(09-01-2019 09:35 AM)Fort Bend Owl Wrote: "Provide deescalation training and mental health professionals to law enforcement agencies to prevent interactions from becoming deadly" possibly? It sounds like it was a routine traffic stop and the guy shot at the officers with a rifle before they approached the vehicle (hitting one of them). That's an unfortunate ambush and nothing could probably have been done there to prevent that.
But I'm sorry, I don't think the officers did a good job of apprehending him when he was able to drive 20-30 miles away on a high speed chase on a major freeway, shooting (and perhaps) killing people along the way. Then he apprehended a post office van, killed that driver and hijacked that vehicle before they finally caught up to him at the movie theater.
A lot has changed since 1963. More violent movies, TV shows, video games certainly don't help. It wasn't ideal in the 1960's either - don't fool yourself. But outside of the UT shootings and maybe Charles Manson, most of the high publicized killings of that era were political assassinations. Maybe the shootings existed but just weren't publicized to the extent they are today. Maybe weapons have been more advanced and it's just easier for crazies to kill more people in a quicker amount of time than they could have 55 years ago. Today's political climate doesn't help things either.
Deescalation training sounds like a good thing in and of itself, but I don't know which, if any, f these incidents was a standoff gone bad. The more common result is the shooter shoots a bunch of people, the cops arrive a few minutes later and deescalate the situation by shooting him or taking him into custody.
I referred back to my high school days for two reasons. One, guns were prevalent at my school and throughout Texas. Two, this was before the UT shootings and the Manson family.
More violent movies> HA! You must think I grew up watching "the Seven Year Itch" and "The Wizard of Oz". When I was growing up, the main fare was war movies, westerns, and monster movies, like Godzilla. Of course, the heroes only shot bad guys, like Nazis and outlaws. maybe the definition of bad guys has changed.
I don't think the shootings existed very much, and they damn sure didn't become political footballs. The media back then was very different. Report a story, move on. Now we have the 24 hours cable people hammering at it 7/24.
Weapons were plenty advanced enough back then. Think of the guns used in the 30's.
agree on the political climate.
Plenty of guns back then, few shootings. The change is not in the guns, the type of guns, or the availability of guns. It is in the people.