POLL: Should Teachers Be Armed with Guns?

[BillyP]

The connection between guns and tractors eludes me.

Fear is the foundation for handgun ownership. Fear of an out of control government, fear of attack, fear of economic collaps, fear of others different than us. My biggest fear is, all the guns in the Fraidy Cat Nation. 3000 children a year are killed by guns in the Fraidy Cat Nation and this is the best handgun nuts can come up with to justify more guns.

If half the gun nuts would kill another gun nut. I would be twice as safe.

That ridiculous statement will probably get this thread closed.

 

[Raddad]

Good this is a tractor forum.

 

[Bob_Skurka]

My biggest fear is, all the guns in the Fraidy Cat Nation.

Why, will one of those guns jump up and bite you all by itself?

If half the gun nuts would kill another gun nut. I would be twice as safe.

I don't consider myself a gun nut, but I wonder why you advocate law abiding citizens should kill each other. Why not advocate criminals kill each other instead, then you would see real security because the crime rate would drop and the law abiding gun owners would see far less need to legally and lawfully possess them. Oh wait, that would make sense

3000 children a year are killed by guns

I would guess (I don't have statistics) that cars kill far more of our youth. Yet it seems most parents can't hardly wait to by their child a car.

In our little town, we've had several auto related teenage deaths this year. None by gun. When I was in school we had several deaths by car. None by gun. Seems to me the cars are to blame!

See, Bob? That's why it's not worth the time to try to enlighten.

Wayne, I would agree with you that some people will dispute facts with lies, twist statistics by omission of fact and repeat 'sound bite' lies until rational people believe those things. But I would also suggest that there are many gun-neutral people who simply don't know, and who don't have the personal interest to dig into the facts. Those are reasonable people, and if we can provide them with the data they will read it, but we cannot expect them to go looking for it all by themselves for the simple reason that they have no vested interest. They may just be casual observers who simply do not know. I think guys like IslandTractor may fall into that group. He is a non-gun owner, seems open minded to facts, and seems to only know the information that the mainstream media reports from the Brady anti-gun perspective.

Debates like these will never change the 'hard core' opinions of either side, but with rationally presented factual information, the folks who occupy the open minded middle ground can make up their own minds and often end up siding with gun owners.

 

[BillyP]

Good this is a tractor forum.

If you would have taken the time to look you would have seen that this thread is in Related Topics which is under Other Forums.

 

[Bob_Skurka]

That ridiculous statement will probably get this thread closed.

Well it seems to me that only one person has taken an extreme position, others have generally respectfully agreed or disagreed with each other. I'm sure the moderators will see that most of the thread is a simple discussion that is topical to recent news, relevant to rural life and guns are commonly discussed on TBN in the "Other Forums" area.

Heck Billy, you and I don't always agree, but I always feel that we could have a beer together after we are done discussing a topic. Its an adult perspective on things that many reasonable people share.

 

[BillyP]

Well it seems to me that only one person has taken an extreme position, others have generally respectfully agreed or disagreed with each other. I'm sure the moderators will see that most of the thread is a simple discussion that is topical to recent news, relevant to rural life and guns are commonly discussed on TBN in the "Other Forums" area.

Heck Billy, you and I don't always agree, but I always feel that we could have a beer together after we are done discussing a topic. Its an adult perspective on things that many reasonable people share.

Bob, I agree with you 110% (this time)

The sad thing is, as we've all seen, it only takes one person to get a thread headed the wrong direction. I hope it keeps going but I'm just another poster.

I'll buy the beer. Anyone else want to join us?

 

[shvl73]

I'll buy the beer. Anyone else want to join us?

If only you were closer, and I wouldn't even ask what brand.

 

[Raddad]

Great, bring your handguns!

 

[Bob_Skurka]

Great, bring your handguns!

Maybe we can bring some teachers too! We can run them through a gun safety course, or maybe even take a defensive handgun class . . . then hit the bar after we are done.

By the way, I don't drink before/while I drive a car, operate a boat, use a tractor, or golf. Not sure why you'd think I'd use a gun while impared.

Oh, below please find some information from the Smart Motorist website. Interesting that these are only part of the statistics, you'll notice it talks mostly about teen drivers, but don't forget the fact that many other teens die in crashes as passengers. The websites suggests the numbers are roughly doubled when teen passengers are taken into account. Youth auto fatalities was pegged at over 6100 in the last year of the study, and expected to increase. That is more than double youth gun deaths cited earlier.

Still, perhaps in an effort to keep children safer, a 2 phase plan could be enacted. #1, allow some teachers to be armed, and #2, raise the driving age to 18 or even 21 and require more stringent training during drivers education.

[FONT=verdana,arial] Death Rate Among 16 yo Drivers Has Nearly Doubled Since 1975 - IIHS[/FONT]
[FONT=verdana,arial]The increase occurred among both males and females.[/FONT]
[FONT=verdana,arial]The overall driver death rate declined during 1975-96 from 15 to 12 per 100,000 licensed drivers. But among 16 year-olds, the death rate was trending upward, and this trend was more extreme. The rate increased among 16-year-old drivers from 19 per 100,000 in 1975 to 35 per 100,000 licensed drivers in 1996, and the increase occurred among both males and females.[/FONT]

[FONT=verdana,arial]The teenage population in the United States declined during most of the years researchers studied (1975-96). But beginning in the early 1990s, the population of 16 year-olds began increasing and will continue going up through the next decade.[/FONT][FONT=verdana,arial]
[/FONT]
[FONT=verdana,arial]"This means the problem of deaths among 16-year-old drivers isn't going to go away. It's going to get even worse. . .[/FONT]​

 

[BillyP]

Bob, I found this info about accidental deaths amoung children 0 to 18 years of age. This was the only statistics I found (quick search) that didn't involve homicide and suicide.

Accidental Firearm Fact Sheet In 2000, 174 children (0-18) in the United States died from unintentional firearm-related injuries. Unintentional injuries are usually caused when children play with guns or are hunting.

Unintentional injuries from firearms represent less than two percent of all firearm deaths in the U.S. But of this two percent, children and adolescents are involved in 55% of the deaths. The majority of the injuries occur to children playing with or showing the weapons to friends. The easy availability of firearms is believed to be the number one risk factor for unintentional firearm deaths.

Major Risk Factors​

• Easy availability of and access to firearms.
• Youth living in neighborhoods with high rates of poverty, social isolation and family violence.
• Youth with little or no adult supervision.

Records Needed for Case Review​

• Scene investigation reports
• Police and crime lab reports
• CPS histories on family, child and perpetrators
• Names, ages and genders of other children in home
• Ballistics information on firearms
• Prior crime records in neighborhood
• Juvenile and criminal records of teen and perpetrators
• Interviews with witnesses
• Information from gang squad

Resources​

• Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research
• Join Together Online-Gun Violence
• The HELP Network