More on School Shootings and Ideas

Wow! Last week’s scribbles on school shootings brought back a ton of responses.

From the anti-gun folks who want to shoot me – does anyone notice the irony there? – to folks who agree a new idea is needed, to several who shared some of those new ideas (although to the gentleman from Indy who suggested I stick my gun in a rather uncomfortable place, well, uh, no!) . . . that one specific column generated more feedback than any I’ve done in a while.

To quickly review, after the latest school shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder, Ga., the point was made in this space that we need a new approach, a new answer. CBS News reported that since the massacre at Columbine High School in 1999 there have been 388 school shootings and 526 fatalities. Clearly, the efforts to stop the violence and death in schools isn’t working.

So the idea was that with 100,000 schools in this country, we should try different approaches. Teachers, principals, superintendents, police chiefs . . . it matters not who, we are simply in desperate need of creative ideas on what might work.

And let me also add – since several people apparently missed this from the previous scribbles – I am not advocating experimenting with teachers’ and kids’ lives. The point is that what we are doing now isn’t working. It’s time to try something else. And maybe, just maybe, someone at one of those 100,000+ schools will hit on a workable answer that we can all feel good about – and most importantly, one that actually works.

With that said – and before sharing some of the ideas – let me add one more point about some of the communications I got.

Grow the hell up!

Look, we live in a world today where some people want to ignore reality. Black and white have turned into purple and green. If someone doesn’t like something, they make up whatever it is they do like . . . regardless of the fact that it might have nothing to do with anything remotely real. Shoot, we had a presidential debate last week where both candidates just made stuff up. Thing is, we’re used to Donald Trump’s hyperbole. To hear Kamala Harris completely reverse positions she has held for years just weeks before voting begins was a bit unbelievable.

Smart people have long said that everyone gets to have their own opinions – they don’t get to have their own facts. That’s the way the real world works. Some folks ought to try it.

Sorry, I digress. For the purposes of today’s scribbles then, let’s try to stay in touch with reality, shall we?

OK, on to some of the ideas that came in.

Harden the school buildings was a big one. Several folks said that if we make doors and windows impossible to break through, it would stop shooters from coming in to begin with. But what if the shooter is a student – as is sometimes the case? They’re already inside. Plus, at some schools, right beside the classroom door is a piece of drywall that wouldn’t be that hard to get through. This doesn’t even take into account the cost – a significant factor when some school districts are already strapped for cash.

Add security at every door. Again, what if the shooter is a student? And ongoing security costs would make hardening a door or window look cheap.

Arm the teachers. This was something I very much favored a few years ago. Back when  Mark Casteel was sheriff, we had a long talk about it one day. Mark made the very valid point that it’s hard enough for an officer in a police action shooting. Those folks train, and train and train, and yet discharging a weapon in a moment of crisis can be hard for them to do. Do we really want teachers, some of who may have never held a gun before, to take on that heavy responsibility – and are we confident in the outcome if we do?

One teacher who called me said there might be a variation on that. Don’t arm every teacher, just the ones who qualify to carry a firearm. And put up signs everywhere that some personnel in the school are armed and authorized to use deadly force. Since no one would know who was carrying and who wasn’t, that might be an effective deterrent.

Another teacher suggested that in every school there are teachers who are parents. If you want the most motivated person, arm them.

A lot of suggestions came back about the judicial system and punishments – everything from the death penalty to creative approaches that might ignore our Constitution.

There was more – but like mentioned earlier, we’re not leaving the earthly realms of reality.

What’s the right answer? Here’s hoping that the conversation will continue and someone somewhere will come up with something that works. Lives depend on it.

Two cents, which is about how much Timmons said his columns are worth, appears periodically on Wednesdays in The Paper. Timmons is the publisher of The Paper and can be contacted at [email protected].