Discussion List for campus-based and allied personnel working to end gender-based violence on campus.

["Don Lazzarini" <>]

While I respect much of Mr. Sokolow's work I am very interested in his
background and expertise both in self-defense and the use of firearms to
ensure personal safety. His position and connections do not on their
face produce any level of expertise on these very specific and well
researched self-defense issues. It would be nice to know if someone in
his position takes great caution in developing and researching an
opinion piece before trying to influence national policy. The risk of
not doing that is a loss of credibility which in the end is all national
(risk) experts really have to offer these debates.

Sokolow writes "Perhaps the most preposterous suggestion of all is that
we need to relax our campus weapons bans so that armed members of our
communities can defend themselves." In contrast to Sokolow's opinion,
(concerning the ivory towers of academia where great ideas are debated)
this "armed members of our community concept" has proven to be highly
successful in a large majority of the individual states of these United
States. This is not a theoretical debate, the legally authorized
concealed carry of handguns by law abiding citizens, is the norm
nationally, not the exception and according to the research it is
working very, very well. So on what basis does Sokolow a risk management
expert for colleges and universities make his unsubstantiated claims
that armed members of our communities defending themselves is
"preposterous"? The exact opposite has been proven over and over in the
real world, is academia not the real world when it comes to non-academic
issues?

His opinion is "We should NOT allow weapons on college campuses." Does
Mr. Sokolow really believe that anyone has the power and authority to
control items that enter and leave a college campus? As the JD after his
name indicates Mr. Sokolow is relying on written laws to dictate what is
allowed and what is not. The question is not what is allowed but what is
likely to occur based on past knowledge, experience and models. Mr. Cho
makes a very convincing point we can't control what enters and leaves a
college campus.

As is true of our national borders, the borders of a university campus
are imaginary lines that people cross millions of times a day.
Individuals determine if the rules allowing certain things on campus or
denying certain behaviors on campus apply to them or not. Those few
people who function under homicidal ideology don't care what is allowed
on a college campus. Sokolow JD could have written "We should not allow
people to kill other people on college campuses. We should not allow
rape on college campuses." If a penis is the primary weapon of rape,
which we all know is much more prevalent on campus than these homicides,
we should not allow penises on college campuses. The fact is college
campuses are swarming with deadly weapons every day. I have investigated
and reviewed homicides where the weapon was a car, a pencil, a knife, a
hammer, a baseball bat, a fist and even a boot. These are all weapons
but then what is really being said is we should not allow firearms on
college campuses. Mr. Cho and various others keep telling us very
convincingly how "preposterous a suggestion" they believe that is. Mr.
Sokolow just doesn't want to believe them. Personally, I am absolutely
convinced we can't stop them, we have to be prepared to engage them. 

Mr. Sokolow writes "Imagine you are seated in Norris Hall, facing the
whiteboard at the front of the room." I don't know anything about Norris
Hall, so Mr. Sokolow's scenario is not well designed. Sokolow continues
"Mr. Cho enters from the back and begins shooting.  What good is your
gun going to do at this point?" It is painfully obvious to me that Mr.
Sokolow has no experience creating or debriefing shooting situations. He
opines in generalities. In the movie where John Travolta has a brain
tumor that enhances his mental and physical abilities he is being
questioned during a psych exam. The punch line in the interview that is
conducted is "Be specific Bob" due to Travolta's characters frustration
with the lack of detail.

If university level risk management experts want to weigh in on real
world shooting scenarios they need to get specific, real specific.
Since Sokolow's concern is "Mr. Cho enters from the back and begins
shooting...What good is your gun going to do at this point?" The
question I have is "Brett, if you don't know what good a gun is to a
trained citizen at this point, why are you trying to influence us with
your uninformed opinion piece?" Is the room tiny or is it huge? Is your
point, the room is so large, that Cho is too far away for me to return
accurate fire? The answer to your non-specific question is "My gun and
my skills, background, training and experience will allow me to defend
myself against Cho's homicidal attack. Cho did not come to an unarmed
campus to engage in a gun fight. He came to terrorize and to butcher as
many people as he could.

I don't know how large Norris Hall is? I can tell you as an instructor
at the California Specialized Training Institute back in the 80's I shot
at and hit a man sized metal silhouette target at over 500 yards with a
45 caliber pistol. I am confident with a 9mm Smith and Wesson pistol (my
concealed carry weapon) Cho would not stand in the doorway of your
Norris Hall and feel in control even if I was standing at the white
board. If the distance was such that a lesser skilled legally armed
citizen/individual needed to close the distance, it is a choice they
could make. At some point Cho either approaches them or leaves. In the
best of circumstances the armed citizenry in Norris Hall saves many
lives, at the very least they have a real, viable chance of saving their
own life. If a second legally armed student is in the back several rows
of Norris Hall, that person doubles the risk to Cho, without increasing
the risk to other students. Add five or more armed civilian students
(all over 21 years of age according to existing law in most places) and
you have a room where Cho would not have been in control.

If Sokolow's risk management expertise does not extend to firearms and
self-defense then he is sharing nothing more than personal opinion.
"Many  pro-gun advocates have talked about the deterrent and defense
values of a well-armed student body, but none of them have mentioned the
potential collateral criminal consequences of armed students: increases
in armed robbery, muggings, escalation of interpersonal and relationship
violence, etc." As I shared with you all in a post from a few days ago,
every time concealed carry is proposed in a state, all the doomsday
"experts" predict the wild west shootouts and crime with guns will
increase. The research and real world outcomes of these predictions show
these are false fears based on feeling; not accurate research and data.
What is the outcome of risk management experts spewing false fears into
an environment flooded with emotion?

Mr. Sokolow, the reason non of your pro-gun advocates (your label not
mine) don't mention the potential collateral criminal consequences of
student's armed through a states concealed weapons laws is because at
least some of these people are firearms and self-defense experts well
versed in the research and the national results of concealed carry
making communities safer, not more dangerous. It is not best practice
for self-proclaimed experts to bring up personal beliefs that have been
proven wrong through research, field trials and experiments on a
national level. Emotion and opinion are poor substitutes for the
scientific method.

  
And finally, Sokolow says "Virginia, like most states, cannot keep guns
out of the hands of those with potentially lethal mental health crises.
When we talk about arming students, we'd be arming them too." Let us
apply this paradigm to a population of human beings. How many of them
will rise to the level of having a potentially lethal mental health
crisis? How many citizen's out there want the background check including
criminal history run, the cost of fingerprinting, having your photograph
taken for the concealed weapon carry card, providing evidence of
competency with the firearm and going into the Sheriff's Office to get
all of this done? The process of weeding out that occurs, in conjunction
with the people who don't know anything about guns and don't want to
touch them, tends to allow for not everyone being armed under these
statutes. I don't have data, but I am very confident the number of
people with potentially lethal mental health crises is many hundreds if
not many thousands of times lower than upright American citizens who
accept the responsibility of concealed weapon carry. Simply put, for
every Cho we have hundreds of competent law abiding citizens carrying
firearms currently under the law, that would make our campuses safer
places. 

Is there something about campuses that operate differently than the
outside world, when it comes to stopping and controlling homicidal
attacks? 

It looks like we always respond to these threats by bringing in outside
law enforcement armed with guns to deal with the carnage. It looks like
we always experience a major loss of life due to the response time and
lack of awareness inherent in random police patrol. The only concept
that has ever worked in any of these armed assault crimes is when an
armed civilian or school employee was able to retrieve their personal
weapon to engage the suspect. The media doesn't like to advertise these
examples because they go against their belief systems. This isn't rocket
science. You just have to do your research and find the facts. Risk
management experts aren't going to provide them to you.
 

In the nicest way I know how I am asking Mr. Sokolow to focus his
attention on educating himself on the real issue. 


Don Lazzarini M. Ed
Coordinator VAWOC Project
Resource Specialist
208-885-2956