More Weapons In Schools Isn’t The Answer

by Abbe Sudvarg, PEP Board Chair
published in Webster-Kirkwood Times

“The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,” declared the NRA’s Wayne LaPierre at a press conference a week after Newtown.  Yet, in November 2009, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, an Army psychiatrist, opened fire at Fort Hood, Texas, killing 12 people and wounding 31 others.  Trained military “good guys,” skilled in the use of firearms, were unable to keep those 12 deaths from happening.

Missouri House Bill 70, which would allow teachers to bring concealed weapons into public school buildings, is not the answer to preventing carnage like that which occurred in Newtown. More weapons in classrooms is not the answer.  I can easily envision a scenario where a teacher’s gun is taken and used by an angry, mentally ill teenager (who has no other weapon), or is used by a teacher who feels threatened but is actually in no mortal danger.

As a physician who cares for children, one of the questions I always ask of families with guns is whether or not they are locked up and out of reach.  I certainly would feel that the children in an elementary classroom would be in danger were there a loaded weapon in the purse of their teacher.

I hope that all of our state legislators in the St. Louis Metropolitan area will vote “no” on this dangerous piece of legislation.