SCHOOLS DEMONIZE GUNS

GUNS VITAL TO OUR FREEDOM, BUT SCHOOLS DEMONIZE THEM

Zero-Tolerance Gun Policy Is Ignorant, Wrong
A junior high school in suburban Chandler, Ariz., has made national headlines by exercising a zero-tolerance policy and suspending a student for sketching a gun.
Too many teachers have virtually no understanding of the value of guns, the role guns play in our history, and particularly, the fact that guns are why America is still free. They are passing their ignorance on to their students.
The paranoid and politically correct creation of zero-tolerance policies for guns by schools is an affront to everything this country stands for, and must come to an end.
There is no way to accurately teach history, sociology, politics and other subjects without a deep examination of the role guns play in protecting people and maintaining civil order. Students in these zero-tolerance days must be getting some sort of fairy tale instead of an education.
Guns have been a fundamental part of American life since the country began. Some nine million people buy new guns annually according to the FBI, and current estimates suggest nearly 100 million Americans keep at least one gun at home, for good reasons. None of this has any connection with crime or evil -- quite the contrary -- but schools don't seem to care and hide this in the classroom.
Guns save lives. Guns stop crime. Guns protect people. Guns are good. Guns are actually fun when you go to a range and practice. You never hear about that in the news though because, like the education establishment, the news media basically has a zero-tolerance policy for stories that show the truth about guns. This is linked directly to student suspensions for gun sketches.
The media exacerbates the problem by publicizing and literally promoting criminal misuse of guns incessantly, typically on page one, while suppressing news about the good guns do. Thirteen scholarly studies, including one by the Clinton Justice Dept., have found between 700,000 and three million defensive gun uses every year (depending on study length and the set of respondents questioned).
For all the "gun stuff" you see in the news, you haven't seen that, have you. Legitimate gun use outnumbers criminal misuse by orders of magnitude. Talk about unethical biased reporting. Reporters have excuses and justifications for it, but they're bogus. Guns are part of our economy, job pool, tax base, retail markets, hobby scene, sports world, balance of trade, all newsworthy.
Defensive gun use has heroes, villains, lives saved, families preserved, blood and guts, criminals brought to justice, honor, valor, courage, flashy police lights -- all the elements the media says matter.
In an unpublished study I did for a think tank, I found that Americans purchase between five and nine billion rounds of ammunition every year. Almost none of it goes into crime -- and almost none of it goes into the news, skewing everyone's view. Reporters are afraid of guns, don't go to the range to practice, have a morbid fascination with guns that only lets them see the danger and not the safety guns represent. Teachers have picked up on this, and now hurt everyone with their adopted myths.
That's why it's critical for school systems in Arizona to set an example for the country. Schools should adopt and begin teaching the Arizona Gun Safety Program our legislature enacted in 2005. This elective high school class teaches the truth about guns, and requires safely discharging a firearm at a target to get the credit toward a high-school diploma. It will move us from today's abject ignorance and cowering fear to a brighter day of enlightened, educated students and teachers. Sketching a gun in that class would merit a gold star, not punishment.
The Arizona Gun Safety Program teaches how guns work, how they are handled safely, why they are important, marksmanship, the constitutional roots of these precious rights and their place throughout history. Perhaps most important, the class examines the role of firearms in preserving peace and freedom, a linchpin to any valid education in history and politics.
When an evil person commits a vicious aggression, you send in people with guns because it's the right thing to do. The role of firearms in society is critically important, and needs to be honored and appreciated, not amputated by small-minded fearful bigots who think hiding what they hate will make everything just fine.

Posted by The Uninvited Ombudsman on Monday, September 17, 2007