Gun Nuts Media

Reasonable advice on how to deal with air/pellet/bb guns.

“You take every firearm as a firearm. You don’t differentiate cause what they look like,” Vice-President of South Dakota Shooting Sports Charles Summers said.

That’s absolutely correct; the four rules of gun safety always apply, even if you’re only dealing with an Airsoft gun, or a Gamo pellet rifle.  You never point a gun, BB or otherwise at another person, and especially not a cop.

BB guns, Airsoft guns, and pellet guns are not toys, and should be handled with the same respect and care that you’d give to an actual firearm.  While they may not have as much destructive potential; they do posses the ability to cause harm or worse yet, to be mistaken for a real firearm and get someone killed.

As Christmas approaches, lots of well-meaning parents will probably purchase their child a pellet rifle, or a BB gun for Christmas.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with that, and I strongly encourage parents to do so, but with the caveat that if you must teach your child safe gun handling habits.  I will be the first person to tell you that firearms are dangerous if handled unsafely – take the time to teach your children about safe gun handling when they’re young.

With the popularity of the interview with Shirley Katz, I wanted to use this post to refocus on some of the more interesting issues that came up during the interview – and things that I may not have mentioned in yesterday’s post.

Easily one of the most prominent issues discussed was the fact that Shirley’s school district is in a budget crisis.  While on the surface that itself doesn’t appear to be a significant issue, when you take into account the safety concerns expressed by multiple teachers at Shirley’s school, the ties between the budget and her case become more apparent.  The school has said, in court, that they believe that the safety measures they’ve provided are adequate for the teachers and students.  Those safety measures consist of some cameras which may or may not work, and two security officers who are responsible for multiple schools.  Now, a school district that’s in a budget crunch is probably going to cut corners on the safety issue, so that makes sense.

But if they are in such a crunch, why are they spending money to fight Shirley in court?  Shirley believes (and I agree) that one of the primary reasons they’re fighting is to smokescreen their budgetary issues.  If everyone is focused on this court case, no one is going to be going to the school board and saying “where is all this money going, or coming from?”  That’s a question that needs to be asked of the school board – if you don’t have the funding to improve campus safety, why do you have the funding to fight this court case?

On a more positive note, I wanted to actually throw a link out to Good Guy’s Guns, in Medford.  That’s where Shirley went to pick her carry gun; and according to her she received nothing but help and valuable assistance from the staff there.  This is actually something that I’ve always talked about – gun shops being ambassadors of the shooting sports and self-defense world to people who may not otherwise be interested.  The example set by Good Guy’s Guns of welcoming and assisting people should be followed by a lot more gun stores in the country.

The last thing I want to address is the issue of winning this fight – not just Shirley’s case in particular, but the fight for the right to keep and bear arms on a large scale.  The most important people we can win over are the people who don’t know a damn thing about guns, the people in the middle.  We need to win over the moms who watch Oprah, we need to win over the dads who watch SportsCenter every morning.  That’s where I believe that the Shirley Katz case holds its true value; specifically because Shirley doesn’t conform to the negative stereotype of “gun nut”.   That’s what carries the most valuable – visual, indisputable proof that the people who carry guns and own firearms are just the same as the rest of us.

Over the weekend, I had the opportunity to interview Shirley Katz, the teacher from Oregon who is in the process of suing her school district over their policy which prohibits teachers that have valid CCW permits from carrying to the school. Her primary point in the lawsuit is that the school district’s policy is in violation of Oregon law – the law states that CCW holders can carry in public buildings.

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My first question to Shirley was a specific, why did she choose to carry a firearm instead of a form of non-lethal defense, such as pepper spray, or a taser?

Shirley: “I felt that this would have been the only way to really solve it, if it came down to it”, where “it” would be her ex-husband, who has a history of violence, acting violently towards her or her son. On the next question, she talked about her restraining orders against her ex husband, the most recent of which expired on Sep 11^th, 2007. Apparently, despite her instructions to do otherwise, her attorney failed to act in a timely fashion and renew the order.

After that, we moved into the basis for the lawsuit. Shirley is aware that the Oregon law is on her side, but that alone was not the primary motivator for her lawsuit. She actually detailed several reasons for taking her current course of action.

1. Currently, her school is in budget crunch, and has stated in court that the safety measures they have provided are adequate to provide for the safety and security of their students and staff.

2. There is a certain amount of vulnerability that she felt, following the VA Tech shooting; how would she protect herself or her students in that situation? The campus where she works is “wide open” and “totally unsafe for students”.

One of the more interesting points of the conversation came up here; Shirley mentioned that teachers have always been carrying concealed, across the country, and that most of the time there is an unspoken “don’t-ask-don’t-tell” policy about it. Shirley also stated that one of the reasons she believes that her district is pushing back so hard on this issue is to distract attention from their budget issue. Now she is striving to have the school board’s “no guns” policy recognized as invalid.

The school that Shirley works in has some security cameras, which according to the rumor mill are not always functional. Additionally, there are two full time security officers for a population of 2100 students, and one of the officers is responsible for multiple schools in the area. To this time in October, Shirley said she had seen one of the security officers one time, and the other she hasn’t seen at all.

We switched gears off the political/legal issues for a bit, and did a little talking about guns. Shirley told me that her carry gun is a Glock 19, which she picked on the advice of the owner of Good Guys Guns in Medford, Oregon. I’m really happy to hear about her experience there – it’s excellent to hear about gun shops welcoming people in and offering advice and sharing knowledge.

After that, we dovetailed into the issue of teachers carrying firearms – one of the concerns that people often bring up is that “armed teachers” aren’t qualified to carry a firearm in class, that they don’t have the training necessary. I asked Shirley about the process an Oregon resident has to go through to get a concealed carry permit.

In Oregon, you have to take a class specifically on concealed carry, which stresses safety, as well as appropriate times to use your gun. The permit process also involves a rigorous background check conducted by local law enforcement officials and the State police.

When we talked about the possibility of other teachers carrying, Shirley mentioned again that right now teachers do carry, but they do it without the knowledge of their administration, or their administration looks the other way. She feels that if teachers carrying concealed was out in the open, with the knowledge of the administration, that they would be able to incorporate legally armed and trained staff members into emergency response situations.

I made the comparison to the Federal Flight Deck Officer program, which despite its flaws and faults, does allow airline pilots to carry firearms on board their planes. I’ve always thought it was a good program, and I do believe, as does Shirley, that a similar program for school teachers would be an excellent idea. She made the comparison to continuing education: “…as an educator here in Oregon, we are required as teachers to continue coursework. It’s not one of those things where you get a degree, and you’re done. I view owning a gun the same way; it requires continuous practice or otherwise you lose your skill, it requires additional training”. That’s a strong comparison, as by continually training and strengthening your skills, you’ll be better prepared as a teacher, or to defend your life.

I closed with a question that I thought would be a softball; and I was getting ready to close the interview – I asked her if she was a member of the NRA. She said she was, and then mentioned that she’s disappointed with the NRA’s lack of response. They haven’t made any mention of public support for Shirley, and I have to agree that I’m disappointed with that.

At the same time, I do sort of understand why they haven’t – the issue of “guns in school” and “armed teachers” is a serious powder keg issue, and there are a lot of people that just freak out when it gets brought up. So for the NRA, it’s a dangerous political issue, and it’s hard for them to come out in support of it. That being said, as much as I understand why they’re not supporting it, I wish that they were.

Shirley Katz is taking a bold step here – like I’ve said, schools and guns is a pretty divisive issue for a lot of people, and there has been a lot of dogma built up about it just in my lifetime. I feel that if she wins her case, it would be a huge step forward for the gun rights movement nationwide. She makes a good public face for this case – she’s just a regular person with a regular job, just like you and me.

Let’s do this.

From my blackberry in the bedroom, I am literally on the edge of the bed. How my wife can sleep at a time like this I’ll never know.

Here’s the background – Students for Concealed Carry, which is a nationwide group that is attempted to have the laws changed so college students that posses concealed carry permits can carry on their university grounds. Next week, they’re planning a week long “Empty Holster” protest, where their membership is going to wear empty holsters to all their school functions. Sounds like a decent enough idea, it’s subtle, and it doesn’t really scare whitey.

Unless you’re at the University of Florida, where the administration sent out the following email:

TO: Deans

FROM: Dr. Patricia Telles-Irvin, Vice President for Student Affairs

RE: Protest Event Next Week

A national group known as Students for Concealed Carry On Campus, which
advocates allowing students and others to bring concealed weapons to
campus, plans an Empty Holster Protest all next week. Students who
participate in the event are being urged to wear an empty holster to
class in order to protest state laws and university policies that
prohibit firearms on campus.

Neither state law nor campus policies prohibit carrying an empty
holster, so anyone who participates in this event is within his or her
rights. However, if any faculty member or student feels genuinely
threatened (emphasis mine), they should feel free to call the University
Police Department. If you would, please pass this along to your
department chairs and faculty.

Genuinely threatened by what, Ms. Telles-Irvin? An empty holster? So…if someone sees an empty holster and feels scared because there could have been a firearm in that holster, they should call the university police because…the student with holster isn’t breaking any laws?

This is just about the greatest display of hoplophobia that I have ever seen – now you’re acting in fear of an object that carries a gun. This whole email is disconcerting on several levels. For example, I could assume that there are people who would feel threatened by the mere presence of a holster; a sad and disappointing statement. However, if I take the opposite tact and assume that no one would be threatened by an empty holster, than the Vice-Presidente’s email is implying that the Students for Concealed Carry are going to go around bullying people – an implication which I find foolish. It betrays a lack of knowledge of the types of people that get concealed carry licenses in this country, and is an insult to the student body at UF as well.

I support the Students for Concealed Carry – college students with carry permits are all old enough to join the military and be issued automatic weapons. I see no reason why they shouldn’t be trusted to carry their concealed firearms.

Uncle agrees that being threatened by an empty holster is damned silly, as does Sebastian, Bitter, and pretty much anyone else with a brain.