Van-Tramp said:
...Yes, the hide-n-pray method adopted by most schools in this country does not work....
...It is increasingly difficult to hit your target the MORE IT MOVES, so logic would say to MOVE. For years my son (now graduated) has been instructed by his school to hide, but I instructed him to ignore that advice and get out the first window he could find and haul a$$...
...Still, the chance that any of us will be any where NEAR an active shooter situation is lower than being struck by lightening. There are so many zeros after the decimal before an actual number shows up that it is not worth considering any more than in passing. Be prepared, but to dwell on that situation too much might be considered insane behavior...
This is sound thinking and good advice.
Personally, I am nauseated by the marketing of this kind of class. People shouldn't be rendered defenseless by government edict. Without such edicts, far more good guys would be armed and such attacks would be unheard of.
The odds are indeed slim that anyone of us will ever find ourselves in such a situation. You can make them even slimmer by avoiding the places where such things happen, which is almost always venues such as schools and theaters that prohibit the carrying of personal small arms. (The first rule of gunfighting is "have a gun" and you don't want to be in violation of that rule if things ever do get sporty.)
The real value of thinking about this at all is that sound defensive principles apply in other areas of life where someone reading this might actually need to defend themselves. I strongly recommend Jeff Cooper's booklet "Principles of Personal Defense". Jeff was the master firearms trainer, but this particular book is entirely philosophical. It is about mindset, and mindset alone.
You shouldn't ever hide unless you are just concealing yourself in order to counter attack. This is particularly important if hiding will only trap you. You should either run AWAY from the attacker, or TOWARD him in counterattack. Very few goblins are mentally prepared for an instantaneous counterattack, so counterattacks are almost always successful even if you are unarmed.
In the statistics, mass shooting fatalities are lumped in with all other acts of terrorism. Those statistics show that an American is actually 55 times more likely to be killed by a cop than a terrorist. Obviously, that is a mathematically greater concern but still an extremely low likelihood.
For perspective, I remind you that roughly 75 people died TODAY in car accidents in the US. Several thousand more died TODAY of cancer, heart disease and diabetes. Tomorrow and every coming day, just as many people will gain die of these same boring things. Perhaps we should focus a little more on tobacco use, our crappy diets and getting a little exercise!
Jewellann
