Zones' represent. This failure was predicted, but Democrats insisted on passing it, and they, along with their Republican allies have refused to get rid of them. Since they seem poised every time there is a school shooting to propose their favored solution, gun control, it seems as if they want to make school shootings easier.

Gibbs starts by contrasting two church shootings. The first, at Sutherland Springs Baptist Church, where 26 people were killed, was a virtual gun free zone, with the consequences you would expect. The other church, the West Freeway Church of Christ in White Settlement, Texas, had a volunteer security force comprised of members of the congregation. They were able to spot the killer and engage him such that only two members were killed. The contrast is stark:

The church in Sutherland Springs was by design or by accident a gun-free zone that Sunday. The church in White Settlement was not. The difference in casualty count was 24. That many people would have had a better chance of surviving if there had a “good guy with a gun” ready to stop the attacker.

Turning to mass shootings in schools the first thing to understand is that, contrary to the hysteria in the mass media, they are rare. There have been 13 incidents since 1966 (over 55 years). Those crimes claimed 146 lives. That is one-fifth the number of homicides in Chicago during 2021.

And the solution?

The practical solution to school security may require the passage of only one law in most states. It would be based on the “Second Amendment Preservation Act” passed by the Missouri legislature in 2014. It allows teachers and school administrators to carry concealed guns after receiving 112 hours of training with an 18-hour annual refresher course. To date 24 school districts have participated and 52 people have completed the training. School districts can and do still retain SRO’s on their staff.

A program to train teachers and school staff in armed self-defense has many advantages. It hardens the defenses of what would previously be classified as a “soft target.” A teacher would not have to cower in fear, but could take a position in her classroom to ambush any attacker. The trained “School Protection Officers” are likely to be motivated to maintain their firearms proficiency. Their lives literally depend upon it.

There must be a few teachers in every school that are brave enough and dedicated enough to carry a gun to protect the charges under their care. It has the added benefit that if the situation is widely publicized, there will be fewer attempts in the first place. And that may be the whole point. While these killers are obviously mentally disturbed, they are neither stupid, nor irrational in persuing their twisted goals.