Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Shekhinah Calling

Home
About
Archive Index
- Agora: Jewish Witch

Home
Pagan
Another Year, Another Active Shooter Training

Another Year, Another Active Shooter Training

Last updated on: December 4, 2015 at 9:01 pm by Asa West

Another Year, Another Active Shooter Training 2015-12-04T21:01:32-08:00 Asa West

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

“Tears are to the soul what soap is to the body.” – Yiddish proverb (h/t)

When my workplace announced that it was going to be holding another active shooter training, I couldn’t decide whether I should go. I’d already taken the training a couple of years ago. Was it obsessive to go twice? Well, there were probably details that I’d forgotten over time. In an earthquake, there’s only one thing you can do–duck and cover–but there are various strategies for surviving a shooting, which change based on a lot of factors and require split-second decisions.

So, this afternoon, I went to my second training. It was announced before San Bernadino happened, but the room was bursting with over a hundred librarians, library assistants, and student staff, so you could tell the latest catastrophe was on everyone’s mind. And, honestly, San Bernadino (isn’t this amazing, the shorthand we now use for all our shootings?) was probably the tipping point for me, too. I work in a large library that serves as a campus hub at a major university. When I think about where on campus a shooter would choose to open fire, my only cold consolation is that he might choose the student union instead. (Phew, other people will get killed and not me. Phew, he’ll go there instead because the spaces will make people easier targets. What a relief! I’ll sleep well tonight!)

Overall, I’m really glad I went to the training. I learned and re-learned a lot of techniques, ranging from the obvious to the obscure:

Run. Whenever you’re in a building, be aware of the nearest exit. Don’t try to be a hero; no matter what happens in your fantasies, there is most likely nothing useful you can do.
If you can’t get to an exit, get to a room, turn off the lights, and lock the doors. Stay quiet. If someone’s panicking, do whatever you need to do to shut them up.
(My god, I suddenly thought. We are actually talking about this as if it’s normal.)
If the door won’t lock and swings in, wedge a doorstop or a folded notebook underneath it. If the door swings out, wrap a belt tightly around the hydraulic closer or the push bar. Pile furniture against it if you can. A shooter’s goal is to get as high a kill count as possible in the handful of minutes that the shooting will last. If he has any trouble getting into a room, he’ll avoid the delay and look for easier targets. He wants to be remembered for his numbers.
(I am a fucking librarian, I thought. It’s preposterous that this is now part of my job.)
When you’re trapped in a room, look for any objects near you that you can use as a weapon. Scissors. A blunt object. A fire extinguisher you can spray. A water bottle you can squirt in his face. Go for the head and neck area. The point is to throw him off kilter just long enough for someone to tackle him. Stay low, close to the door, so you’re not an easy target and you can surprise him.
A simple technique to disarm him if he comes in: grab the arm holding the gun and fall to the floor. Your weight will bring him down. You can see it in action in this drill for high school teachers. You can’t just cower in a corner and hope that he misses you. Many shooters have trained themselves to hit targets. If you cower, you will get shot.
If you’re outside and you hide behind a car, hide behind the front, not the back. The engine will stop the bullet but the trunk might not.
To sum up: if you can’t get out, be prepared to fight. You have a better chance if you’re fighting than if you’re staying still.
(Librarians and teachers and shopping mall staff and office workers are forced to be braver than politicians, I thought. We have to train to make up for their cowardice.)

I left the training with my coworkers, and when we got back to the library, we looked all around on the way to our office. For once, our building’s funky architecture felt like a boon instead of an annoyance. Twisty corridors everywhere to disappear in. Multiple exits in every large area. I can do this, I thought. The cop leading the training told us that knowing what to do enables you to avoid panicking. He assured us that the training would kick in in the extremely slim chance that we should ever need to use it. I felt like I was prepared.

There happened to be some therapy dogs in the library for our end-of-quarter stress relief program. We snuggled them.

It wasn’t until I got home that I let myself cry.

Because, see, the cop didn’t just stand there telling us about these techniques. He showed us this video developed by the California Sheriff’s Department. The video contains depictions of shooting after shooting after shooting: in an office, in a school, on the street. It’s extremely graphic. Watching it doesn’t feel like you’re watching a Hollywood-style thriller. Watching it literally feels like watching a nightmare. Bang, bang, bang. Kill, kill, kill.

Trigger warning for violence: skip this paragraph if you have to. I holed myself up in my bedroom and I thought about the first woman to get killed in the video: one minute a unique human being, the next a giant explosion of blood on the wall. I thought about the gunman who holds his gun up to his head when he’s done; the involuntary yelp of horror from the coworker sitting next to me. I thought of all the actors falling like dominoes–the jerk of impact, the collapse.

Image credit Woodfaery, via Deviant Art.

I couldn’t just tell myself that the video wasn’t real, because for every actor who pretended to die, there are about a hundred people who actually died in the exact same way. I let myself weep. I thought of Shekhinah weeping for her exiled children, and I let myself become Shekhinah and wept and wept. While I wept, the Morrigan devotee in me calmly reviewed and filed away all the techniques I’d learned. I wept for human beings who only see other human beings as targets. I wept for all the beautiful lives that have ended in an instant of pain and terror. I wept for all the shootings that have blurred together. I wept at the thought of a shooter in my daughter’s preschool, in my husband’s classroom. I wept for the broken, violent people we’ve let ourselves become.

Those in power have no intention of getting us out of this disaster. We can’t get out, so we have to fight.

Tonight I wept. Tomorrow I’ll fight.

Previous Post

November 30, 2015

Imagine a Flying River: Rainforest Deforestation and Capitalism

Next Post

December 31, 2015 2015: The Year I Discovered Adult Coloring Books

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Anu Aphrodite Book reviews Books Buddhism Daily practice Deity Depression Divination Feminism Goddess Holidays Judaism Justice Magic Mental Health Morrigan Morrigan Hymns Nature Politics Pop culture Priestessing Race Reclaiming Tradition Sabbats Shekhinah Tikkun Olam Travel Uncategorized Witchcraft

Select a Month June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Though you sit among the coals lamenting, you must remember that_________. What does Lamentations say will not cease?

Select your answer to see how you score.

His compassions His covenant His love His presence