Virginia delegate Nick Freitas (courtesy youtube.com)

The video of Virginia delegate Nick Freitas talking about gun control [below] went viral on Facebook. Why wouldn’t it? He slams gun-free zones, government policies that create broken homes, the “abortion industry” and the ineffectiveness of gun control laws in Europe. Mr. Freitas highlights defensive gun uses. And turns to arming teachers . . .

“Not every teacher,” Mr. Freitas demurs, “but a teacher that is comfortable with it, is former law enforcement, is former military, that is now in the classroom.”

I interrupt this pro-gun polemic to point out that this position — that cops and vets (and teachers that receive specialty active shooter training) are OK to carry in school whereas your garden variety gun owner are not — cedes valuable ground to gun control advocates. Americans’ natural, civil and Constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms should not end at the school gate.

Don’t be angry. I’m picking nits. It’s what I do. I know that this video — that takes Democrats to the woodshed — is heavenly manna for the pro-gun rights side now. It should be seen by any and all firearms freedom fence sitters. Send it.

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40 COMMENTS

  1. How many teachers are former LEOs or military? People keep saying we need to “allow teachers who are vets and former cops” to carry guns, but I have only known one teacher in a public K-12 school who was former military or law enforcement (my high school metal shop teacher was in the Air Force), and in higher education there’s very few (I had a history TA who was a former prison guard, though). Professors are almost all people who have never ventured outside academia, and the greedy admin slimeballs ship them around the country to keep any of them from actually getting tenure. You’re not going to have any run-of-the-mill teachers comfortable with carrying guns until schools are no longer legally GFZs.

    • In order to get tenure, profs must toe the established lines and after they get it thay can coast down all the way to retirement. In which other job you get guaranteed that the employer can’t fire you if your performance sags?

      • In my experience, most people who should have tenure don’t have it, and many people who have tenure shouldn’t have it.

    • On the staff side, I would hunch that about 50% of the employees are POTG.

      I work at a university in a large northeastern city and I am familiar with the staff at two other universities in the area and many, many staff members are 2A activists, sports shooters, hunters, etc.

      It also isn’t unusual for the staff to protect some of the professors from their total lack of common sense. If these professors are allowed to carry, substantial training will need to be a prerequisite.

      One time, I responded to a fire alarm activation to find a professor had started a campfire in the middle of the classroom so the students could study the visual aspects of the flame (I’m not kidding).

      • Pretty much every college administrator I’ve ever met with only cared about milking me, my friends, and my family for money, and nothing else, and they are very antigun here in Ohio.

        • If I had known there was going to be one I would have made time for it. I’m going over to my friend’s place so he can replace my brake pads, which should probably be done before any trips to C-bus.

        • Yep. Brakes are important.

          If Fecesbook is your thing, there are a good number of Ohio based groups to keep tabs on gatherings. I don’t really do FB so I often have people text me about them. Unfortunately, many are late notice… like this one. However, I will be there for this one.

          Take care and hope to see you at some of the next ones.

  2. Well said and powerful. I would vote for this guy. Yes, not just former agents of the state deserve to be able ti degend themselves and their charges in school.

    • I think this guy is former .mil too.

      I live in VA and there is a lot of support for a senate run.

  4. RF he chose his wording carefully. Former cops, retired troops, and “specially trained” teachers is a much MUCH easier pill for Mr. and Mrs. America to swallow than say any teacher who happens to have a Glock sittin in their dresser. Not to say it isn’t wrong but your average citizen has been brainwashed to trust such things more than any other Average American toting a gun, sadly the antis have whipped us pretty good on that front and it will take a good long time before we can change the perception that special training is needed in order to successfully defend the lives around you as well as your own.

    • Bites at the apple Bob. Bites at the apple. Trained former LEO/Mil today, standardized training for non-LEO/Mil teachers that want to carry a gun and demonstrate the ability to do so in training tomorrow.

      Incrementalism is how the antis roll. We can do that too.

      • There’s still a training element there…. That is the problem. The max amount of training it takes to operate a firearm with iron sights is maybe 2 hours, teaching how to aim, load, and fire with actual live fire to show said trainee the finer points of sight picture, trigger squeeze, breathing, and stance. Past that you really don’t need much to figure out how to save your skin with a gun. Sure it’s nice to know the proper way to pie a corner or the ever useful low ready but it’s not necessary for what we’re asking of potentially armed school staff. the most they need is how and where to aim, how to squeeze the trigger properly, and how to clear a malfunction. People need to wake up and realize there really isn’t a whole lot of voodoo involved in defending a locked down classroom. Just sit in the corner aiming at roughly chest height on your closed door and don’t shoot the cops or unarmed students.

        • Again incrementalism.

          As armed teachers are introduced and nothing bad really happens you can take more and more bites at the apple until you have what you want or maybe 80%-90% of it.

          Personally, I don’t think getting armed teachers into schools without training is ever going to happen and I also think that it’s probably not a good idea from a practical perspective. I’ll go really, really far with gun rights but I’m not an “absolutist” and I’m sorry giving every teacher the ability to carry a gun with no restrictions, training or questions asked is just begging for some nutbar to become a teacher just so they can do something terrible or asking for some idiot anti-gun teacher to do something awful to make a political point. When that happens you can kiss the whole thing goodbye and we’re back to square one.

          I mean consider how progged out some teachers are. If they could just carry a gun tomorrow you don’t suppose a few would be tempted to shoot up the school just to prove a point do you? I think a few would be and one might actually do it too. Just to set back the cause of gun rights and allowing arming teachers.

        • NRA basic pistol is about 8 hours. That and a little regular practice (anything that could be considered to be “substantially” more than the average NYPD officer) will do.

          They gotta be better than the NYPD.

        • Hadn’t thought of that… The training requirement could be a good thing but it could also be abused like many anti gun states do with their concealed carry permits. Freedom isn’t always safe, simple, or pretty. Teachers are people too. So it’s always a possibility that some nutbag commie teacher shoots up their classroom just to “take a stand against The Man”.

        • I’m not hugely in favor of training requirements, but if there’s going to be one, they could use the time to get people in the right mindset. More than anything, being mentally prepared for the situation is what’s going to get them through.

          If the RSO at Parkland had had the right mentality, many lives would have been saved. No one is talking about this, but to me the contrast is stunning. In Sutherland Springs, NRA member Stephen Willeford grabs his rifle as soon as he hears what’s going on and doesn’t even stop to put on shoes! He just needs to get there as fast as possible to do what he can. The killer had shot nearly everyone in the church, but his intended targets weren’t there, so he was going to look for them elsewhere. Willeford dealt him mortal wounds, then flagged down a passerby in a truck to pursue. Eventually, the killer pulled over and finished himself off.

          In Parkland, the deputy is right there, has a radio, can get backup rolling instantly, and… nothing. Actually waves other officers away from the site and tells everyone to stay at least 500 ft away. The killer is able to continue his massacre unimpeded until the rifle malfunctions, at which point he leaves. At no point is he confronted by law enforcement on site.

          If the training can get people carrying in the schools to be like Stephen Willeford and not like the disgraceful Broward County Sheriff’s Office, then it will be worth it.

        • Max:

          I’m not qualified to say what the level of training should be I would leave that to someone more qualified than myself. I’d like to see it be the minimum we can “get away with” while still being effective. Yes, generally I’d say a basic NRA course would pretty well cover the bases and yes, I’d say it would be better than the NYPD.

          Bob:

          “The training requirement could be a good thing but it could also be abused like many anti gun states do with their concealed carry permits.”

          This is true. However the idea of no training requirement is basically a non-starter for most Americans and therefore it’s a fantasy that will never happen. A national standard, as loath as I am to suggest that, could be an answer to this problem. Unfortunately the world, as you correctly point out, is not perfect but at this point I think we need to take bites at that apple and I would prefer that we not let perfect become the enemy of good.

          Carlos:

          All very good points. I would however point out that at this point it’s starting to look like the whole thing in Florida was a set of screwed-up SOP’s that were actually being followed. As if the standing orders were to let the massacre continue because the brass didn’t have the balls to actually do anything about it.

      • “Incrementalism is how the antis roll. We can do that too.”

        That reaction is not typically reversible. Incrementalism takes generations and the natural tendency of government provides the activation energy for only one direction. Barring presence of a catalyst, full exercise of rights rarely happens incrementally.

        Put another way, individuals only have one lifetime, whereas governments tend to span over many generations. There might be a push from a segment of society for something to increase or decrease government power but only the push towards more tyranny is typically successful over generations. That is because the natural tendency of government is towards more power. This tendency magnifies the efforts of the group pushing for more government power. The group pushing for less government power is pushing against the other group, their own less informed members of their group, and government desire for more power. The group wanting less government power usually fails at the task over generations. A catalyst, such as uprising or massive civil disobedience, has a chance to overcome the gradient of the system but that is only when it happens in one generation.

        Besides, deprive an individual of liberty for a lifetime and you have deprived that individual forever.

  5. Hear, hear!

    There are three things, IMHO, that are the basis of rational debate. These things all must be present before an actual “discussion” can be had. Personally I think we have none of the three in the “gun debate”.

    1) Some level of mutual respect where both sides actually argue in good faith. If you just want to ban guns, fine. That’s a position I do not agree with and never will but at least you’re being honest before stepping into the arena instead of this “I support the 2A but…” bullshit. We don’t have to agree but we can’t have any sort of honest and open debate when one side lies about it’s objective(s).

    2) An agreement as to what facts are. No more of this “Oh, Jesus it has a gas operated receiver/thing that goes up/whatever the fuck”. If we cannot agree on basic facts, such as how a firearm actually functions without some asshole screaming “it’s fully semi-automatic!” as if that actually means something, then we will never get anywhere.

    3) An agreement about what words mean. You don’t get to make up definitions that suit your purposes to misdirect (lie) about things. You don’t get to pull a Don Lemon and say “Well, my personal definition is…”. No, words have defined meanings and you either use them or admit that you’re 1) ignorant, 2) a fucking asshole 3) both.

    But hey, who the fuck am I? Just some asshole on the interwebz who writes video game (and occasional) gear reviews. Actually wait, check that, I’m the one pointing out that this is how debate actually works and now I’m going to tell the truth as I see it: The reason democrats and gun grabbers won’t do ANY of these three things is simple. Because if they obey these rules they’ll get an open, fair and honest debate which they will lose.

    • Absolutely. They’re not interested in fair debate, anyway. They’re going at this like it’s a war, and in war you never give the enemy a fair shot. They have trained troops constantly laying the groundwork to exploit every shift in circumstances. (And we have…?) http://ace.mu.nu/archives/374125.php

    • In the use of words, option three is a liar, and there definitely are people out there who are ignorant asshole liars.

      • I kinda rolled liar into #2 in my head. I probably should have actually said that since no one here can read my mind…

  7. I have two questions:

    1. How can I send this man money?
    And
    2. How can I bear his children?

  8. Not too keen on the assumption that retired LEO’s (Broward County anyone?) and vets are automatically the ‘anointed ones’. However, any teacher who volunteers to be one of the armed resistance should undergo some sort of aptitude testing & training.

    A lot of teachers are virtually incapable of getting through the day as it is. Let’s allow them not to carry if they are not willing and able.

    Apart from that, two thumbs up!!

  11. Why suggest the use of handguns for teachers to use for school defense when ARs are more effective and easier to train on and shoot more accurately than handguns. Have it locked up and hidden in a wall safe with a bio-metric scanner to allow quick access to it. These wall safes are easily installed these days and are hidden quit good. I guess it is easier to say give a teacher a hand gun than an AR in this current climate of anti-2nd Amendment bashing.

  12. Nick won’t get elected, he’s pro 2a, some woman is going to come out with the slanderous truth that back when they were in the 6th grade Nick dropped a pencil to look up her dress

  13. Memo to self and 2A supporters: Cliches are not compelling, and refreshing takes on boring topics are refreshing.

  14. A friend sent me the link to the video (which I had seen elsewhere) and a news article that reported some democrat delegates were forced to the leave the room because they were so “offended” by his little speech (as they duly reported to the press). What hypocrites…but I expected no less.

  15. “I’m picking nits.”

    No, you aren’t. It doesn’t do me or many other POTG any good if “they” can carry and we cannot. This isn’t a nit; it is huge to me and probably quite a few others.

  18. I pray that a group of homeschoolers will publicly announce training at a gun range and education in the Second Amendment. I’d like to see just how many people would be against that.

    A small group of homeschoolers did just this a few months ago and of course they were attacked. But after what happened in Marshall County Kentucky and Parkland Florida I’d like to see someone else complain about homeschoolers being educated about firearms and those teachers, who are their parents.

    If the Deep State fights arming teachers I expect a million more children will become home schooled.

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