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Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956
A school in Indiana has been criticised for apparently shooting teachers "execution style" with pellets as part of an "active-shooter drill". The case has reignited conversations about the usefulness of drills and the methods used to prepare schools for shootings.
[...] Many experts agree that discussing and practising how to respond to a dangerous situation will help protect students who find themselves faced with the real thing. Fire drills, for example, are well established tools to teach children how to behave in a potentially life-threatening situation.
[...] While more realistic and stressful situations may be appropriate here, he says "large-scale, prolonged, realistic drills are not ideal" for children.
[...] "Children being asked to pose as victims on the floor covered in fake blood is just pointless and can be traumatising, I can't see why that's necessary."
Source: US school shootings: Have drills gone too far?
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Monday April 01 2019, @02:09PM (1 child)
Good point. Never thought of it quite like that. Lemme put a tangent on the spin, or a spin on that tangent.
My earliest memories start about 1959 or 1960. Television at that time had about 4 to 6 hours of WW2 combat related shows. Air crews, infantry squads, destroyer crews, and always, the Krauts and the Japs were bad guys. As kids, we grew up thinking in those terms - Krauts and Japs. And, we wanted to grow up to fight them.
Today, maybe the kids aren't as intensely indoctrinated as we were, but the indoctrination is there. They are taught that "People go into schools and shoot them up" and "this is what you should do when it happens". That odd ball who doesn't accept the school's brainwashing, is saying to himself, "Yeah, and when I get my own guns, that's how I'll do it." Meanwhile, the media is glamorizing every single incident. That little oddball is thinking, "AWESOME!" The freak of the hour has his photo on television, all the internet sites, including social media. Just like the standard trolls on any site, all the potential trolls are watching him, "Yeah, that's how you do it!" So, for a decade or more, the schools and the media are cooperating with each other, making it look like a game, a competition. And, all those little oddballs are just waiting for the proper trigger to set them off.
And, most of that in the name of ratings. It's obvious to everyone that the media is after ratings, right? But those school administrators are chasing their own kind of ratings. They're scored on a number of metrics, and emergency preparedness is one of those metrics. Setting off an alarm, and terrorizing many, or most, of the students in the school is dramatic as all hell. Add some media fools to record it, and the ratings skyrocket. "Think of the children!"
Maybe they DO need to "think of the children" instead of those ratings.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday April 02 2019, @03:12AM
Indeed. I think you're right that this is for appearance sake. Doing their real job is risky and hard work. Shoving their students through play acting, and the local two minute hate, is relatively low risk unless someone gets hurt.