I would pull out my gun and shoot back... 
however, in a setting like that w/o a gun, there really isn't anyone can do. Its like shooting fish in a barrel... and you're the fish :-(
however, in a setting like that w/o a gun, there really isn't anyone can do. Its like shooting fish in a barrel... and you're the fish :-(I have had a gun pulled on me once. I was in a car and the guy with the gun was in front of my car. I could have hit him but instead, I immediately threw the car in reverse and went backwards as fast as I could. I was lucky there was nothing behind me and I escaped unharmed.
I don't know what I would do in that situation but I do know I wouldn't have stood up against the wall to die.
Handguns are not the easiest to shot and unless he was very good with it, he would be hard pressed to hit moving targets.
I don't know what I would do in that situation but I do know I wouldn't have stood up against the wall to die.
Handguns are not the easiest to shot and unless he was very good with it, he would be hard pressed to hit moving targets.
Ours is in the public safety building, between physical sciences and the library.
Of course I can't know for certain what I'd do, but based on my reactions in other extreme events my bet is I would either have run for my gun (in my car or storage) or improvised (fire extinguisher, big stick, etc). From now on though it'll be much easier - I'll just draw my sidearm and give it my best.
I'd say it's the best prep, but not the only. Law enforcement and security both have their moments that can help define a person.
most people think there are only two instincts: fight or flight. but there are actually 3. what do deer do when they are suddenly lighted by the headlights of a coming truck? they freeze. most people probably has that instinct. this situation is hard to analyze rationally cause non of the students where thinking rationally.
irishScott
Lifer
- Oct 10, 2006
- 21,562
- 3
- 0
I admit we still need more info about what happened, but there's no denying that most people freeze in such a situation. They don't even try to avoid getting shot.
I blame the pussification of America for the freezing. Not the inability to take him down.
FallenHero
Diamond Member
- Jan 2, 2006
- 5,659
- 0
- 0
mooncancook
Platinum Member
- May 28, 2003
- 2,874
- 50
- 91
I can only imagine... my first reaction would probably be duck and hide and hope I don't get shot before he leave the classroom. If he lines us up I would probably do it and try not to do anything to provoke him and hope he's only using us as hostages, and hope for rescue. Once line up and he's holding 2 guns in his hands standing a few feet away, you are totally at his mercy, and if he want to shoot you all you can do is pee in the pants and hope his shot won't be fatal to you, and any action I take will guarantee certain death because he would likely give a few more shots at anyone trying to fight back.
Honestly, in that situation, I don't see how you think there is much a student can do other than take cover. The only way a rush would work is if you had some kind of coordination with the other students. I think the best you could do is play dead until the gunman leaves, then barricade the door.
Maybe I haven't been reading enough, but I also don't know why people have come to the conclusion that nobody fought back.
Maybe I haven't been reading enough, but I also don't know why people have come to the conclusion that nobody fought back.
TraumaRN
Diamond Member
- Jun 5, 2005
- 6,893
- 63
- 91
I think only certain kinds of people would even be able to think in a situation like that. You have to be used to emergency situations and used to chaos, life threatening situations to really deal...I mean I work in a inner city Level One Trauma Emergency Room.....one of the best in the country and it took me at least a month to start to be able react instinctively to certain emergencies. Now I dont even think, I just react. We had a patient today try and attack one of our nurses...I was tackling that patient in a blink...but 6 months ago I would have just froze in place. It's definitely something that not everyone can do, and to that extent not everyone can learn to react like that.
And like crazydood said it sounds like more than a few people either sacrificed themselves or help barricade the doors to classrooms...
And like crazydood said it sounds like more than a few people either sacrificed themselves or help barricade the doors to classrooms...
rockyct
Diamond Member
- Jun 23, 2001
- 6,656
- 32
- 91
Please, explain to me how a person needs to know how to use a firearm or take out someone with a firearm in everyday American life. The reason why some thought it was construction equipment is because it is so incomprehensible that someone could walk in through the door while a prof is lecturing and shoot them. Heck, if I heard gun shots while I was sitting in class, I'd be more likely to attribute it to the construction crew outside than an insane killer because it is 100,000 times more likely.
Also, like someone mentioned earlier, have any of you who say they should have fought back actually sat in a college desk?
If someone walks into a small classroom with a gun, they will enter in the empty space in either the front or back. So, there could be 5-15 feet, even much more between the killer and the first desk. Now, even if you have the right mind to think, "hey, I've got to stop this", you now have to get out of your desk, run to the front of the row while avoiding people curled up on the floor, and then if you get to the front of the row, you now probably have 15 feet of completely open space before you even get a chance to disarm the gunman.
Unless you're Neo, you're dead five seconds after you stand up. This is assuming both of his guns don't jam or run out at the same time.
Bateluer
Lifer
- Jun 23, 2001
- 27,730
- 8
- 0
Call me crazy then, because if I was in that situation and he was lining my class up to be executed, I would attack him with everything I had. Teeth and finger nails included. He may kill me, but I would hope that every one else in that room would jump on him a moment after me.
The only thing that makes me think that someone should have fought back is this...I heard in one classroom, he reloaded 3 times.
I know pistols don't take long to reload, and maybe everyone had already been shot atleast once (he fired multiple shots into the same body)...but if not, I imagine there would have been atleast a slight chance of taking him down..which is better than nothing.
I imagine I would have done it..or some other sort of crazy antics.
I know pistols don't take long to reload, and maybe everyone had already been shot atleast once (he fired multiple shots into the same body)...but if not, I imagine there would have been atleast a slight chance of taking him down..which is better than nothing.
I imagine I would have done it..or some other sort of crazy antics.
rockyct just gave a good explaination of why fighting back was next to impossible. About reloading, apparently he had a bunch of ammo on him so I wouldn't be surprised if he had extra clips as well. Popping out a clip and shoving in a new one takes a second, not enough time for the people who are lying on the floor to do much.
Also if he only unloaded one at a time then he would definately have enough control to be able to pop out that clip and put a new one in.
The more I think about this the more I'm surprised Columbine and other shooters haven't been as deadly.
Some people are making some very stupid comments here and they should check themselves before they're embarassed further.
If it's true he wasn't lining them up, and just coming in and shooting off a few rounds, then yeah, I completely understand how they were so helpless.
mooncancook
Platinum Member
- May 28, 2003
- 2,874
- 50
- 91
Whether the gunman line them up or not is irrelavant. I can't believe how quick to judge and slow to think some ppl are.
If you are sitting in a classroom and a gunman comes in standing near the entrance and ask everyone to line up against the wall, would you do it or not? I'm sure you would do it, right? You know you have no chance (don't tell me you can disarm a man with a gun standing 20 ft from you while you are sitting), and you wouldn't think that he's crazy enough to execute everyone, maybe he's looking for someone, or just hold hostages. Now if he starts executing while everyone is lined up against the wall, unless the gunman is stupid enough to shoot you from within arms length, the best you can do is hope he miss you or the bullet won't fatally wound you. Think about it, there's nothing you can do if he's firing at you while you are facing the wall and he's 30 ft behind you.
I've read many of the news articles and not one has yet to confirm that he was lining up people.
From this I'm assuming he just went classroom to classroom with guns blazing. As with most college classrooms the desks are cluttered up so close that you have to walk sideways to get through the isles. Even in those giant lecture halls it's still hard to get around the chairs that quickly. There is just no way you can run through these desks and other students to get to the gunman in time. The people in the front have the best chance of rushing him but they're likely to be the first ones shot when he comes in the room.
From this I'm assuming he just went classroom to classroom with guns blazing. As with most college classrooms the desks are cluttered up so close that you have to walk sideways to get through the isles. Even in those giant lecture halls it's still hard to get around the chairs that quickly. There is just no way you can run through these desks and other students to get to the gunman in time. The people in the front have the best chance of rushing him but they're likely to be the first ones shot when he comes in the room.
- Oct 9, 1999
- 12,513
- 49
- 91
Mark Steyn is a great writer - and he sums up my thoughts in a way far more eloquent than I ever could.
A Culture of Passivity
"Protecting" our "children" at Virginia Tech.
By Mark Steyn
I haven?t weighed in yet on Virginia Tech ? mainly because, in a saner world, it would not be the kind of incident one needed to have a partisan opinion on. But I was giving a couple of speeches in Minnesota yesterday and I was asked about it and found myself more and more disturbed by the tone of the coverage. I?m not sure I?m ready to go the full Derb but I think he?s closer to the reality of the situation than most. On Monday night, Geraldo was all over Fox News saying we have to accept that, in this horrible world we live in, our ?children? need to be ?protected.?
Point one: They?re not ?children.? The students at Virginia Tech were grown women and ? if you?ll forgive the expression ? men. They would be regarded as adults by any other society in the history of our planet. Granted, we live in a selectively infantilized culture where twentysomethings are ?children? if they?re serving in the Third Infantry Division in Ramadi but grown-ups making rational choices if they drop to the broadloom in President Clinton?s Oval Office. Nonetheless, it?s deeply damaging to portray fit fully formed adults as children who need to be protected. We should be raising them to understand that there will be moments in life when you need to protect yourself ? and, in a ?horrible? world, there may come moments when you have to choose between protecting yourself or others. It is a poor reflection on us that, in those first critical seconds where one has to make a decision, only an elderly Holocaust survivor, Professor Librescu, understood instinctively the obligation to act.
Point two: The cost of a ?protected? society of eternal ?children? is too high. Every December 6th, my own unmanned Dominion lowers its flags to half-mast and tries to saddle Canadian manhood in general with the blame for the ?Montreal massacre,? the 14 female students of the Ecole Polytechnique murdered by Marc Lepine (born Gamil Gharbi, the son of an Algerian Muslim wife-beater, though you?d never know that from the press coverage). As I wrote up north a few years ago:
Yet the defining image of contemporary Canadian maleness is not M Lepine/Gharbi but the professors and the men in that classroom, who, ordered to leave by the lone gunman, meekly did so, and abandoned their female classmates to their fate ? an act of abdication that would have been unthinkable in almost any other culture throughout human history. The ?men? stood outside in the corridor and, even as they heard the first shots, they did nothing. And, when it was over and Gharbi walked out of the room and past them, they still did nothing. Whatever its other defects, Canadian manhood does not suffer from an excess of testosterone.
I have always believed America is different. Certainly on September 11th we understood. The only good news of the day came from the passengers who didn?t meekly follow the obsolescent 1970s hijack procedures but who used their wits and acted as free-born individuals. And a few months later as Richard Reid bent down and tried to light his shoe in that critical split-second even the French guys leapt up and pounded the bejasus out of him.
We do our children a disservice to raise them to entrust all to officialdom?s security blanket. Geraldo-like ?protection? is a delusion: when something goes awry ? whether on a September morning flight out of Logan or on a peaceful college campus ? the state won?t be there to protect you. You?ll be the fellow on the scene who has to make the decision. As my distinguished compatriot Kathy Shaidle says:
When we say ?we don?t know what we?d do under the same circumstances?, we make cowardice the default position.
I?d prefer to say that the default position is a terrible enervating passivity. Murderous misfit loners are mercifully rare. But this awful corrosive passivity is far more pervasive, and, unlike the psycho killer, is an existential threat to a functioning society.
? Mark Steyn, a National Review columnist, is author of America Alone.
Link
A Culture of Passivity
"Protecting" our "children" at Virginia Tech.
By Mark Steyn
I haven?t weighed in yet on Virginia Tech ? mainly because, in a saner world, it would not be the kind of incident one needed to have a partisan opinion on. But I was giving a couple of speeches in Minnesota yesterday and I was asked about it and found myself more and more disturbed by the tone of the coverage. I?m not sure I?m ready to go the full Derb but I think he?s closer to the reality of the situation than most. On Monday night, Geraldo was all over Fox News saying we have to accept that, in this horrible world we live in, our ?children? need to be ?protected.?
Point one: They?re not ?children.? The students at Virginia Tech were grown women and ? if you?ll forgive the expression ? men. They would be regarded as adults by any other society in the history of our planet. Granted, we live in a selectively infantilized culture where twentysomethings are ?children? if they?re serving in the Third Infantry Division in Ramadi but grown-ups making rational choices if they drop to the broadloom in President Clinton?s Oval Office. Nonetheless, it?s deeply damaging to portray fit fully formed adults as children who need to be protected. We should be raising them to understand that there will be moments in life when you need to protect yourself ? and, in a ?horrible? world, there may come moments when you have to choose between protecting yourself or others. It is a poor reflection on us that, in those first critical seconds where one has to make a decision, only an elderly Holocaust survivor, Professor Librescu, understood instinctively the obligation to act.
Point two: The cost of a ?protected? society of eternal ?children? is too high. Every December 6th, my own unmanned Dominion lowers its flags to half-mast and tries to saddle Canadian manhood in general with the blame for the ?Montreal massacre,? the 14 female students of the Ecole Polytechnique murdered by Marc Lepine (born Gamil Gharbi, the son of an Algerian Muslim wife-beater, though you?d never know that from the press coverage). As I wrote up north a few years ago:
Yet the defining image of contemporary Canadian maleness is not M Lepine/Gharbi but the professors and the men in that classroom, who, ordered to leave by the lone gunman, meekly did so, and abandoned their female classmates to their fate ? an act of abdication that would have been unthinkable in almost any other culture throughout human history. The ?men? stood outside in the corridor and, even as they heard the first shots, they did nothing. And, when it was over and Gharbi walked out of the room and past them, they still did nothing. Whatever its other defects, Canadian manhood does not suffer from an excess of testosterone.
I have always believed America is different. Certainly on September 11th we understood. The only good news of the day came from the passengers who didn?t meekly follow the obsolescent 1970s hijack procedures but who used their wits and acted as free-born individuals. And a few months later as Richard Reid bent down and tried to light his shoe in that critical split-second even the French guys leapt up and pounded the bejasus out of him.
We do our children a disservice to raise them to entrust all to officialdom?s security blanket. Geraldo-like ?protection? is a delusion: when something goes awry ? whether on a September morning flight out of Logan or on a peaceful college campus ? the state won?t be there to protect you. You?ll be the fellow on the scene who has to make the decision. As my distinguished compatriot Kathy Shaidle says:
When we say ?we don?t know what we?d do under the same circumstances?, we make cowardice the default position.
I?d prefer to say that the default position is a terrible enervating passivity. Murderous misfit loners are mercifully rare. But this awful corrosive passivity is far more pervasive, and, unlike the psycho killer, is an existential threat to a functioning society.
? Mark Steyn, a National Review columnist, is author of America Alone.
Link
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