Critics Take Aim Again Over Gun Issue

The mail has reached critical mass again--and, yes, some of it is critical indeed.

“I used to think that you were a thoughtful person,” wrote one frequent e-mail correspondent, normally thoughtful himself, “but it appears that you are the same breed of uninformed, smug, self-righteous twit that permeates the anti-gun crusaders.”

So it goes when you write about America’s love-hate relationship with the gun. That was part of the reaction to a column about guns at school that was inspired by the schoolboy commandos of Jonesboro, Ark. I noted that, the day of the shootings, I received a promo for a pro-gun book titled “More Guns, Less Crime.” My admittedly ungrammatical reaction was to propose a book titled “More Guns, Less Kids.”

I knew that members of my personal gun lobby, known for their itchy keyboard fingers, would take their best shot. But the correspondence of late has concerned many topics. Let’s now focus on schools as a place of learning, not dying.

A recent column based on an interview with Los Angeles school board member David Tokofsky was reprinted in a professional newsletter for school administrators. I asked Tokofsky to put in perspective the fact that the troubled district has produced California’s No. 1-rated school for Advanced Placement tests (North Hollywood High) and the state’s Academic Decathlon champion (El Camino Real High).

Tokofsky, who as a teacher had coached Marshall High’s 1987 national Academic Decathlon champs, expressed concerns that such successes work “like Prozac” on the district’s “deep depression.” Educators, he said, can learn something meaningful from the hard work of those academic programs, not just smile over happy headlines.

A retired principal wrote that the story, which duly credited North Hollywood’s highly gifted magnet program for its AP performance, left him wondering about the school’s general student body. The principal, who requested anonymity, looked up the school’s performance on the California State University system’s new Academic Performance Reports (APR) of incoming freshmen, which may be found on the Internet at www.asd. calstate.edu/performance.

North Hollywood’s AP stats are one thing, APR quite another. The latter yardstick shows that 80% of North Hollywood students tested as “not proficient” in English and 70% as “not proficient” in math.

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Success in elite academic programs, the principal wrote, often doesn’t rub off on the general school population. “There often is a false impression,” he wrote. “The impression often masks needed changes at a school.

“I liked your article. The problems of LAUSD are monumental. There are so many talented and dedicated teachers and administrators working hard everyday. It is a shame that a small minority have such an adverse and devastating effect on the education of students.”

Speaking of devastating effects, guns have taken a toll on education, too. The “More Guns, Less Kids” equation applies to the L.A. schools, not only because too many students die by gunfire, but because in recent years literally hundreds of students have been expelled for bringing weapons to school, competing in the teenage arms race. (How many don’t get caught?) Yet the city attorney’s office has prosecuted only one parent under a law holding gun owners responsible for safe storage in the presence of children.

The details bear repeating: A 9-year-old girl at Plummer Elementary in North Hills brought a .40 Glock semiautomatic pistol from home, removed the loaded magazine and showed the gun to a 7-year-old playmate. Unaware that a round remained in the firing chamber, she pulled the trigger, the shot tearing through the boy’s sleeve. Shocked, the girl dropped the gun and fled in tears. Officials later recovered the Glock and the magazine loaded with 10 live rounds. The girl’s mother would be convicted of unsafe storage and sentenced to 35 days on a Caltrans work crew.

Again, my gun lobby took aim.

One reader, Ruth Kalin, said gun education is the answer. In her letter, she made reference to two accidental fatal shootings in recent years--one in Sylmar, one in the Lancaster area--that I had noted in the column:

“What has happened to personal responsibility? Chris Mitchell’s 16-year-old friend was ‘playing’ with a gun? Fred Gajeta’s friend ‘jokingly’ pointed a rifle at him? Guns are not toys! If children are taught, at an early age, that guns kill, they don’t play with guns.” And because the Jonesboro boys were indeed educated about guns, she said, they must be held chiefly responsible, despite their youth.

Kalin continued: “The second part of your article addressed the Children’s Firearm Protection Act; why should Charlton Heston persuade the NRA to back an ineffective law? You state that zero charges have been filed by the city attorney’s office in five years! Instead, why don’t we persuade parents to teach their children the truth about guns? A little respect and personal responsibility [go] a long way in saving lives. And finally, we ALL need to spend more time guiding the youth in America. . . .”

Well, so Kalin missed the tale of the Plummer kid. She’s only off by one. My question is: Why haven’t more parents been prosecuted for their unsafe handling of guns? The NRA touts its Eddie Eagle education program for children as a preventive measure for gun violence. Yet the gun industry’s favorite group, after supporting California’s gun storage law, has since opposed similar legislation in other states. Why the flip-flop? Why not do more to hold parents accountable?

Yet it is my gun lobby that complains about extremism. Consider what a guy named Russ wrote:

“I just read your ‘Young Gunslingers’ article. It is refreshing that you do not put the blame on the guns, but on irresponsible ownership of them. If the usual voices against guns were to focus on such a common-sense approach, and cease trying to disarm every law-abiding citizen, then maybe we could all get results. . . . If they could control their own extremism and urge to control others’, then we’d be more trusting when they claim to serve ‘kids’ or ‘public safety.’ Now? These are just convenient Goebbels-esque mantras used to strip away guns from everyone in America--EXCEPT the crooks, crazies, military and government. My own book idea: ‘Less Guns, SIEG HEIL.’ That is ALL that gun-control gets you. Ask any Auschwitz survivor.”

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And then there was another guy, Jon from Pasadena. He figured I was way off target for writing these words: For sheer misery, one must go back to Oklahoma City. Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols had a much greater body count. . . .

“Wrong,” he declared. “The . . . respiratory therapist may have snuffed 50 lives right in our own backyard, at Glendale Adventist Hospital. I guess these lives flew by your sensitivity radar, because they weren’t killed by (gasp!) guns. Gosh, I guess we see only what we want to see, huh?”

Yes, Jon, I guess we do.