Teachers Fake Gunman Attack

Anti_Climax writes "Staff members of an elementary school staged a fictitious gun attack on students during a class trip, telling them it was not a drill as the children cried and hid under tables. It'll be interesting to see what happens to these teachers after the charges brought against students in recent months."

Comments

Poor judgement

[chemicaloli]

With fear of stating the obvious I'll say this: How could teachers show such bad judgement, maybe practising for this type of situation could be a valuable experience, but with professional help and advice as well as parental consent, otherwise it seems like professional suicide and being in the states certain to cause tons of lawsuits.

Re:Poor judgement

[VirusEqualsVeryYes]

What confuses me is when they decided tricking the students was a good idea.

The point of drills is not to educate on what to do when you're scared, the point is to educate on what to do in this specific situation. Take fire drills, for example: are students tricked into thinking their school is burning down? No, of course not. The point of the drill is to inculcate the directions that all students must follow in order to avoid chaos. Tricking the students achieves nothing but emotional distress--which is not helpful in any way--and disorder. Drills are there to make the procedure second nature so that disorder does not happen; they're there so that students in distress don't have to make decisions, because the drill spells out all decisions beforehand.

Parental consent is ALWAYS necessary when anything out of the ordinary happens, especially when said extraordinary thing causes emotional distress. Unfortunately, the article didn't make it clear whether this was teachers acting on their own authority during a field trip, or whether this was sanctioned by the administration without parental consent, but whichever it was, this was stupid, stupid, stupid.

Re:Poor judgement

[cultrhetor]

You said the key words that will make these kids rich and get the teachers fired:
"Emotional distress."

Re:Poor judgement

[jgardner100]

How,

Well, I had my head bitten off a few weeks ago by slashdotter's who insisted that children should be exposed to extreme violence as quickly as possible (I had suggested on holding off with getting them to play Halo etc until they were more mature) as apparently bears would eat them if they didn't (you thing I'm kidding, but look through the archives!)

Personally of couse I say hold off with both Sex and violence as long as possible, they have a whole lifetime to follow up on those topics but the innocence of childhood is but once.

Regards
John G

Re:Poor judgement

[qwijibo]

You're right about how drills are supposed to work. This was anti-training. Instead of teaching people how to think about situations and how to react and testing the results, they chose to see how people react under stress. Kids react the way they are taught, and this does nothing positive to reinforce positive reactions. If anything, it taught these kids that their teachers should not be trusted and will like to them for amusement.

Re:Poor judgement

[DrWho520]

Take fire drills, for example: are students tricked into thinking their school is burning down? No, of course not.

When I was in high school, we received the same warning for a drill as for the real thing. No one panicked, but no one was sure whether it was real or fake. Let me reiterate, high school. This was monumentally poor judgement by the teachers and the administration (I cannot imagine this was done without some administator knowing something.)

I think this exercise is worth considering, but not for sixth graders. Some thought should be taken as to student shooter situations, but recent events have been in high school and higher environments. Hear me out on this. Running this exercise in a high school would be advantageous. Teenagers think they are invincible in high school and would be more apt to go "vigilante" in this situation and try to track down a shooter. This exercise could help identify some of these lemmings.

Re:Poor judgement

[Opportunist]

Did you take fire drills serious at school? I didn't. The only way to get us out of the building was to threaten with "extra work" should you still be in the building after 5 Minutes. And even then we usually took a quick trip to the cafeteria coke dispenser (hey, standing 'round outside doing nothing makes you thirsty!).

My guess is that they wanted to "test" how the kids would react in a "real" threat situation. But how fucking nuts do you have to be to use kids a guinea pigs for a psychological experiment without at the very least inform the parents about it? Even with information, this is no way to treat kids.

For fuck's sake, those are teachers. Not some oddball nutjobs, or science wizards in their ivory tower, who have no connection with the emotional makeup of kids. Those are the people we send our kids to, every single day, to learn things.

Do you wonder why kids snap and start shooting? When the adults we entrust them to don't even have the foggiest idea just what they do the the psyche of a child? This is something we hear about, because it has been so damn over the top that you can't simply keep it under cover anymore. How much psychological abuse do we never notice? How often do our kids get scarred by teachers who don't have the minuscle idea about motivating and actually encouraging the kids to learn, instead relying on scare and pressure?

Damn, I think I know where those trigger-happy kids come from now!

Re:Poor judgement

[djh101010]

Running this exercise in a high school would be advantageous. Teenagers think they are invincible in high school and would be more apt to go "vigilante" in this situation and try to track down a shooter. This exercise could help identify some of these lemmings.

What do you mean by that please? Because it looks like you're saying that if someone were to try to stop the situation, they're a lemming? Seems to me, cowering under a desk waiting to be shot in the head is the mindless, ineffective approach. A student tackling the gunman so others could disarm him, or a teacher with a concealed carry permit, or _any_ non-passive response, seems to be a hell of a lot better than just waiting to die.

Re:Poor judgement

[Ender Ryan]

Teenagers think they are invincible in high school and would be more apt to go "vigilante" in this situation and try to track down a shooter. This exercise could help identify some of these lemmings.

Why are you calling them "lemmings?" Someone who goes all vigilante and tries to do something is not following the herd.

In many school shootings, fewer people would have died had students rushed the shooter(s) in an attempt to take them out. Especially in the VT massacre, where the shooter was allowed to methodically murder 32 people trapped in a building. It would only have taken a small group of people to disarm him. Yes, it would certainly be risky to be part of that group, but if you're trapped with no way to escape... you've nothing to lose. As we saw.

No. This is not a good exercise to do. At any school. Especially lead by the fucking idiots who did it.

Every situation is going to be different. This is not like a fire-drill. There is no way to prepare students for such an event. Teach them to do one thing to do, and you are just as likely to get students killed as you are to save them.

Re:Poor judgement

[Anonymous Coward]

With fear of stating the obvious

That's the whole damned problem - fear. What's worse, our government (and the public school is an arm of government) is alarming people about so-called "dangers" that only one in ten thousand of us will ever see. Ten schools out of a hundred thousand have had Columbine-like incidents, while far more kids have died in school bus rollovers because there are no seat belts on the busses!

This was a pet peeve of mine when my kids were growing up and is even worse now. We taught our kids from the get go to wear seat belts. If an adult was riding with us and didn't fasten the belt, the children would scold them. Then they went to school. When my daughter got her first traffic ticket, it was for not wearing a seat belt!

Likewise, I'd like to see most of that money they're wasting on homeland security spent on highway improvements, like guard rails, particularly on exit ramps. Forty thousand people die on US highways every single year, while 3000 Amerticans died in the only terrorist attack on US soil in the last 10 years.

Priorities are as ass-backwards as our other laws; drug laws, for instance. The most deadly and addictive drug known to man, tobacco, is legal, while Marijuana, which has no lethal dose and has been recently shown to PREVENT cancer is a felony. Of course, since pot makes you lazy, industry is dead set against it!

I want my government back. Assuming, that is, that We The People ever actually had control of it to begin with.

-mcgrew

PS and OT, the capcha is "destuff". Could you guys please stick to real words? I have a hell of a time trying to decipher some of these goddamned capchas!

Re:Poor judgement

[Tuoqui]

Well when you consider some crazy bastard shot up an Amish 1-room schoolhouse, anything is possible.

Though this is entirely the wrong way to go about teaching them what to do. I really do wish that the kids had a riot and beat the living #*$% out of the teachers and put them in ICU. Noone would have blamed them

Re:Poor judgement

[djh101010]

or a teacher with a concealed carry permit, or _any_ non-passive response,

Nice try, but it is a violation of federal law to bring a fire-arm onto public school property.
(The one exception being Police Officers in the course of their official Duties)

Well, and that other exception, the homicidal maniac on a rampage. Pesky little thing, reality, isn't it? Seems to me the fact that you'll never stop every last madman is reason enough to let the honest citizens defend themselves if they choose. Outlawing self-defense for good people only harms good people.

I also remember hearing about a study that says having a gun in that sort of situation is a Bad Thing(TM) because it changes your first instinct to be "draw weapon" instead of "duck & Cover/Run/punch/etc" where a gunman would already have his weapon drawn, and presumably pointed at you
Sorry, but state after state which has enacted concealed carry laws have shown the opposite of your vague "study from somewhere". Person on person crime goes down, and the only people less safe are the criminals. Me, I prefer to have the criminals afraid to attack good people.

Re:Poor judgement

[furball]

Nice try, but it is a violation of federal law to bring a fire-arm onto public school property.

Tell that to the shooters.

Re:Poor judgement

[Anonymous Coward]

Seems to me the fact that you'll never stop every last madman is reason enough to let the honest citizens defend themselves if they choose. Outlawing self-defense for good people only harms good people.

Um...no. This is real life, not a video game. Bad people aren't conventiently identified, and even trained soldiers are involved in friendly fire deaths. Scenario: crazed gunman walks into a school and starts shooting people. Ten not-psycho people randomly distributed building are packing heat. You now have eleven people walking around the building with guns. One is happy to see everybody die. The other ten are stressed and most likely don't know anything about the situation other than the fact that there's another armed person somewhere in the building. Given the heightened tension of the situation, your other ten are as likely (if not more so) to start shooting at one another as the gunman, letting off rounds as soon as they see someone else with a gun, and that's not to mention the collateral damage caused by hastily-aimed shots missing their intended target and ending their path inside an innocent bystander. I appreciate that you want to defend yourself, but your self-defense is, to the rest of us good people, most likely just a lot more bullets in the air.

Re:Poor judgement

[DerekLyons]

When I was in high school, we received the same warning for a drill as for the real thing. No one panicked, but no one was sure whether it was real or fake. Let me reiterate, high school. This was monumentally poor judgement by the teachers and the administration (I cannot imagine this was done without some administator knowing something.)

No - it's actually correct to use the same warning for a drill and the real thing. The idea is that the drill teaches your proper reflexes and actions - and when the real thing happens there is no questioning or panic.

Re:Poor judgement

[cyclop]

Parental consent is ALWAYS necessary when anything out of the ordinary happens, especially when said extraordinary thing causes emotional distress.

Oh please. Stop this "emotional distress" BS.

My parents were subject to a LOT of "emotional distress" when they were children. My children father was a refugee from the Italian-Yugoslavia border during the WW II, fleeing to leave most of his relatives (except for his brother and his parents) slaughtered by the Tito army. My grandma, when a child, slept on the ruins of her bombed house. My mother, when a child, lived in Venezuela, with only my grandma caring of her while my grandpa worked 500 km apart and there were earthquakes and revolutions.

Still, my parents and grandparents are psychologically healthy, very normal people. The fact is: human beings have been created to survive a much more cruel, distressing world than our Occidental world. A little distress is more than harmless: it is actually a benefit, because they learn to cope with stress and bad feeling when still young, instead of waiting too late to discover the world is not made of happy Disney cartoons.

The only problem with that happening is that children will (wrongly) learn that OMG TERRORISTS are a common, everyday menace, while they should have to fear obesity much more for their lives, for example.

Re:Poor judgement

[cyclop]

Do you wonder why kids snap and start shooting? When the adults we entrust them to don't even have the foggiest idea just what they do the the psyche of a child? This is something we hear about, because it has been so damn over the top that you can't simply keep it under cover anymore. How much psychological abuse do we never notice? How often do our kids get scarred by teachers who don't have the minuscle idea about motivating and actually encouraging the kids to learn, instead relying on scare and pressure?

Stop this THINKOFTHECHILDREN!!!!1!11!! BS, please.

The psychological problem with your children is that they live a too much protected life. They are hysterically protected and cared about. What would they learn about coping with conflicts, bad people, bad bosses, bad things of life and so on, in the world you want for them? Nothing. They would live in a carefully crafted shell of tender hydrophilic cotton, until it's too late for them to learn that the world is not that depicted by the Disney channel.

Human beings didn't evolve in a happy, Teletubbies-like world. They evolved in a cruel savana full of bloody predators. Yet we are here. Childhood is made to learn to cope with bad situations, not to stay in a happy candy world.

Let your children have emotional distress. Let your children smash their heads on the bad facts of life. They are children -they will quickly learn and know how to react and they will become stronger and stronger (if you have a family shaping those conflicts correctly, of course). What will make your children crazy, neurotic people is to let them discover how bad is the world at 20, when they won't be able to pick up any emotional instrument to cope with the world anymore.

Re:Poor judgement

[steelfood]

This is wrong. While I support the idea that everyone should be versed in self defense, I don't believe guns are the answer. Firearms are too unpredictable, too uncontrolled, and too final. If I hit you in the head, the worse I'll do is give you a concussion. At that point, there's no point in continuing the violence; I've already defended myself sufficiently. I'd have to hit pretty hard and aim for very specific spots to actually kill you. Unlucky for you and me both, but that's just how life is sometimes. But if I shoot you somewhere in the body, you've got a really good chance of dying. And if I shoot you in the head, you've got an even better chance of dying. Worse yet, if I miss, that bullet might hit someone else and kill an innocent person.

Your assumption that concealed carry laws don't work is based on the premise that the bad guys are completely, 100% bad. Concealed carry laws are most useful against those people who might need a gun in certain situations and thus would acquire one without such laws but whom the barriers to entry as a result of such laws would result in that person not having the means to acquire one. These include small-time dealers, druggies, people living in rough neighborhoods, people interested in firearms, potential mass murderers (who by and large would end up using less efficient means of killing when they snap), etc. In cities with ghettos, violence definitely goes down with gun control, simply because there are less guns floating around, which means the police have an easier time not just apprehending, but also identifying the criminals. If every small-time dealer carried a gun around, the cops' effectiveness would be significantly reduced.

I don't care for laws against other weapons, like knives or such, but guns are just too unpredictable. Also, for the record, I'm divided on whether to openly teach firearm handling regardless of gun control laws. I wouldn't think twice about the idea of teaching others how to deal with an opponent holding a gun however. And everyone possesing that knowledge, I think, would be a sufficient deterrent for most petty criminals.

Re:Poor judgement

[djh101010]

Seems to me the fact that you'll never stop every last madman is reason enough to let the honest citizens defend themselves if they choose. Outlawing self-defense for good people only harms good people.

Um...no. This is real life, not a video game. Bad people aren't conventiently identified,
Really? Seems to me he identified himself pretty completely by going into classrooms and, you know, killing people.

Scenario: crazed gunman walks into a school and starts shooting people. Ten not-psycho people randomly distributed building are packing heat. You now have eleven people walking around the building with guns. One is happy to see everybody die. The other ten are stressed and most likely don't know anything about the situation other than the fact that there's another armed person somewhere in the building. Given the heightened tension of the situation, your other ten are as likely (if not more so) to start shooting at one another as the gunman, letting off rounds as soon as they see someone else with a gun,
You seem to have a fantastic (as in fantasy) understanding of CCW, who carries, and how well it works.

I appreciate that you want to defend yourself, but your self-defense is, to the rest of us good people, most likely just a lot more bullets in the air.
Don't worry - it's fine that you don't understand the reality, really it is. But don't force me to be a sitting duck because of your uninformed preconceptions. It's really not that hard to tell when someone is a threat - they're the one coming into the classroom shooting people. A defensive use of a firearm will be over before there can be any confusion as to which guy is the bad guy. You'll be fine. Us good people outnumber the madmen and badguys by thousands to one. I'll take those odds.

Re:Poor judgement

[djh101010]

I don't think relying upon potential victims carrying weapons of their own choice is a sound strategy (most people don't bother, so most of the time a situation comes up even if they had the option, chances are no one would be equipped to stop them).
My point is, the VT leadership forbid valid CCW holders from carrying on campus, which deprived them of the choice one way or the other, and guaranteed the killer a "safe work envirionment". I don't have a problem with someone choosing not to carry, but I _do_ have a problem with someone telling me I may not, because they want me to "feel safer" (yeah, I can dredge up the news article with that quote from the VT leadership if you'd like).

Another thing I've heard suggested is that people should be *required* to be armed. Admittedly, I don't hear this argument out of many reasonable people, but it has come up.
Not here, so no point in going over that part.

Probably some program to deputize, train, and arm some number of officials in areas of concern is potentially a prudent action. You have a known set of people to rely upon without indiscriminately putting guns in the hands of random people who may be prone to anger.
Great idea. This, in effect, is what CCW is. A set of people who are of good moral standing with clean records, who have the interest, ability, and training to safely protect themselves and, by the nature of protecting themselves, protect those around them.

Short of bombers, potential mass-killing attempts outside of schools are cut short if happening over a short period of time. Generally because police or private security companies that are armed are closer at hand, not because random people happened to be armed to stop it.
There have been a number of school shootings that were stopped by armed potential victims putting an end to the rampage, actually. I won't speculate on why more people don't know this, but to me the reasons are obvious. I can dig up the links - one was a law student in the eastern US, another was a principal in Pearl Mississippi: http://www.davekopel.com/2A/OthWr/principal&gun.ht m

Point is, armed folks _have_ stopped school shootings, despite the fact that they had to bring a gun onto campus to do so. Seems to me that a good person with a gun is less of a threat than a murderer on a rampage, but maybe that's just my bias showing.

Re:Poor judgement

[DragonWriter]

Fear of "emotional distress" suits is why some schools have stopped using red ink to grade, or even grading all together - it might make the kids that don't do as well feel bad.

No, it isn't. The reason they've done that is because either of political pressure on school boards or adherence to particular theoretical models in education. These may be problems, but they aren't the problem you are pointing to.

Of course, the school doesn't give a damn about making the kids feel bad - they're there to teach, not reassure, after all - but they're terrified to do it because you can sue a school for anything these days.

You can sue anyone for anything, and that's not a new situation "these days". You don't have a snowball in hell's chance of winning a suit for emotional distress in the kind of situations you point to as examples, though, against a school district or anyone else.

Crying "wolf"

[Bromskloss]

Was it really smart to say it was not a drill? It sounds, you know, like crying "wolf"...

Re:Crying "wolf"

[Andy Dodd]

A friend of mine from high school worked as a substitute teacher at our old high school to make some extra money to pay for graduate school. The stories she told of the current state of our high school were horrifying - Many of the "old guard" teachers (who actually had a clue what they were doing) had retired, and their replacements were awful, many of the current teachers at the school went to high school with us, and saying that some of them were not the best students at our school back then is giving them too much credit.

The problem is that those who are best qualified to teach are also usually qualified to do something that pays FAR better. Between the better pay and the horrific politics of public schools, it's pretty hard to convince someone to teach unless they have nothing else they can do.

A few summers ago I got a job as a teaching assistant at a summer program for gifted high school students. As stressful as it was, it was the most rewarding job I have ever had in my life. Unfortunately, as much as I enjoyed helping to teach those students, there's no way I could teach high school. As rewarding as it can be, it can also be VERY stressful, and the pay is just not worth the stress, especially when you have to deal with public school politics in addition to unruly students.

In short - unless the educational system in our country gets overhauled soon (not likely, considering that we have giant leaps backwards like No Child Left Behind which makes the political bullshit WORSE), we're screwed.

Learning about authority

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, at least they have started their education in not trusting authority, and learning that those in authority will lie to you. This is one of the lessons that most people don't get, until much later in life.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[joebagodonuts]

Besides just stupid. Why anyone would think this is a good idea is beyond me. We are truly making ourselves insane.

"Principal Catherine Stephens declined to say whether the staff members involved would face disciplinary action, but said the situation 'involved poor judgment.'"

You think so, Doctor?

What Maroons!

[WrongSizeGlass]

How can they be so stupid? These kids won't trust teachers ever again ... and they'll probably have trouble with authority figures for the rest of their lives.

I say we take the asshats responsible for this and lock them in the school's auditorium with all the angry parents and let the asshats see how it feels to fear for their lives.

Re:What Maroons!

[inviolet]

Take care to remember that when you hear a news item that makes you think any of these words:

• crazy
• insane
• evil
• outrageous
• inexplicable

...then you have almost certainly been given only half the story.

These kids won't trust teachers ever again ... and they'll probably have trouble with authority figures for the rest of their lives.

You say that like it's a bad thing.

Re:What Maroons!

[Opportunist]

they'll probably have trouble with authority figures for the rest of their lives.

You say that like it's something negative that they will use their own mind to judge a situation instead of turning to someone to tell them what to think and how to act.

Re:What Maroons!

[VirusEqualsVeryYes]

Take care to remember that when you hear a news item that makes you think any of these words:

• crazy
• insane
• evil
• outrageous
• inexplicable

...then you have almost certainly been given only half the story.

Either that, or you're reading about US politics.

Right Idea, Wrong Implementation

[AKAImBatman]

Considering how (relatively) common school shootings have become, I'm not against the idea of drilling kids on what to do in such a situation. If a set of procedures have been devised to combat the situation or at least keep it under control, then teaching it to the kids would probably be a positive thing. However, it does need to be taught to them.

You can't just spring a "real emergency" drill on them without first performing announced drills and properly training them. The result would be similar to the pandemonium that would result if it was announced that the school was really burning down every time there was a fire drill. That's no way to teach proper handling of the situation. You want everyone as calm and collected as can be.

The article is light on details, but I do hope some good comes of this. These teachers sound far too junior to be implementing this plan on their own. (Their first major mistake.) If schools take notice, however, perhaps more appropriate training and procedures can be put in place.

Re:Right Idea, Wrong Implementation

[Turn-X Alphonse]

Please tell me how I plan for a mad man with fire arms. I would really like to know how you plan your exits while you have a guy in an unknown position heading towards unknown locations. Do you play Russian roullete and let 1 class get massacred so the others can escape, or do you all move to 1 location and get shot when he realizes you're all going to parking lot B?

If you've ever played any sort of FPS game you know full well people react in odd ways and you can't predict which way they will come at you from, let alone make a formal plan for such a situation. Putting this into real world setting you're plan revolves on 99% luck and 1% skill.

Re:Right Idea, Wrong Implementation

[rlp]

Considering how (relatively) common school shootings have become

They're not - when they happen they get amplified by extensive coverage on the 24-hour cable news programs.

Re:Right Idea, Wrong Implementation

[digitig]

Considering how (relatively) common school shootings have become, I'm not against the idea of drilling kids on what to do in such a situation. Er, just how common have school shootings become? Relative to what? I thought they were very very rare, and the chance of your or my kids being involved in one was tiny. Isn't that why they still shock?

No it won't

[Visaris]

It'll be interesting to see what happens to these teachers after the charges brought against students in recent months.

No it won't. Not much will happen to them. Unlike the student who was arrested a while ago for completing his essay assignment as sked, these teachers will not be arrested. At best they may be fired after a couple months of looking in to it. They will probably only get a slap on the wrist. Don't forget that America in not interested in protecting children. This is a perfect example. By pulling this stunt, the teachers were able to scare the kids and permanantly brand the image of terrorists into the Children's minds. It doesn't matter that the thing turned up to be a hoax, the less educated/experienced of the kids will live with fear for quite a while, perhaps their whole lives. The teachers are acting much as the rest of America acts. It more important to mold children into the "American Cog" than to treat them fairly, or to give them an education. I mean, after all, what about the terrorists?

modern life in the US

[gEvil (beta)]

Gotta start teaching them to be scared at an early age, y'know...

Did these teachers ride the short bus?

[qwijibo]

Doing a drill where students are taught what to do and try to react in a controlled environment might be reasonable. Whether or not the underlying idea has merit, training has to be right to have value. Executing a drill for the purpose of finding out how kids will respond is just sick amusement.

Telling the kids that it wasn't a drill and they had to fear for their lives was counter productive at best. The teachers and administration that were involved in this should all be locked up. The purpose of this act was to terrorize the children. At a minimum, each person involved should be charged with one count of child abuse for each child affected by this incredibly retarded action. The closest any of them should be to a child for the rest of their lives is asking "do you want fries with that?"

Re:The new "Stop, drop and roll" for the '00's?

[wass]

In how many of those drills were you told it wasn't a drill and that the Soviets really were on their way to bomb the school? Or how many fire drills have you had where the teachers yelled that it's not a normal fire drill, the school really is burning down and you might burn to death?

What these teachers did was equivalent of yelling "Fire" in a crowded theater.

What'll Happen.

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Some students really scared. Parents cope.
2. Some Students really scared. Parents see dollar signs, hire lawyers.
3. Some students, this doesn't bother.

4. Lawyers sue, get settlement. Parents get small check, lawyers buy another couple of BMW's.
5. Pricipal gets talked to.
6. Teachers get fired, humiliated, and blackballed.

Re:In the words of Stan Marsh

[andy666]

Completely! It makes me really angry to read, thinking of what my own daughter would feel in this situation. The only real reason that I can imagine these teachers doing this is that they are a fundamentally sadistic. It is incredibly cruel.

Too true

[spike2131]

And the accompanying fear-mongering only enhances the probability of such attacks in the future.

Still, in terms of number of lives saved, the resources would be better spent on educating kids about things like basic traffic safety, good nutritional habits, and not sniffing paint.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[rblancarte]

If there is one thing that the American populace has never failed to shock me on is their lack of common sense. We are blanketed by tons of laws that are nothing but common sense laws. IMHO, even without the Virginia Tech events in such resent memory, this was a bad idea, and common sense should tell you this.

I think that there are ways to tackle issues such as this. One is probably the most obvious, talk about it. I think if you want to do something like this, you have to contact parents to alert them you want to do this, and give them the option to remove their kids from this class (and/or field trip).

These teachers probably cost themselves their jobs as well as any chance to ever work in their field again. And considering their actions, that is probably a good thing.

RonB

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[maxume]

Common sense isn't. Anywhere.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[Fordiman]

*blinks*

Yeah. 'Cos you can prepare for a crazy dude bent on filling an elementary school full of lead. Who the hell thought this neurosis-inducing plan might be a good idea?

Re:Meh.

[Lurker2288]

I seriously doubt you'll ever see a school district encouraging students to "mob" a shooter, because the parents of every kid blown away in the process of doing so will sue the hell out of the school district.

Approval??

[necdeus]

Isn't it interesting that schools need parental approval for sex education but no approval for violence education?

Re:In the words of Stan Marsh

[Anonymous Coward]

Now if only a few of this students were packing heat, we'd have a few dead teachers right now.
God Bless America

XOXOXO,
Wayne Lapierre

Re:I love the internet ...

[muellerr1]

Don't post this sort of info anonymously. If this is public information, what do you have to hide? Unless that's your ex-girlfriends phone number up there.

If you find yourself posting vigilante information anonymously, please ask yourself why you can't sign your name. If you think what you're doing is wrong, maybe you shouldn't do it. Not that I'm saying what you've done is illegal, just that you should really have the balls to take responsibility for this action. Anonymous attacks on people (even if justified) make me extremely suspicious.

I'm not condoning it but...

[JustNiz]

I'm not condoning it but I think everyone has totally overreacted. It was only a prank and its made national news.
America is breeding a country full of paranoid parents and kids that need psychotherapy if someone says boo to them.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[Hatta]

I'm guessing the "give all students guns and Virginia Tech wouldn't have happened" crowd won't be commenting on this story.. Imagine how much worse this would have been if everyone had guns.

Give all students guns and this wouldn't have happened either.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[drooling-dog]

...this is undeniably domestic terrorism. Absolutely it is. The children were terrorized, and that was exactly the intent of the people who did this.

Re:In the words of Stan Marsh

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, how dare they prepare them for reality. I mean, let's cancel fire drills while we're at it.

You just defined lemming for him.

[Xest]

I don't think he was suggesting that anyone hide under a desk, because that's equally as stupid as going after a gunman - both are only reasonable options when you have no other choice.

I think he was suggesting more to get the hell away from the area via a safe route, or otherwise get somewhere the gunman can't get to (i.e. blockade yourself into a room much like the students that survived Virginia Tech did).

Both your suggestions are prime examples of what the person you were responding to meant when he mentioned lemmings - people who just sit and die and people who, well, go and die. Both are equally stupid when there's another more blatantly sensible option - get to safety and let well trained police/soldiers wearing bulletproof vests and armed with flashbangs deal with the guy with a gun.

Re:You just defined lemming for him.

[djh101010]

I don't think he was suggesting that anyone hide under a desk, because that's equally as stupid as going after a gunman - both are only reasonable options when you have no other choice.
So you are claiming that duck and cover is equally as bad a choice, as someone taking a direct approach and stopping the shooter? Seriously?

I think he was suggesting more to get the hell away from the area via a safe route, or otherwise get somewhere the gunman can't get to (i.e. blockade yourself into a room much like the students that survived Virginia Tech did).

Right. That's how at least one of the professors got killed, by him shooting through the door. Better chance than sitting and waiting, sure, but so much less effective than if he'd had the means to effectively defend himself.

Both your suggestions are prime examples of what the person you were responding to meant when he mentioned lemmings - people who just sit and die and people who, well, go and die. Both are equally stupid when there's another more blatantly sensible option - get to safety and let well trained police/soldiers wearing bulletproof vests and armed with flashbangs deal with the guy with a gun.
In the case of VT, there wasn't a _get to safety_ option, was there. The hallways were occupied by a gunman, the exits had been chained shut. Waiting for professional help is what got them killed. ONE teacher with a gun could have stopped it at something less than 32 deaths. Even knowing that his intended victims were allowed to carry if they so chose might have deterred his entire rampage - it was obviously directed at helpless people. If he didn't know his victims were forced by law to be helpless, maybe he wouldn't have started in the first place.

Lemmings aren't the ones fighting the killer and dying, lemmings are the ones dying while hoping that "well trained police/soldiers" will show up in time to save them.

rehearsed drills would be an even worse idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Think about this: if the shooter is a student, as is generally the case, then that student has been through the same situation drills as everyone else and can therefor adapt his or her plan to to take that into account. Remember that situation in Arkansas a few years ago, where the kids pulled the fire alarm then sat outside with the guns so they could shoot people as they came and stood in their pre-designated areas? Yes, just like that.

If there is to be a plan, then the students can never know about it. The teachers just need to know where to put the kids and when.

Re:It would have been quite dangerous for teachers

[rev_sanchez]

This shooter drill thing is troubling since my plan is nudity. Being a somewhat overweight, hairy guy this would serve many purposes.

1. Distraction - They are coordinating a dangerous operation and the last thing they need is to ponder is what's up with that fat, naked guy. This distraction is just what the SWAT team is looking for.
2. Not a Threat (Mostly) - Unless I'm aroused I'm not going to appear too dangerous at first but in the back of their minds they know they aren't going to want to fight a naked dude.
3. Safety Via Shame - They aren't going to shoot everyone because then no one would be left to explain the naked guy. I don't think there is anything wrong with being gay but there is a good chance that the shooters aren't going to want people to think the fat naked guy thing was their idea of sexy time. At the very least they are going to want to spare a few people to make sure everyone knows that I didn't get naked because they asked me to. My naked ass might not survive that scenario but I'd go out saving a few lives.

My home anti-invasion/burglar scheme is pretty much the same idea. I've near heard of a nudist being robbed.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[omeomi]

I'm guessing the "give all students guns and Virginia Tech wouldn't have happened" crowd won't be commenting on this story..

Oh, I'm guessing they will. They will very likely mod my comment here down as well for agreeing with you. I've found it interesting that, even though both the Columbine and VT events, along with this most recent staged event in Tennessee, happened in "red states", where guns are more prevalent, and more a part of daily life, people in those states seem to want more guns, not less. Like Texas, where legislators are arguing that guns should be allowed in schools and courtrooms. That logic makes no sense to me...

Cue the "2nd amendment means everybody should have an armory" folks now...

sadistic tinpot dictators

[e-scetic]

I'm going to quote myself from another article...

Rather, the issue here is that too many teachers and principals are little tinpot dictators who view their schools as their fiefdom and students as little serfs answerable to them. It's part of why they become teachers and principals in the first place, a great chunk of them HATE kids but see it as a way to get a piece of their own little world, isolated from the adult world and with a more vulnerable, ignorant populace more fearsome of authority and thus more easily controlled. Oh, plus the summer off.

If there wasn't a way to force respect based on authoritarianism they wouldn't be interested, they're sado-masochists in disguise, mix them in with children and that makes them predators

Year after year there's always something or other frivolous thing they're trying to control. This year, in my neighbourhood, it was them trying to ban Axe body deodorant. I remember when I was a kid they tried to ban Doc Martens. Somewhere in between it was friggin' multi-colored shoe laces. Now it's MySpace. It never ends.

And to that I'll add this example to my growing list...

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[VagaStorm]

One of the larger problems with a drill like this as I see it, is that you rely cant prepare for it. You can tell the kids what to generally do in such a situation, but as no incident will be alike, it is very hard. With a fire drill, it is simple, evacuate the building using designated escape routes, if they for some reason are blocked you can discover that and select another route. Whereas in the event of a gunman in the hallway, if your escape route could very well be shooting at you befor you realize its a hinder. What happens during a drill where th students dos the smart thing and jumps from the 3. floor to get away? Bottom line is; if these drill where to be preformed, they NEED to be drills made out by someone who has some clue of what they are doing, which I severely doubt your general teacher do in this situation.

Re:Obligatory...

[Miseph]

Well, sort of.

More like, the parents will be set for life, and the town will have to close down it's schools due to legal fees, and several teachers will be bankrupted and never again able to find work. The kids might get to sponge off their parents' newly enlarged coffers a little more greedily, but I seriously doubt the kids will ever see a dime of it after they turn 18. Probably won't be given the beamer either.

Re:At least a Disturbing the Peace Charge

[Sancho]

Hi.

But now we have an ACTUAL case of terrorism. Let's not play our government's game of claiming things are terrorism when really, they're not. Terrorism refers to attempts to use violence and threats to coerce and incite change in those who have power. Terrorism does NOT refer to scaring people (I am not a terrorist if I jump out of the bushes and shout "boo!") Terrorism also isn't simply scaring people on a larger scale (I am not a terrorist if I jump out of the bushes and shout "BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"). Some people in power would have you believe that any form of inducing fear is terrorism, however these are the people who are trying to get a stranglehold on your civil rights by making you afraid of your own shadow. Please don't follow in their footsteps by labelling this insane lack of judgement and high liklihood of emotional scarring 'terrorism'.

Re:In the words of Stan Marsh

[Gerzel]

Reality? Where are you from? Bosnia? Iraq?

I attended school in the US and have been in school when tornadoes where in the area and have been in the school when it caught fire. Gunmen attacking isn't something that generally happens in US schools. Furthermore, in all those drills it was clearly stated that they were in fact drills and not the real thing.

Such a drill has no basis in reality and goes against fairly well reasoned and tested methods of conducting such drills. A gunman attack isn't something that is likely to happen to a student in their entire school lifetime, including if they go through a doctorate program, and even if it was what reason is there to pretend that such a drill is the real thing?

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[Hijacked Public]

The problem with incidents like these (the actual ones) is that it is difficult to collect the necessary information you would need to determine which dots to follow in order to safely evacuate. Who knows where the assailant is? How many of them are there? How are they equipped?

I've been on patrols that were ambushed. These were well trained well disciplined professional soldiers and the first minute or so was still total pandemonium and I really have no recollection of specifically what any of us did. Until we were able to assess the situation the best thing anyone could do was get behind solid cover and figure out the nature of the threat.

The last thing I would want some teacher doing is making tactical decisions about how to get a classroom full of students out of as building, particularly when the teacher has no way to know what is going on anywhere else in the building. The portion of the VT incident that happened in the classroom area lasted 9 minutes. No time to determine the specifics of what was going on and where, consult a building plan to determine evacuation routes, communicate them to the professors in the classrooms, then have them execute the plan. Doing anything other than barricading oneself in a safe room in a situation like this is a tactical mistake.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[Deagol]

Like Texas, where legislators are arguing that guns should be allowed in schools and courtrooms. That logic makes no sense to me...

(Note: While I live in UT -- as Red as they come, these days -- I'm a liberal-leaning person with a strong belief in personal responsibility. I proudly own and use several firearms.)

I'm one of those pro-gun folks who does (and did, after VA Tech) suggest that if everyone (or a non-trivial percentage) was packing on campus, that there may have been fewer deaths. I won't mod you down for having a difference of opinion, though. That's just lame -- discourse is a cornerstone of any civilized community.

Anyway, as to what I quoted from your post... I can't speak for anyone else, but if I were to "go postal" (and were still in control of my mind, as it were) I'd actively seek out a place where I *knew* everyone would be disarmed if they were good law-following citizens. That is, post offices, courthouses, any K-12 public school grounds, many churches (being a private property), and gun-free college campuses like the University of Utah and, say, VA Tech.

While many would see the logical conclusion to arming *everyone* as a recipe for anarchy and accidents waiting to happen, those of us on the other side of the issue believe that it is wrong (and downright silly) to place law-abiding people at an inherent disadvantage by default for simply following the law. After all, criminals don't give a flying fig about the laws, so they will always have an advantage. There's a good Dark Helmet quote a about Good vs Evil that addresses this very issue. ;)

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[Deagol]

Anyway, the problem with the idea of allowing anybody to carry a concealed weapon, as has been proposed in Texas, is that the assumption is made that all gun-owners are responsible, upstanding citizens. That's clearly not the case.

I concede to this point. However, we allow these same people all sorts of other privileges. We let them navigate large masses of steel at high speeds (yes, there's registration -- won't touch that one for now), we let them purchase other dangerous substances (compressed gases, chemicals, poisons, etc.) w/o any oversight, and we even let them *breed* unchecked.

If you believe that the State should not meddle in your procreation, travel, or shopping habbits, then you should reasonably conclude that your own self defense (even with a weapon of deadly force) should fall into this category as well.

I agree with the courthouse thing, though. I didn't think through my list well enough in my example. A courthouse is probably the *last* place I'd "go postal" at. :)

This is brain-washing

[gunnarstahl]

According to wikipedia "Primary or elementary education consists of the first years of formal, structured education that occur during childhood.". In other words, the target group of this excercise is in the age of 5 - 11 years.

What could possibly be the reason behind something like this? Exposing little children to such a nightmare scenario is insane. I guess there will be more than just one child being left behind with psychological traumata as a result of this.

Either the teachers were completely out of mind or these teachers have the intention of inflicting fear, making the children obedient.

Yt,

Gunnar

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[MillionthMonkey]

The suggestion that this event could have ended in tragedy if students had guns is not a special circumstance.

Sure, this event might have gone differently (better) if everyone had been packing heat. What you're not considering are the other events which then become possible, on days when there is not a mass murder going on. Because actually, this type of event is quite rare, and ordinary shootings are so common they're not even newsworthy.

Now if you could figure out how to have everybody armed just on the day the psychotic shows up, then this might be a good policy.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[omeomi]

The ones that aren't responsible and upstanding don't care about the law, by definition. Therefore, they will carry concealed weapons anyway!

It's quite possible to be irresponsible, but still abide by the law. For instance, if guns are allowed into public schools, a perfectly upstanding teacher might carry his .44 Magnum to school in order to protect his students. Makes perfect sense, except he isn't a particularly good shot (although he likes to think he is), and isn't trained to safely fire a gun in a crowded area, as is the case with police. He went to a shooting range once when he was a teenager, but hasn't been back since. He likes to carry a big gun, so people see it and know not to mess with him, but it's not a great choice when dealing with a crowd, because the .44 has a lot of penetrating power. One day, a student walks in with a realistic looking toy gun, says "bang bang, you're dead"...not a wise decision, but kids do stupid things...the teacher quickly draws and fires, killing the student, and the completely innocent student who just walked in the door behind him. He had the best of intentions, but does it sound *responsible* to you?

We did that

[B1ackDragon]

This was like 6 or 7 years ago now. I was attending a secondary ed. career center and they staged a gunman attack. It was executed very nicely; everyone knew what was going on, (well, that there would be a drill of that type on that day) and the local police department and hospital ER staff was even in on it so they could practice their skills in handling the situation.

Certain students were selected play roles. I got to play a shot guy! The police dragged me out to the ER people, who tossed me in an ambulance and I went all the way to the ER. Whee.

I'm sure it was very instructive, not so much for the students but for the faculty, local PD, and hospital, who all need to coordinate together in situations such as those. I rather miss that "tech center." Shortly after Columbine the local highschools started to go batshit crazy, expelling students and messing up their lives for the most rediculous of offenses; as I understand it this sort thing still continues. The Tech center, on the other hand, still has a rather open and friendly atmostphere. The faculty and students appreciate and respect one another, and the exercise I described actually served to strengthen that bond.

Anyway, mostly rambling now. I guess the point is, I think there is some correlation between how many schools treat their students these days (ie as dangerous criminals vs., well, people) and how these sorts of exercises are run (ie as cruel experiments vs. community oriented preparation). I would also conjecture that the behavior of the students reflects how they are treated...

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[eosp]

If we don't need guns for defense then I guess the police don't either. /sarcasm

Re:OK, so first step

[furball]

Firearms are not a crime deterrent no matter whose rhetoric you listen to. The key thing to realize about firearms and concealed carry laws is that to make that stuff work, the person with the firearm in the defensive position needs to have the willingness to kill or at least severely impair the aggressor to the point where violence is abated.

Let that sink in for a moment. Do you feel safer with your kids in an environment where one of the faculties has made a conscious decision that he is willing to kill? Does that unnerve you like it unnerves me?

I am greatly intrigued by the school program that teaches kids to fight back. At the very least if I die due to similar violence, I at least made a conscious decision to do something, anything, that might affect the outcome in a positive way.

I would rather die trying to make a difference rather than die a victim cowering. In the very least, it would be a good death.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[kalirion]

The correct plan against a single rampaging gunman seems to be for everybody to rush him. An archer can shoot peons all day long if all they do is run and hide within the base, but he'll only be able to get a few if the entire workforce rushes him.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[Anonymous Coward]

Can you imagine in this "non-drill" drill if some of the kids had chosen to do just that (heave a book, desk, or other object at the 'shooter'). This was not a brilliant plan.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[BitterOak]

I could not for the life of me think of a reason why you would watch a man with a gun walk in and start shooting your friends and NOT DO ANYTHING TO DEFEND YOURSELF.

Here's the reason: the shooting took place in a gun free zone. According to school rules, no one was allowed to have guns, making them all sitting ducks. Obviously the shooter new this, and this probably had something to do with his choice of location. You really think throwing textbooks at this guy's head would have had any effect against someone armed with two semi-automatic weapons???

You are ignoring

[warrax_666]

those who are incompetent, i.e. those who merely think that they're responsible and upstanding, but who in reality aren't. The tragic thing is that the more incompetent you are at something, the more likely you are to be bad at judging your own skills (a pretty famous study was done on this; can't remember the title though -- you might want to try google). That is a recipe for disaster when mistakes can have fatal consequences.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[demi]

You cannot name a major single city or country where a person cannot fairly easily obtain a gun and ammunition. Not one! You can _talk_ about theory until you're blue in the face, but Britain, Canada, Japan, Russia (every country) still have shootings. Get my drift?

This is a terrible argument for a gun advocate to make. Comparing gun crime crime statistics for the UK vs. the U.S. greatly supports the notion that gun controls make you less likely to get shot. Of course there are still shootings in the UK, but they are a tiny, tiny fraction of what they are in the U.S. Essentially what is a common occurrence in the U.S. (tens and thousands of gun deaths each year) is a freak occurrence in the UK (negligible in number: 100s, for a country around a quarter of the size of the population of the U.S.).

The entire gun advocate position is based on making up stories, using powerful imagery like that of a teacher or student taking the VA Tech shooter down. It's based on the idea that we must protect ourselves against the exceedingly rare but sensational (the VA Tech shooting), at the expense of the common (theft of firearms, use in crimes of impulse, etc.).

It's the same kind of argument we see when we have discussions about what to do about terrorism. These security discussions are characterized by the description of sensational past and future events, and how to deal with this or that specific attack ("What if they attack the Super Bowl? Or they could put ebola in the water supply!"). Bruce Schneier writes eloquently about "movie plot" threats and the way they lead us to make irrational securty decisions, born of fear, out of all proportion to the actual risk that we're dealing with.

It's pretty simple: The actual risk of being shot by Seung-Hui Cho or someone like him is vanishingly small. The risk of being shot by some yabbo who's pissed at you and happens to have a gun handy is, relative to that, pretty high. Making the former less likely and the latter more likely is bad trade-off. It's too bad so many people are seduced by the cinematic scenario of getting into a shoot-out with the bad guys to notice this, or allow rationality, rather than their power fantasies, to dictate public policy.

Baby Steps...

[baboo_jackal]

A whole lot of realism right up front isn't always a good thing when you're training for contingencies. I could see the logic if the teachers had gone through an incremental training process with increasing realism and randomness. If their intent was to terrorize young kids while minimizing the learning value of the drill, then, Mission Accomplished!

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[drawfour]

If you hit someone in the side of the head with a heavy object (book, large stapler, laptop, chair, etc...) there are a few things that can happen. You may succeed in knocking him out if you hit him in the temple. You may succeed in breaking his nose, causing his eyes to tear up and making it nearly impossible to see. You may hit one of his eyes, causing partial blindness and extreme pain. Or you may just cause him to try to cover his head, giving you or someone else a chance to rush him.

Any of those are better that laying there and hoping that you're not next. I agree with the GP post, it doesn't seem like anyone even tried to fight for their life.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[TobyRush]

There is no question that having drills for situations like this can save lives when and if the real thing happens. But there is a difference between having a drill and the real thing. What was done here is like having a fire drill that involves setting the school on fire.

For the students involved in this "drill" there is no difference between the trauma they experienced and what they would have experienced in a real situation. By the time the students were told that it was all just pretend, it was too late... they were scared for their lives, crying, hiding, wondering what was going on. Whatever sense of safety they felt in their school (or, in this case, on a school-related trip) was taken from them, and I'm guessing the nightmares are going to last a long time.

Kids soak up information like a sponge... a drill in this situation should have been announced and prepared for, down to the minute, so the students knew exactly what to expect. When the drill is done in a calm, orderly fashion, the kids remember that sense of calm and order when the real thing happens, and things go much better. Ideally, if a gunman enters a school, most of the school should be evacuated in such a way that the students are never entirely sure if it's the real thing or just another drill.

This stunt is, in my mind, a tragedy equal to that of a real gunman situation. The only difference is that this one had no physical injuries...

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[unapersson]

"Here's the reason: the shooting took place in a gun free zone. According to school rules, no one was allowed to have guns, making them all sitting ducks."

His point was you don't have to be sitting ducks, use a bit of ingenuity. If you're all carrying guns the gunman doesn't even need to have to smuggle his in anymore. He can just take yours. If you don't have the instincts to cope with a gunman unarmed then a weapon probably won't do you much good as he's likely already got yours.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[maelstrom]

I love how you've never even been to the United States, yet you characterize a nation of 300 million people by talking to a few people who were exchange students. There is probably more difference between a feminist living in Berkeley California and a Baptist living in Alabama, then there is between someone living in Poland and someone living in Germany. If stereotyping millions of people through ignorance is your great example of "European common sense", maybe it isn't such a bad thing that Americans have none.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[GreenEnvy22]

I agree that if everyone had guns, you probably would not see these multi-kill massacres much, however you probably would have many more smaller shootings. If everyone has guns, simple bar fights, road rage, annoying neighbours, and the like can all turn into deadly situations because someone gets stupid and pulls out their gun.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[Anonymous Coward]

As an owner of a paintball field I'm around guns a hell of a lot

I sincerely hope that you never have to find out the difference between paintball and a firefight.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[Cecil]

Catch the idiots, kick them out, then (most importantly) get rid of the cameras.

And that's why they call surveillance a slippery slope. Going down is all well and good, but when you want to go back to where you used to be it is very nearly impossible. Once those cameras are there, I don't think any force of willpower on earth will be able to get rid of them.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[The Good Reverend]

You forgot "you might miss, he'll see you, and you'll get shot long before you get a second throw off".

I've thankfully never been in such a situation, but I don't know if I'd be able to find something heavy, stand up, throw that thing across the room, and hope I don't get in his line of fire in the process.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[drawfour]

The difference in your situation and that one at Virginia Tech is that in the restaurant, a guy went in to rob it, probably not to kill anyone. Just because someone is waving a gun around is not necessarily a reason to throw something at him. Give him the money, your watches, jewelry, whatever he wants.

But when he's already demonstrated that he's willing to kill with no provocation, all bets are off. You're next whether you're 10th or the very next one to be shot.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[SadGeekHermit]

First of all, don't compare "Europeans" to "Americans". The titles are so broad as to be utterly meaningless. The continental United States and Europe are about the same size, geographically. The 48 states that comprise the continental U.S. vary culturally just as widely as the countries that make up Europe do. Do you think a Frenchman would react or think the same way a Romanian would? How about comparing a Welshman to an Italian? Or maybe a Swede with a Spaniard? The ONLY reason you Europeans think it makes sense to lump us all together is that we've all agreed to speak English (most of the time). To YOU people, that implies homogeneity, because your own "tower of babel" makes the differences jump out at you.

Even if we speak a similar language, New Yorkers (such as myself) are as different from Texans or Alabamans as Englishmen are from Greeks. Even our language is only barely compatible; local dialects are often impenetrable to outsiders. I would go so far as to say that every state in the U.S. is different, with a different subculture and a different set of laws.

Here's another example: if you, a European, were to hang around New York for a few days you wouldn't find too much you didn't like. The same would probably go for most of New England, possibly Pennsylvania, the Pacific Northwest, and California. You'd LOVE Hawaii, of course. Everybody does.

But if you were to accidentally find yourself somewhere down South, like maybe the back woods of Louisiana, well... Let's just say that if you hear the phrase "purty lips" you'd better run like hell. :)

Not the same. Different. Get it?

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[kevinx]

I know I'm a little late to the table on this one, but I just had to say something.. These people were displaying a natural human survial instinct. With no place to run and faced with an extremely dangerous threat, they simply attempted to not draw attention to themselves. Doing anything only insures that you as the next target. Someone who has no training or knowledge with dealing this type of situation will in essance play dead. Fighting an enemy who has no regards for their own life is the worst because they will sacrifice their own life just to take yours. This is contrary to someone who has a high level of self preservation.

You can't equate paintball to real bullets. Trust me, having real bullets coming at you puts you in a completely different frame of mind. I've played paintball before, its about a step up from waterguns. There is a difference between risking pain and losing your life. It's only natural to try and pull yourself out of the line of fire. That's why the military spends so much time on training, conditioning and simulating stress situations long before a soldier is thrown into combat. By the time the soldier is in the line of fire, they are somewhat familiar with what is happening and they know how to react. Even then, the most gungho still might freeze up.

I agree that doing nothing in the face of a crazed gunman will most likely result in your own death and the death of those around you, but what you're expecting is the opposite of survial instinct. To be a hero in a situation like that, you need to be willing to not survive for the hope that those around you might fair a better chance. What's going through the 'hero's' mind is "how many bullets can I take and still have enough strength left to disarm this lunatic", clearly not worried about their own survival.

Are you freakin' insane!?!?

[DocSponge]

Absolutely, we need to ensure that our children grow up with a realistic understanding of reality. They need to understand the rules at play in the world. There are evil people and everything from extremely horrid atrocities to simple childhood cruelties happen. Sh%*t happens. They should be taught how to deal with this reality and be given the mechanisms and tools to negotiate through and live a happy well-adjusted life in spite of the minefield that is our predominantly selfish world. There is however, to your very point, plenty of emotional distress to go around in day to day life just dealing with the crap expounded on above. We owe it to our children to prepare them for this and not to try to hide it, downplay it or somehow shelter them from it. I would in no way shield my kids from the reality of the world around them.

BUT DAMMIT I WILL DECIDE WHEN AND HOW MY 2 CHILDREN LEARN THIS! NOT YOU! NOT SOME ROGUE TEACHER!

Preventing unconscionable acts like this is not over protecting our children. Yes, children will face times of emotional distress and

They are children -they will quickly learn and know how to react and they will become stronger and stronger (if you have a family shaping those conflicts correctly, of course)

But this atrocity is not simply emotional distress or conflict it is NOT indicative of the type of emotional distress and situations that people face regularly as a part of life. This is a cruel subjection of children to a emotionally and psychologically TRAUMATIC experience.

You want to see what kind of damage this insanity, that you seem eager to justify, can do? Go and talk to the kids that were at Columbine. For that matter, why don't you look up and see what effect any of these school shootings have had? And pay close attention to those that occurred at elementary schools. And before you go and cite some post in this thread where 'Joe Bob' says that something similar didn't have any effect on him in no way precludes it from having a dramatic effect on others. Do just a tad bit of research before you open your mouth and utter uninformed and possibly damaging opinions. Skim over this article on emotional and psychological trauma. Read the common elements of a traumatic situation: 1) it was unexpected 2)the person was unprepared 3) there was nothing the person could do to prevent it from happening. A key here is that it doesn't have to be real threat to life but is perceived to be real. Look at the table of effects that this can have.

Are you advocating subjecting children to this? Or did you just knee jerk and spew a poorly thought out opinion taking an easily agreed to premise of not sheltering children from reality and using it completely inappropriately?

And if you want to be so arrogant as to challenge this material or these concepts surrounding the impact of traumatic events I'll be happy to introduce you to a couple war buddies that will set you straight. Or a couple professors I know in the Psych department who practiced child psychology for several years prior to teaching. I'm sure they could quickly point you to plenty of sound research (i.e. not baseless opinions) on this topic in addition to their own observations.

PREPARING my child for these situations is different from intentionally CREATING a NEEDLESS traumatic experience!! Why in hell would I purposefully traumatize them in a calculated way?!?! That's just sick, wrong and stupid.

This is a SCHOOL where I expect that teachers behave ETHICALLY and follow the mandate they have been given. They are there to provide knowledge and understanding of the world around them. And at times this means teaching students to be prepared for dangerous situations. But fire drills, tornado drills (historically bomb drills) are not used to scare the sh*&t out of the kids but to give them the practice at doing the things that will redu

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[Tim Browse]

But if you were to accidentally find yourself somewhere down South

I did like the way you railed on someone for assuming the states in USA are homogenous, and then referred to 'down South' :-)

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[Reapy]

Easy to process that information when you are behind your desk picturing yourself in the situation. But I know how I used to be in early morning classes. Zonked out, thinking about going back to bed. If someone kicked in the door and started shooting and killing people I know I'd probably freeze up. I haven't seen any "real" blood before, I haven't seen anybody die before, and the whole process would just be information overload. I doubt many people would be able to assess the situation and act within the time required to save their lives. And the people who could do it, would probably have had some military training to get them there.

Also, the paintball guy above is crazy to compare moving around a paintball field the same as moving around a battlefield. I am willing to bet that 75% of the tactics used on the paintball field wouldn't fly when real bullets are in the air. In paintball you sit out a round. In the real world, you're done, and people know that, and I'm sure act very differently because of it.

But whatever, we are all internet tough guys. It's all easy to make the logical choices back out of the situation, but when your life depends on what you do next, thats a hell of a lot of pressure to be thinking clearly.

Re: Most will be paid by others

[node 3]

But perhaps I'm just being cynical when I don't think that `thinking, for a little while, that you might die very soon' is worse than, say, losing a leg. Or an arm. Or actually dying. No shit it's not "worse than" those. Where did you get the idea that that's what people were thinking? What kind of thinking is that, where so long as you can think of something worse, you can dismiss some other bad thing?

It's pretty sick that you seem to be trivializing scaring children half to death. How would *you* feel if you were having a family picnic (ie, in a public setting) and some pranksters decided to fake a gunman attack, and *your* children were crying and screaming for their lives?

Definitely not as bad as actually being shot, maimed, or murdered (what a stupid metric), but something that should definitely put the pranksters legally vulnerable to criminal charges and/or punitive damages.

Re:Under the PATRIOT Act...

[orcrist]

Not going to look up the exact figure, but Australia is roughly the size of the US. I can't really accept that two people brought up in the same country, no matter how far apart, can claim to be more different than two people brought up in completely different cultures and vastly more diverse religions than just two brands of the same one.

I'm from Berkeley, California. While I was in the military I was stationed in Connecticut, South Carolina, and, finally, San Diego (southern California). I have now lived in Munich, Germany for about 11 years. I speak German fluently, and my kids go to school here, so I don't merely have superficial view of the culture -- I am immersed in it. I can say for a fact that the world view of South Carolinians was more "foreign" to me than that of Germans. This is true to a lesser degree of Connecticut. When I visit any number of other countries in Europe I find that, despite the major differences in traditions, language, and history, there is a much greater degree of homogeneity in things like e.g. morality, or geopolitical views between many of the countries than, say, between San Francisco, California and Charleston, South Carolina.

Just look at how the Republican party literally tried to make the last election about not letting someone with "San Francisco Values" become the Speaker of the House. I'm trying to think a case in Germany which would even be comparable, and though there are vague appeals to regional differences, I just don't see the public perception of someone coming from one Metropolitan area being used as a bogeyman for voters in another region in the same way.

Of course their are common threads that run through (almost) the whole U.S., just as you can divide Europe into regions of 'similar' thinking (the former Soviet Bloc countries, central Europe, Scandinavia, etc.), but my favorite quote (from me ^_^) about the mutual misconceptions between Europeans and Americans is:

"Americans are almost completely ignorant about Europe... and don't care that they are, while Europeans are just as ignorant about America... but think that they aren't"

(Okay, so I'm no Ben Franklin when it comes to quotes). My point is, many Europeans seem to think that the vast amounts of media they consume about America actually make them very knowledgable about America, and constantly underestimate the extreme diversity there, and try to reduce it to a kind of 'average', which almost always fails to hit the mark. Hell, I can understand that, because Americans do it quite often too, especially where it suits the needs of some demagogue trying to raise a little patriotic fervor.