# How can we better prevent school shootings?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [December 14, 2012, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051 "2012-12-14T18:46:44Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 25
### Author:  [@the\_diego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the_diego)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/481 "2012-12-21T06:01:54Z")
> [@Marley23](#):
>
> Most schools have more than one entrance or exit. And there are almost 100,000 public schools in the U.S. Grab a calculator and figure out how much that’s going to cost.
How hard is it to cut the number of entrances? In the case of schools without walls, entrances to the more populated buildings and roving guards. You don’t have that many victims in shopping mall shootings, right? That movie house thing was a fluke as far as I’m concerned. No package as big as an M-4 would go past my movie house.
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### Author:  [@Dave\_Hartwick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dave_Hartwick)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/482 "2012-12-21T07:02:17Z")
> [@the\_diego](#):
>
> How hard is it to cut the number of entrances? In the case of schools without walls, entrances to the more populated buildings and roving guards. You don’t have that many victims in shopping mall shootings, right? That movie house thing was a fluke as far as I’m concerned. No package as big as an M-4 would go past my movie house.
They’re all flukes. And it’s going to be tricky cutting down on entrances when they’re there to comply with fire codes and other good reasons.
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### Author:  [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 7:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/483 "2012-12-21T07:20:07Z")
> [@Dave\_Hartwick](#):
>
> They’re all flukes. And it’s going to be tricky cutting down on entrances when they’re there to comply with fire codes and other good reasons.
I was thinking the same way. I believe it is currently more likely for there to be a fire, fire scare or bomb scare than it is for there to be a rampaging shooter attacking a school. Those aren’t just entrances-they’re also _exits_.
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### Author:  [@Stealth\_Potato](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stealth_Potato)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 7:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/484 "2012-12-21T07:42:23Z")
> [@This\_Just\_In\_2](#):
>
> Outside of fiction, what can be horrifying without being serious? Are you saying mass shooting isn’t serious?
Mass shootings are extremely serious to everyone involved. But regarding safety of the population on a national level, there are a great many things that cause more deaths, including ladders, swimming pools, and the common flu. Mass shootings rival lightning strikes and bees for total body count.
So, no, from a national policy standpoint, considering the net effect on the public safety, mass shootings are not serious.
> [@This\_Just\_In\_2](#):
>
> So we shouldn’t ever make any changes if emotions will be involved?
I don’t think that’s what **artemis** meant. We should avoid making changes that have only an emotional basis. Perhaps emotion stirs us to action, but the first part of that action should be subtracting the emotion and considering the facts.
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### Author:  [@the\_diego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the_diego)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 9:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/485 "2012-12-21T09:11:17Z")
[double tapped]
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### Author:  [@the\_diego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the_diego)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 9:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/486 "2012-12-21T09:14:12Z")
There’s a danger to limiting ingress/egress in buildings due to fires and other risks, not in an enclosure/enclave. I was referring to the latter. For buildings, it’s easy to maintain dedicated exits (as many as you want) for emergencies. But everyone can enter through just one door.
I’m not an American, so you’re telling me that scenes wherein a school guard holds a basket and tells each student “All rings and blings here,” while the student passes through a metal detector is purely 555 Hollywood?
This isn’t representative of Philippine private schools but many are like this:
[http://t3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSNkG0PIEs4MSR9VPcQKI13KB3\_ivYRCGSSvwu1L8fNtq6Bw7lJ6yDycdTT](http://t3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSNkG0PIEs4MSR9VPcQKI13KB3_ivYRCGSSvwu1L8fNtq6Bw7lJ6yDycdTT)
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### Author:  [@Dave\_Hartwick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dave_Hartwick)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 10:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/487 "2012-12-21T10:08:40Z")
> [@the\_diego](#):
>
> But everyone can enter through just one door
Oh yes, you’re correct. Even back when I went to school students only entered through one or two doors. US schools that have problems with violence already have measures in place, such as guards and metal detectors, that would probably have prevented the most recent mass shooting. Most US schools don’t have a significant problem with violence and many don’t have measures in place more effective against armed intruders than a grumpy janitor. Who, it being America, may have a gun in his car.
School security measures, however, can only prevent shootings in schools. The only motivations spree killers have in common-- other than revenge, which is why schools are sometimes preferred targets-- are body count and notoriety, as far as I can tell. The next might hit a public pool, a concert, a crowded bus or train. Restaurants and churches have been the scene of rampages in the US, too.
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### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/488 "2012-12-21T14:24:42Z")
> [@Dave\_Hartwick](#):
>
> They’re all flukes. And it’s going to be tricky cutting down on entrances when they’re there to comply with fire codes and other good reasons.
Fortunately, we’ve got magic doors nowadays that only open from the inside. 😃
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### Author:  [@Dave\_Hartwick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dave_Hartwick)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/489 "2012-12-21T14:31:07Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#):
>
> Fortunately, we’ve got magic doors nowadays that only open from the inside. 😃
Oh yeah, they had those at the Century in Aurora. I used to prop the ones at school open when I cut class.
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### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/490 "2012-12-21T14:59:28Z")
Me too. No reason they can’t be keyed to the fire alarms or whatever, though.
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### Author:  [@artemis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/artemis)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/491 "2012-12-21T15:54:52Z")
Requiring all new schools have at least two ways out of each classroom would be a really, really good idea. And maybe we can accomplish that in older schools as well, by installing windows that can be opened and used as emergency exits if necessary. The only reason these school shooters are able to rack up such high body counts is that their victims couldn’t run away.
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### Author:  [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/492 "2012-12-21T16:10:36Z")
People are seriously arguing about hiring large numbers of security guards at a time when schools are slashing their budgets like crazy?:dubious:
Where’s the money going to come from.
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### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/493 "2012-12-21T16:34:52Z")
Maybe the NRA will provide funding. 😉
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### Author:  [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/494 "2012-12-21T16:58:53Z")
The NRA just called for armed guards at all schools. I wonder what he might suggest they be armed with?
He also talked about “bad guys” and “monsters.”. What is he, five years old?
Did anyone ever read “The King, the Mice and the Cheese”?
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### Author:  [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/495 "2012-12-21T17:07:38Z")
I’d think a more pertinent question is…who would be paying for this? If the NRA is volunteering to pay then that’s one thing…but if the plan is to have this come out of taxes, well…I don’t think it’s worth it from a cost to benefits perspective.
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### Author:  [@BrokenBriton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrokenBriton)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/496 "2012-12-21T17:24:47Z")
Wouldn’t that just move the killer down the street a little - maybe to the gym, or the supermarket, car park, restaurant, etc?
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### Author:  [@CJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CJJ)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/497 "2012-12-21T17:26:22Z")
> [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#):
>
> The NRA just called for armed guards at all schools. I wonder what he might suggest they be armed with?
>
> He also talked about “bad guys” and “monsters.”. What is he, five years old?
I encourage everyone here to immediately [read Mr. LaPierre’s statement](http://whnt.com/2012/12/21/transcript-of-nra-press-conference/) from a “press conference” where he took absolutely no questions. It is most charitably described as a meandering sideshow, but more accurately a call for–yet again–more guns (sold by his industry backers) to solve the problem, as he himself acknowledges:
> [@](#):
>
> Now, I can imagine the shocking headlines you’ll print tomorrow morning: “More guns,” you’ll claim, “are the NRA’s answer to everything!” Your implication will be that guns are evil and have no place in society, much less in our schools. But since when did the word “gun” automatically become a bad word?
In the rest, he blames video games and movies (Jeez Wayne, couldn’t you find any more recent titles than “Natural Born Killers” and “American Psycho”?), and in a laughable bit of irony, the refusal of the federal government to maintain a database of the mentally ill.
He says he’ll appear on Meet the Press this Sunday. I wonder if he’ll bring his AR-15, just to make sure the questions stay “polite”?
Why anyone thinks the NRA in general and this clown in particular has anything substantive to contribute to the discussion is beyond me.
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### Author:  [@Gangster\_Octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gangster_Octopus)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/498 "2012-12-21T17:58:45Z")
And as he was giving his press conference some guy decided to [have himself a shooting spree in Pennsylvania](http://gawker.com/5970497/while-the-nra-was-on-tv-talking-about-the-need-for-more-guns-some-guy-was-walking-up-and-down-a-road-in-pennsylvania-shooting-people).
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### Author:  [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/499 "2012-12-21T18:05:07Z")
> [@Gangster\_Octopus](#):
>
> And as he was giving his press conference some guy decided to [have himself a shooting spree in Pennsylvania](http://gawker.com/5970497/while-the-nra-was-on-tv-talking-about-the-need-for-more-guns-some-guy-was-walking-up-and-down-a-road-in-pennsylvania-shooting-people).
Well, he could have just as well been walking up and down the road with a knife or a swimming pool.
ETA: Or an alcohol.
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### Author:  [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)
#### Post date: [December 21, 2012, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-we-better-prevent-school-shootings/644051/500 "2012-12-21T18:16:22Z")
> [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#):
>
> Well, he could have just as well been walking up and down the road with a knife or a swimming pool.
>
> ETA: Or an alcohol.
Kind of like [this](http://www.tucsonnewsnow.com/Global/story.asp?s=5761116), right? A quick Google search for drunk driving accidents turns up that a person is killed in the US every half an hour in a drunk driving accident…approximately 16-20k every year in drunk driving accidents alone. When you are finished patting yourself on the back, check out the stats for Europe some time…might surprise you. Though I’m sure you still don’t get the point.
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