Dr. Ignatius Piazza
For Immediate Release: Friday, December 14, 2012
Dear Marcellus SMITH,
Please Forward to Your Local Newspapers, Radio Stations, and Television News Stations
Subject: Gun School For Teachers
Las
Vegas, Nevada: In the wake of the yet another senseless school
massacre, I ask all our politicians, law enforcement officials, and
school administrators one simply question:
WHEN ARE WE GOING TO WAKE UP AS A NATION AND PROTECT OUR CHILDREN?
How
many more children have to die before we will find the testicular
fortitude, as a nation, to put in place REAL policies that will stop a
deranged gunman in his tracks, before he can commit mass murder on
innocent and defenseless children?
How many times do I have to offer the nation THE solution?
What
the hell is wrong with the leaders of our country? Find a pair, and make
the RIGHT decision to protect our children, not more of the wrong
decisions that create the opportunity for the next lunatic to murder at
will with zero resistance!
Once
again, Front Sight Firearms Training Institute, arguably the world
leader in providing intensified courses in the defensive use of firearms
for private citizens, has the answer to stopping further attacks on
school children. Front Sight will once again offer free firearms
training to any school administrator, teachers, or full time staff
members designated as school Safety Monitors.
Front Sight will accept for training up to three staff members from each school, college or university.
Applicants
must submit a letter requesting training on school letterhead signed by
the top school district official and designating the applicant as the
school's Safety Monitor.
Please
forward this e-mail to your state and federal legislators, local law
enforcement departments and your child's school administrator, as well
as your friends and family, asking them to do the same.
Guns and Teachers
As
Front Sight's Founder and Director, I understand my offer to train armed
school teachers may offend some school administrators and parents who
do not see arming and training selected school staff members as a
positive solution to violent attacks. However, historically, my
approach has worked while gun control has actually increased violent
crime by shifting the balance of power to favor the criminals and
lunatics.
My
offer is not a new idea. In the early 70's, Israel was faced with much
greater problems of armed terrorist attacks on schools. The cry for
more gun control was heard then too, but Israel very carefully analyzed
all possible options before adopting the proactive position of arming
and training their teachers. School shootings stopped and terrorists
looked for easier targets. Gun control never has and never will stop
criminals and madmen from carrying out acts of gun violence.
In our
country, every time a misguided individual on psychiatric drugs goes on
a killing spree, anti self-defense legislators, watch the polls and
exploit the dead victims in order to fool the public into accepting more
gun control. It is time our country finds some resolve and the will to
tackle the real problem, which is rooting out the actual influences in
the lives people hat predispose them to commit atrocities. The problem
is not guns. Guns don't cause these incidents to occur any more than
cameras cause child pornography or automobiles cause traffic fatalities.
Israel
had the right answer. Society is safer when we train and arm our law
abiding citizens. As the defensive training leader in the USA, Front
Sight is willing and able to set the example for the rest of the country
to follow.
Armed Teachers
Dave
Clark, who recently retired after teaching for the last 25 years at
Junction Junior High School in Livermore, California agrees with Front
Sight's philosophy. In fact, Mr. Clark has previously attended a Four
Day Defensive Handgun course at Front Sight at his own expense and found
the course to be exactly what is needed to train fellow teachers to
stop an attack similar to Columbine school and Virginia Tech. "Front
Sight provides safe and responsible training to a level that exceeds law
enforcement standards." Says Mr. Clark. "Among the many lessons
taught, I learned universally accepted rules in justifiable use of
deadly force. More importantly, I learned when not to shoot and how to
be more mentally prepared to see a lethal confrontation coming before it
happens in order to avoid it. The firearms training is second to none
and clearly gives the graduates the skill needed to save the lives of
those in their charge if ever attacked. If my school district chose to
adopt a policy of sending selected teachers to Front Sight for concealed
handgun training, I would wholeheartedly support it and volunteer as a
Safety Monitor. There is no reason for our children to continue to be
victimized when free, professional training is available to stop school
attacks."
Guns in Schools
There is evidence that a gun in the hand
of a teacher will stop an armed attacker. The vice-principal of a school
in Pearl, Mississippi used his handgun to stop and detain an armed
killer until the police arrived. It seems obvious that armed and trained
staff members inside the school are in a better position to identify
the attackers and do something immediately to resolve the situation. It
is much harder for police, who arrive on the scene too late to stop the
killing.
Lawmakers With Blood on Their Hands
An obstacle to training and arming
teachers is the current law in many states prohibiting the possession of
firearms on school grounds even when the possessor is qualified and has
a concealed weapons license.
Understand that those laws did not prevent
or stop the gun violence at numerous schools over the last ten years.
The brazen attacks in school after school during the last decade
indicate criminals have concluded that 'Gun-Free-School-Zone' actually
means 'Government Certified, Helpless and Unarmed Victim Zone.'
Schools Can't Afford to Pass on No Cost Security
Most school districts cannot afford to
have even one full time police officer in every school, but they can
easily afford to train three or more of their selected staff members to a
higher level of firearms training than offered in police academies
because Front Sight will provide the training at no cost.
Retired law enforcement firearms
instructor, Mike Waidelich from Bakersfield, California strongly
supports the Front Sight concept of arming and training teachers.
"Nearly every tragedy on or off school grounds in the entire 30 years of
my law enforcement career could have been prevented or the damage done
considerably limited, by the presence of an armed and trained
individual."
Concealed Guns
The training provided in Front Sight's
basic training classes easily exceeds the training provided in most
police basic training academies.
Front Sight proved it on their nationally
televised reality series Front Sight Challenge. 80 Seasoned law
enforcement officers from around the country went head-to-head in tests
of marksmanship, speed and tactics against 80 private citizens--
including teachers-- who had not received any training other than Front
Sight's firearms courses. Remarkably, the Front Sight trained, private
citizens won over half of every contest.
Teachers will be trained to carry a
concealed weapon, so potential attackers will not know which teachers
are armed and which are not. In states that have adopted concealed
weapon laws for private citizens, violent crime has dropped. School
attacks will drop as well once it is known that any of the teachers and
staff members on school grounds have the ability and training to stop a
violent attack immediately.
There is also scientific research that
supports Front Sight's stance on concealed weapon training from John
Lott, Jr. at University of Chicago School of Law who published Crime,
Deterrence and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handguns in July 1996. Mr.
Lott's research of cross-sectional time-series data from all 3054 U.S.
counties from 1977 to 1992 found that allowing citizens to carry
concealed weapons deters violent crime and appears to produce no
increase in accidental deaths. If those states which did not have
right-to-carry concealed handgun provisions had adopted them in 1992,
approximately 1,570 murders, 4,177 rapes, and over 60,000 aggravated
assaults would have been avoided yearly.
Gun Control Increases Violent Crime
How many times must we experience another
Littleton, Colorado or Virginia Tech or Newtown Connecticut massacre
before we wake up, study the research and adopt policies which actually
reduce crime and begin saving our children instead of leaving them
helpless victims when the next psych drug user snaps?
Gun control increases violent crime yet
some politicians continue to tout disarming law abiding citizens as a
solution. Front Sight has a better solution.
Arm and train school teachers to carry a concealed weapon. And post a DIFFERENT sign outside of ever school!
Look
for the RIGHT sign all over America. They are in front of the homes of
armed and trained Front Sight students. If you were a deranged murderer,
which house would you invade? One with an armed and trained occupant
with a Front Sight sign or one who had a "Gun Free Zone" sign in his
yard? The answer is simply to any rational person.
WHY ARE SCHOOLS ANY DIFFERENT?
It
is time WE WAKE UP and start providing REAL protection for our children
in schools. Front Sight stands ready, willing and able to train every
teacher in America if that is what it takes! Help us protect your
children by demanding YOUR school send their teachers to Front Sight!
Sincerely,
