My first question for Mr. Carr is this: What research?
David Hemenway’s study has been debunked because he failed to adequately account for defensive gun uses when there was no actual discharge of the firearm.
Did you read the full article, William? Hemenway’s 2015 study is not the only one referenced in it, but your statement here is misleading. In fact, I’m not sure where you’re even getting the idea that he didn’t account for defensive uses where the gun was not discharged. The study specifically identifies 13 different types of protective action taken by the participants, one of which is “Threatened offender with a gun.” This is distinguished from “Attacked offender with a gun,” and at the very least it implies that one involves discharging a weapon at an offender and one does not.
What you say about self-report being unreliable on this measure is true, but I’m not sure how you expect other studies to do much better. Hemenway’s study also does show that SDGU can be more effective at achieving certain outcomes than other actions, particularly when it comes to protecting property. However, I do mention the limitations of self-report specifically when it comes to SDGU. You don’t seem to have anything to say on that.
My second question would be: What does a study of guns in the home have to do with anything? There are about 80 million or more gun owners in the United States. In 2017, the CDC reported there were 486 fatal injuries caused by accidental gunshots. Yes, a home without guns is less likely to experience an accidental shooting or a suicide using a gun, but a home without knives, belts, extension cords, prescription medicines, flammable liquids, poisons is equally less likely to experience accidents or suicides with those. If a person never leaves their home, they are less likely to be killed or injured in an automobile accident, too.
It seems like the rest of your paragraph answers your own question, William. What’s the comparative rate of fatal injuries per year for any of the home items you list? A good majority of those things you mention (i.e. knives, belts, extension cords, prescription medicines) have a primary use that is non-lethal, too. I don’t buy that you’re really this confused about what the difference is in the case of a gun, though. Elsewhere, your comments suggest that you know perfectly well what guns are primarily used for and just how lethal they are.
While state law prohibits releasing detailed information about district policies or participating staff members, about 170 Texas school districts have officially authorized armed school employees. To date, there has never been an incident of an accidental discharge, an unauthorized person gaining access to a staff member’s firearm or a teacher “going postal.”
Yes, and you know how many ISDs in Texas that makes for? 17%. That sample size alone makes it problematic to argue that allowing guns in schools would be safe because it’s already done in a tiny fraction of districts in Texas. Your remark about there never being an incident of accidental discharge may be true in those Texas districts (I haven’t looked into this, though), but this has already happened at least 30 times in a number of schools nationwide just since 2014.
What would be a lot more productive is if, instead of debating reality, we focused on training these volunteers. Say what you will about diverting their attention from their primary job, the whole process is voluntary.
This is not an either-or issue, though, William. Better training is always going to be a good thing, and even police forces across the country are in serious need of that. It’s also a good thing to make sure that certain gates and doors are properly secured, that monitors are better trained, and so on. And yes, it’s important to remember that school shootings are relatively rare, too.
But ignoring or dismissing the important question of whether or not arming teachers is a smart idea by calling it “debating reality” is foolish. It’s foolish because what you term a reality is only a reality in a minority of cases, there are still real dangers associated with it (not dangers equivalent to having knives, belts, or whatever around), and this reality is not some objective unavoidable fact of life — it’s something we choose, contribute to, and bear responsibility for, locally as well as nationally, and that in itself makes it an open question as to whether or not we want it to continue or expand.
It is not a settled issue, but are there some steps we can take that are more constructive than others? Absolutely. No one is arguing that the one and only answer to school shootings is to ban all guns.
