Poll of the Day > Parkland armed school officer who is being criticized for not acting during the

(+) Yeah! (+)

....shootings had 6 police officers posted outside his house. Read a news story on msn about how a florida news crew tried to interview him to ask him why he didn't act during the shootings and was turned away by 6 officers protecting his house after his name was published, maybe his address also.

he's a coward. a grown man with gun training vs a kid who was an amateur.

Zikten posted...

he's a coward. a grown man with gun training vs a kid who was an amateur.

oh ok big man you try to stop it next time
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He was only trained to shoot non-whites.
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i don't blame him. he probably had a service handgun or revolver. i wouldn't want to go up against an ar-15 with that.

but on the other hand he was a sheriff deputy and if you don't want to put your life on the line why are you becoming a police officer?
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Kimbos_Egg posted...

Zikten posted...

he's a coward. a grown man with gun training vs a kid who was an amateur.

oh ok big man you try to stop it next time

I will if I have police training.

zikten again, not to be mean, but you made a topic about how you couldn't even talk to a faceless customer service rep on the phone without having a panic attack.

please don't pretend you would do anything if this happened.
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Jen0125 posted...

i don't blame him. he probably had a service handgun or revolver. i wouldn't want to go up against an ar-15 with that.

but on the other hand he was a sheriff deputy and if you don't want to put your life on the line why are you becoming a police officer?

From my understanding guards and police officers and the like are not legally obligated to protect other people. But that just highlights how adding more (or arming teachers) isn't really going to prevent the problem except under unusual circumstances.
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yeah there was also an armed security guard at the time of the pulse nightclub mass shooting

jen we are talking if I was a different person. if I was a trained cop. of course I would do my job.

and yea, I guess I am dumb, so dumb that the country is agreeing with me and crucifying this man, and he lost his job and is being sued.

Jen0125 posted...

i don't blame him. he probably had a service handgun or revolver. i wouldn't want to go up against an ar-15 with that.

but on the other hand he was a sheriff deputy and if you don't want to put your life on the line why are you becoming a police officer?

Most cops go their entire career without firing their guns once.
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Kimbos_Egg posted...

Jen0125 posted...

i don't blame him. he probably had a service handgun or revolver. i wouldn't want to go up against an ar-15 with that.

but on the other hand he was a sheriff deputy and if you don't want to put your life on the line why are you becoming a police officer?

Most cops go their entire career without firing their guns once.

but that doesn't mean it's not a possibility that they're trained for and required to do as part of their job function in certain scenarios.
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Zikten posted...

jen we are talking if I was a different person. if I was a trained cop. of course I would do my job.

and yea, I guess I am dumb, so dumb that the country is agreeing with me and crucifying this man, and he lost his job and is being sued.

really? he's being sued? he ain't rich is he?

Zikten posted...

jen we are talking if I was a different person. if I was a trained cop. of course I would do my job.

and yea, I guess I am dumb, so dumb that the country is agreeing with me and crucifying this man, and he lost his job and is being sued.

i mean i really feel for the guy. i would do the same thing but that's why i don't go into that career path. it's a shitty situation all around. the bottom line is though he may not have acted properly he is still a person. i really worry how all these people utterly TRASHING him over the media is going to affect his mental health.
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I think the thing he has to worry about more is seeing the victims in his nightmares.

to me, a cop is supposed to protect non cops. that's their entire point. if you don't want to do it, don't sign up to be a cop. cops these days are trained to protect themselves above us. and that is fucked up. it didn't used to be like that. when I was a kid, cops were heroes. sometime over the past 30 years, they changed

Zikten and Ico need to start a YouTube channel where they sit in front of a fireplace and armchair quarterback every single mass shooting and its flaws despite never being in a position that requires difficult decision making in a life or death situation.
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Now it's up to four who didn't go in.
I think we just need more good guys with guns against one shooter. We'll figure it out eventually.

Maybe they were waiting for backup from the armed teachers...?

Cacciato posted...

Zikten and Ico need to start a YouTube channel where they sit in front of a fireplace and armchair quarterback every single mass shooting and its flaws despite never being in a position that requires difficult decision making in a life or death situation.

and then we have on guests who do have experience, and they back us up by saying that your supposed to protect civilians.

Cacciato posted...

Zikten and Ico need to start a YouTube channel where they sit in front of a fireplace and armchair quarterback every single mass shooting and its flaws despite never being in a position that requires difficult decision making in a life or death situation.

add NMB and a cereal segment and Id watch it
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Stuff like this just highlights how stupid the "Arm the teachers! Protect the schools!" movement really is. I mean, let's look at how well that's worked out in a couple of high profile shootings.

Columbine: Not often talked about, but the school had an armed guard. Not only did he fail to stop the shootings, he very nearly got killed himself and was forced to retreat to the parking lot.

Pulse shooting: There was an off-duty officer in the club who attempted to shoot the attacker with his sidearm. He quickly realised he was completely outgunned and retreated.

Las Vegas shooting: Some members of the band and their road crew had guns. They realised that if they used them they could easily be mistaken for the shooter and so could only hunker down and wait for the cops to handle it.

Gabby Giffords shooting: Giffords herself carried and regularly practiced with a handgun, which did not protect her when she was attacked. Several people in the crowd were armed and drew their weapons, but in the confusion one of them almost shot another, mistaking him for the actual shooter.

But sure, the only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. Let's go with that.
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DirtBasedSoap posted...

Cacciato posted...

Zikten and Ico need to start a YouTube channel where they sit in front of a fireplace and armchair quarterback every single mass shooting and its flaws despite never being in a position that requires difficult decision making in a life or death situation.

add NMB and a cereal segment and Id watch it

NMB can do the commercials for the program and write nothing but cereal jingles that he personally records and performs.
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You have to remember that the gop is so far down the guns NRA agenda that even when they (GOP) got fucking shot at playing baseball last year they didn't go against the NRA.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Fort_Hood_shooting
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Fort_Hood_shooting

what about these two military base shootings? fort hood is full of fully capable trained people who "should" have been able to stop the attacks but couldn't.
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Zikten posted...

he's a coward. a grown man with gun training vs a kid who was an amateur.

The thing is, he couldn't possibly have known that's all it was. It was an extremely chaotic situation, the majority of which was over in less than six minutes. I can't speak for exactly what his rationale was, but in his situation, I'd absolutely wait until I had more information on what was going on before charging in there, as well as possibly waiting for backup. It's not the police's job to charge in blindly and get killed for no reason.

Now, did he act appropriately? By the sounds of things, not really. Though as I understand, he didn't actually get fired. He was suspended, pending review of his conduct (as is quite sensible when 17 of the people he's supposed to be guarding end up dead), and then voluntarily resigned (which is also pretty understandable, because this would have been an extremely traumatic experience). That sounds to me like he's acknowledging that he's not up to the task, which is far from cowardly. Quite the opposite, in fact.
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Blighboy posted...

Jen0125 posted...

i don't blame him. he probably had a service handgun or revolver. i wouldn't want to go up against an ar-15 with that.

but on the other hand he was a sheriff deputy and if you don't want to put your life on the line why are you becoming a police officer?

From my understanding guards and police officers and the like are not legally obligated to protect other people. But that just highlights how adding more (or arming teachers) isn't really going to prevent the problem except under unusual circumstances.

Maybe there's something to RC's idea of disbanding the police in favor of armed civilians then if you can't count on government.

darkknight109 posted...

But sure, the only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.

Then what do the good guys use again? A stern voice? Because cops seem to have more luck with guns.
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Zeus posted...

Maybe there's something to RC's idea of disbanding the police in favor of armed civilians then if you can't count on government.

why would you say this? you know that isn't at all anything RC has ever said.
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Jen0125 posted...

i don't blame him. he probably had a service handgun or revolver. i wouldn't want to go up against an ar-15 with that.

but on the other hand he was a sheriff deputy and if you don't want to put your life on the line why are you becoming a police officer?

That's exactly it.

If you're a coward who's unwilling to risk your life to save others you shouldn't take a job where that's expected of you.

It's like saying you signed up to be a marine but you refuse to shoot people because it's scary.
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Jen0125 posted...

Zeus posted...

Maybe there's something to RC's idea of disbanding the police in favor of armed civilians then if you can't count on government.

why would you say this? you know that isn't at all anything RC has ever said.

When you love to argue, sometimes you gotta make up the argument out of thin air to keep ya going!
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Jen0125 posted...

i don't blame him. he probably had a service handgun or revolver. i wouldn't want to go up against an ar-15 with that.

but on the other hand he was a sheriff deputy and if you don't want to put your life on the line why are you becoming a police officer?

This exactly. Technically, you wait for back up UNLESS you need to act to save lives. He agreed to the risk taking the job.

He fucked up massively and potentially could have stopped a lot of horror.

ASlaveObeys posted...

Jen0125 posted...

i don't blame him. he probably had a service handgun or revolver. i wouldn't want to go up against an ar-15 with that.

but on the other hand he was a sheriff deputy and if you don't want to put your life on the line why are you becoming a police officer?

This exactly. Technically, you wait for back up UNLESS you need to act to save lives. He agreed to the risk taking the job.

He fucked up massively and potentially could have stopped a lot of horror.

It's even worse apparently because there were at least four deputies outside that were waiting behind their cars until the local police arrived.
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Jen0125 posted...

ASlaveObeys posted...

Jen0125 posted...

i don't blame him. he probably had a service handgun or revolver. i wouldn't want to go up against an ar-15 with that.

but on the other hand he was a sheriff deputy and if you don't want to put your life on the line why are you becoming a police officer?

This exactly. Technically, you wait for back up UNLESS you need to act to save lives. He agreed to the risk taking the job.

He fucked up massively and potentially could have stopped a lot of horror.

It's even worse apparently because there were at least four deputies outside that were waiting behind their cars until the local police arrived.

The only thing I can th8nk is they thought it was multiple shooters which heavy weapons. There is protocol in these situations, I don't know enough to comment.

ASlaveObeys posted...

Jen0125 posted...

ASlaveObeys posted...

Jen0125 posted...

i don't blame him. he probably had a service handgun or revolver. i wouldn't want to go up against an ar-15 with that.

but on the other hand he was a sheriff deputy and if you don't want to put your life on the line why are you becoming a police officer?

This exactly. Technically, you wait for back up UNLESS you need to act to save lives. He agreed to the risk taking the job.

He fucked up massively and potentially could have stopped a lot of horror.

It's even worse apparently because there were at least four deputies outside that were waiting behind their cars until the local police arrived.

The only thing I can th8nk is they thought it was multiple shooters which heavy weapons. There is protocol in these situations, I don't know enough to comment.

Yeah I don't either. It's a fucked up situation all around.
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That last comment is all fucked up. But I've worked 30 hours in the last 48 and I'm not fixing it.

I got the gist lmao
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every time they think it's multiple shooters. and it never is. the only time it was ever more than 1 was columbine. and that one the entire police squad was there and they still didn't enter the school. columbine actually changed protocol. they are SUPPOSED to charge in. I remember. I was following the news and the aftermath of columbine. it was a huge thing back then.

Zikten posted...

every time they think it's multiple shooters. and it never is. the only time it was ever more than 1 was columbine. and that one the entire police squad was there and they still didn't enter the school. columbine actually changed protocol. they are SUPPOSED to charge in. I remember. I was following the news and the aftermath of columbine. it was a huge thing back then.

I'm a deputy. There is no protocol saying you charge in solo to take on an active shooter.

adjl posted...

Zikten posted...

he's a coward. a grown man with gun training vs a kid who was an amateur.

The thing is, he couldn't possibly have known that's all it was. It was an extremely chaotic situation, the majority of which was over in less than six minutes. I can't speak for exactly what his rationale was, but in his situation, I'd absolutely wait until I had more information on what was going on before charging in there, as well as possibly waiting for backup. It's not the police's job to charge in blindly and get killed for no reason.

Now, did he act appropriately? By the sounds of things, not really. Though as I understand, he didn't actually get fired. He was suspended, pending review of his conduct (as is quite sensible when 17 of the people he's supposed to be guarding end up dead), and then voluntarily resigned (which is also pretty understandable, because this would have been an extremely traumatic experience). That sounds to me like he's acknowledging that he's not up to the task, which is far from cowardly. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Indeed. I've read a few testimonials from cops responding to mass-shooting situations who describe it as absolutely terrifying because, unlike most situations, they're basically told "don't wait for a plan and for backup, get in as fast as you can and pray you don't get shot."

Zeus posted...

Then what do the good guys use again? A stern voice? Because cops seem to have more luck with guns.

I was more referring to the fact that - contrary to what Trump and the NRA allege - one yahoo with a handgun does not an elite anti-crime taskforce make and it's wholly unreasonable to assume that arming additional civilians is going to solve the problem when that hasn't worked anywhere else.

But since you asked, the good guys might want to try not letting the bad guys get guns in the first place, because that tends to work even better.

In the UK, for instance, most cops do not have guns - only specially trained units do and at no point in the last decade have more than six people been shot and killed by British cops in a year. Yet, somehow, they manage to avoid the carnage that plagues the US.

I wonder if there's something to their whole "maybe civilians shouldn't be equipped like they're fighting a war" thing...
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The people to blame is mainly the shooter, and the politicians and lobbyists that have made sure that nothing stands in their way to make profit by selling guns used for warfare to the general public.

You have no idea what was going through the officers head. Maybe fight or flight kicked in. Maybe he thought firing into bear the crowd would do more harm than good. Maybe we know a lot less about the situation in that moment than people who were actually there.

Anyone calling him a coward probably couldnt even make it through the first round of training to become a cop.
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darkknight109 posted...

The good guys might want to try not letting the bad guys get guns in the first place, because that tends to work even better.

In the UK, for instance, most cops do not have guns - only specially trained units do and at no point in the last decade have more than six people been shot and killed by British cops in a year. Yet, somehow, they manage to avoid the carnage that plagues the US.

Overlooking that the UK's firearm death rate isn't zero despite being a tiny segregated island, it's worth remembering that the US is the world's largest manufacturer of guns in addition to having a largely unsecured border. As such, "well, Britain..." is kind of a hollow argument.

darkknight109 posted...

I wonder if there's something to their whole "maybe civilians shouldn't be equipped like they're fighting a war" thing...

Except US civilians *aren't* equipped like they were fighting a war. Although maybe they should be if cops aren't going to do anything and we're always one incident away from the next LA Riot, Ferguson, or Baltimore.
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Zeus posted...

Overlooking that the UK's firearm death rate isn't zero despite being a tiny segregated island, it's worth remembering that the US is the world's largest manufacturer of guns in addition to having a largely unsecured border. As such, "well, Britain..." is kind of a hollow argument.

They're not sending their best folks

Zeus posted...

Overlooking that the UK's firearm death rate isn't zero despite being a tiny segregated island

The US is the last place to be pointing fingers at other people's gun death rates. Clean up your own house first and then we'll talk.

Zeus posted...

it's worth remembering that the US is the world's largest manufacturer of guns

I know. You guys might want to look at fixing that, it seems to be causing you a lot of problems.

Zeus posted...

in addition to having a largely unsecured border

Guns are flowing from the US to its neighbours (usually for weed from Canada and cocaine from Mexico), not the other way around.

Zeus posted...

As such, "well, Britain..." is kind of a hollow argument.

How does "well, Norway" grab you, then? That's another nation where police don't carry guns. "Well, Australia"? Number of police shootings per year is in the single digits. "Well, France"? "Well, Finland"? "Well, Iceland"?

I can keep going.

Zeus posted...

Except US civilians *aren't* equipped like they were fighting a war

Sure, sure, keep pretending like AR-15s have a legitimate civilian use. "Sport shooting" or "self defence" or some other such nonsense. In most countries in the world, that sort of thinking is rightly recognized as lunacy.
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Zikten posted...

every time they think it's multiple shooters. and it never is.

And that's no reason to assume it won't be. This was a crowd of 3000 people in a mad panic evacuating a building while he could hear large numbers of gunshots. He had no way of telling it was a single shooter, and by the time he got to where the action was happening, there's a good chance he wouldn't even have been able to tell who the shooter was (since the guy discarded the rifle so he could blend into the crowd and leave). Exercising some caution and not charging in blindly was hardly a bad idea.
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Zikten posted...

every time they think it's multiple shooters. and it never is. the only time it was ever more than 1 was columbine. and that one the entire police squad was there and they still didn't enter the school. columbine actually changed protocol. they are SUPPOSED to charge in. I remember. I was following the news and the aftermath of columbine. it was a huge thing back then.

Dude you cant even talk to a person on the phone how are you criticizing the way the police try to save lives
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Zikten posted...

every time they think it's multiple shooters. and it never is.

Maybe if hundreds of rounds weren't going off every minute people wouldn't assume it's multiple shooters.
Getting rid of assault rifles would fix that easily.

The amount of shit going on at the time and the speed at which action needs to be taken is unpredictable and different for every scene. I don't believe any cops WANTED kids to die, but you have to keep so many things in mind at the time that one little mistake could cost a life.

It's not easy, I never want to do that. Fortunately, I probably will never have to.

Zeus posted...

it's worth remembering that the US is the world's largest manufacturer of guns

Bingo, we have a winner! Why on earth would the NRA possibly want to circulate the idea of stopping gun violence with more guns? Hmmm, I'll give you some time to think on that.