Yes, the focus is always going to be trying to effectively avoid the shooter, but there is also training on how to overpower him/her in a last ditch effort.
This is a culture war. And I’m on the side of the cultured.
Feel free to be part of a statistic. I am living in reality. I will try and save people if I can.
We had active-shooter training at my workplace. I think the first thing one is supposed to do in such a situation is try to get away (e.g., out of the room or the building). If that is not possible, attempt to get into a room without windows and with a door that locks. Hiding in plain sight (e.g., behind a desk) is not likely to be helpful. Attempting to take down the shooter is a possibility, depending on the circumstances.
Saving people would probably be more effective if you attempted to help them get out of the situation rather than going hand to hand with a gunman placing more people at risk.
@fractalmstr - saving people by helping them escape is much more survivable. There have been many studies done that show that law enforcement needs to train, and train often, to deal with active shooter situations. If they stop training even for a month or so they could become more dangerous than helpful.
I will try to dredge up a scary video of civilians who thought they were trained.
There were reports that he had an explosive on him. We know in hindsight that this isn’t true but they didn’t know that.
It’s all nice and good to sit here and play armchair quarterback, but I’m sure that those in that situation didn’t want to blow themselves and the whole place to smitherines. If you had someone shooting at you, you’re going to run away, too. I’m so sick of hearing about this “hero” BS.
And looking at the timeline, it seems like people died in two waves. The initial shooting where he was spraying bullets and very few people knew they were gunshots and by the time they figured it out, they began to run. In a crowded club, I wouldn’t be surprised if they couldn’t even SEE the gunman. Then it seems like there was a secondary shooting in the bathroom after quite a while- enough time for people to send several texts, take a snapchat, etc. It’s reasonable for those people to think that the police would’ve saved them in time.
Another reason I’m sick of the heroism BS is that it blames the victims. “Why didn’t someone stop him?!” Well lookie, there was a “good guy with a gun” and yet we still have nearly 100 victims. Gee, I can’t imagine why. Maybe the things that we say we’ll do in our heads in times of safety go out the window when you’re actually looking at death?
Here you go: not a perfect study but enough of an illustration to show that you should leave it to the pros unless you’re absolutely sure.
Someone at work told me the assault rifle the gunman used fires 900 rounds per minute or per second or whatever the hell it is. That is terrifying. I can’t get that out of my head. Also, a doctor on the news showed what bullets from an assault rifle do if they hit bone in the body. It was an x-ray. Oh my God. It just shatters the bone. “It can be fixed, this injury results in amputation.” Oh, wow. It will take a long time to get that image out of my head.
I’m also freaked out by the the reports now that the gunman was chatting and friending some of the people in the club on gay dating apps. The same reports are saying he frequented the club before … not just to case the place but to drink, party and relax. Some of the survivors said they knew him from the club. The gunman also tried to friend, on Facebook, the owner of another Orlando gay club which was closed for renovations this week.
One witness said the gunman would sit in the club alone and drink and sometimes get drunk and very loud. I wonder now about what his dad said about him getting very upset about seeing two men kissing in Miami. It doesn’t sound like that should have upset him. Maybe he didn’t want his dad to know he was gay. I don’t know. The dad apologized but others have said the dad has posted stuff in his language bashing GLTB folks.
Please stop the squabbling about which fundamentalist religions and which countries are the most homophobic. Especially if you’re not LGBT yourself. It’s unseemly, and beside the point. The fact remains that this particular killer was born and raised in the U.S.A. (regardless of the claim by a certain prominent person today that he was “born in Afghan” [sic]). and was inevitably exposed to all kinds of homophobia, from all kinds of sources. It’s omnipresent. Yes, there’s a lot of homophobia expressed by many (but certainly not all) Muslim clerics But this is also a country where James Dobson recently expressed support for the idea of shooting “men” (i.e., trans women) who use women’s bathrooms. This is a country in which three mainstream presidential candidates attended an event last November, and sat there without raising a word of objection when a pastor named Kevin Swanson delivered a speech “in which he said Biblical law calls for ‘homosexuals’ to be executed. ‘Yes, Leviticus 20:13 calls for the death penalty for homosexuals’ he said. Swanson said he was ‘willing to go to jail for standing on the truth of the word of God.’” (https://www.yahoo.com/news/republican-candidates-attend-rally-where-014821801.html?ref=gs) This is a country in which more than 200 anti-LGBT laws have been introduced just in the last year or so. And this is a country in which people of various religions continually proclaim that LGBT people are going to burn in hell.
So please don’t pretend that this guy was exposed only to Muslim homophobia, especially given that there’s no indication that he was ever particularly religious. As far as I’m concerned, all those who preach this kind of hatred, and all those who support them, have blood on their hands. Not only because of this, but because of the hundreds of young LGBT people who commit suicide every year. (Which is why I think it’s contemptibly hypocritical for anyone like that to pretend that they care about the victims of this mass slaughter. We don’t need their “thoughts and prayers,” or their moments of silence – especially the ones who can’t even bring themselves to mention who the victims were.)
And I feel this way just as much now that it’s come out that this killer may have been to the Pulse nightclub at least a dozen times before over the last several years, see http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/pulse-orlando-nightclub-shooting/os-orlando-nightclub-omar-mateen-profile-20160613-story.html and http://gawker.com/orlando-shooter-was-reportedly-a-regular-at-pulse-and-h-1781920316:
Was he working up the courage to kill? Was his homophobia a product of self-hatred? Sometimes, the loudest homophobes (including some holding elected office) have turned out to be struggling with their own feelings.
Most of the time, when LGBT people struggled with self-hatred and the effects of internalized homophobia or transphobia, they don’t express their self-hatred by perpetrating violence on others. If they hurt or kill anyone, it’s themselves. Sometimes, though, they’re cowardly enough to turn it against others. If that’s the case here, then I think this guy pledging his loyalty to Isis was essentially the excuse he gave himself. But regardless of whether that’s the “real” reason, he was worthless and contemptible, and I wish he had just turned his gun on himself instead of deciding to take 50 people with him. But let’s not pretend that societal and religious homophobia (whatever the source) aren’t what causes people to hate themselves in the first place.
Leaving it to the police is the ideal option, but it is also the least reliable option. There is this pesky real-world thing called “response time”. What are you going to do until they arrive? If you can escape, great, if not, then what do you do?
Again, you can’t count on the option of running away. I think it is safe to say that if the people in this particular club had the option of running away, they would have.
If he was a self-hating and heavily closeted homosexual then it finally makes sense that he would go to Orlando. There would be no shortage of targets in the far closer Miami, but he drove several hours to Orlando probably because he didn’t want to be spotted by anyone he knew when he was visiting the clubs.
Ugh, this somehow makes it all even worse. I wish he had used that gun on himself first too.
@musicprnt and DonnaL thank you for your well thought out posts, you have no idea how helpful they are. As the mother of a gay child I can’t stop crying. I’m sad, fearful, angry and feel defeated. I’m angry at our current culture that has encouraged hate and judgment. I’m angry that some leaders are not mentioning the victims, I’m angry that some news sites have omitted the fact it was a gay night club. I will not stand by and allow this heinous massacre erased from history.
@sly123 Are the news sites that you’re referring to national news sites? Everything that I’ve seen have stressed that it was a club frequented by the LBGT community. I’m not doubting you, I just haven’t seen that. That’s awful.
An article with photos of 40 of the victims who’ve been identified so far. I don’t think I need to tell anyone here how incredibly sad it is to look at all those young faces.
So many beautiful faces…
I have a friend who has a vinyl cutter and makes t-shirts and signs. I asked him to make me a t-shirt. It says, “F%$^ Guns and the %&(@#$ who use them to shoot people”.
If you think musicprnt is exaggerating, there is a documentary called “God Loves Uganda” that will put hair on your chest.
I can’t watch any of the details of the attack or the stories of the victims this time. Too close to home.
@carolinamom2boys No thankfully it hasn’t been erased from the national news sites, I’m talking about local news stations and random sites that come across my FB page. But my fear is we will get forgotten, most of the news I watched today talked about ISIS and possible extremist ties he may have had. This individual had over 10 year history of racial and homophobic remarks and a violent past according to co workers and his ex wife.
Several of our state authors of the proposed ‘bathroom bills’ have not said a word about the victims. Truly sad.
^Sly123 - maybe we don’t want them too, from some of the comments I HAVE seen…