im-lost-but-not-gone:theweekmagazine:Let’s be honest about what arming teachers means: We expe
im-lost-but-not-gone:theweekmagazine:Let’s be honest about what arming teachers means: We expect them to kill studentsAnyone who has bothered to suggest even the most straightforward and commonsensical of additional gun control measures has found himself browbeaten by well-catechized right-wing obfuscators. If you use the phrase “assault rifle,” they pretend that this is a journalistic neologism rather than a precisely defined term. If you point out that it is far easier to prevent someone from getting a driver’s license in this country than to deny him access to semi-automatic weapons, they pretend that in the modern United States being able to play dress-up with Rambo gear is a more fundamental “right” than being able to drive a car.This is not to say that Second Amendment absolutists are unwilling to propose solutions of their own. Lately, they have fallen in love with the ludicrous notion, happily promoted by President Trump, that in order to prevent massacres like the one in Parkland, Florida, we must ensure that as many of our teachers as possible carry guns in their classrooms. I would call this “Swiftian,” because it is certainly worthy of the Dean of St. Patrick’s satirical art, but as far as I am aware its proponents are absolutely sincere in their view that every classroom in this country should be considered the potential scene of a Wild West shootout.This is the single stupidest public policy proposal floated in my lifetime. It is so vauntingly cynical, so painfully unimaginative, so glibly unquestioning of a status quo in which a certain number of students must simply be expected to attempt mass murder that it would be generous to refer to it as nihilistic.Slams hands on desk.YES, PREACH, MOTHERFUCKER! -- source link
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