I Regret To Inform You That From Now On I Will Be Packing Heat, Though I Have No Aim and Less Sense

I've been resisting weighing in on the Virginia Tech incident, mostly because it doesn't seem to me to be at all about politics. It's a tragedy, in the purest sense, and there's not much to do about it except express horror, and condolences.

For others, though, the whole thing is actually a test of gun control laws, and their efficacy, in a university petri dish. This is unsurprising -- any spectacular episode of gun violence will lead to the classic "take away the goddamn guns" versus "if only every American would carry a concealed weapon" dichotomy. But then there's John Derbyshire, and it is he who has sent me over the edge.

You've met Derbyshire before. I discussed him in an earlier post, in the context of his courageous assertion that, if faced with torture by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, he'd spit in their face. Now, evidently, he thinks he's also capable of taking out an armed madman. The post is worth quoting in full:

As NRO's designated chickenhawk, let me be the one to ask: Where was the spirit of self-defense here? Setting aside the ludicrous campus ban on licensed conceals, why didn't anyone rush the guy? It's not like this was Rambo, hosing the place down with automatic weapons. He had two handguns for goodness' sake—one of them reportedly a .22.

At the very least, count the shots and jump him reloading or changing hands. Better yet, just jump him. Handguns aren't very accurate, even at close range. I shoot mine all the time at the range, and I still can't hit squat. I doubt this guy was any better than I am. And even if hit, a .22 needs to find something important to do real damage—your chances aren't bad.

Yes, yes, I know it's easy to say these things: but didn't the heroes of Flight 93 teach us anything? As the cliche goes—and like most cliches. It's true—none of us knows what he'd do in a dire situation like that. I hope, however, that if I thought I was going to die anyway, I'd at least take a run at the guy.

Where to begin with this? Counting rounds? If I hold a gun to your head, right now, can you tell me how many rounds in a .22? Given that they are modifiable with attachments? Quick, now -- remember, your life depends on it -- how many? And there is also the bizarre logic of the "handguns aren't accurate" ranged against the clear success of this particular handgun artist.

But it's so much worse; because, if handguns aren't accurate, what good, exactly, is a concealed weapon? Of all the bullshit being slung this week about the VT tragedy, this to me is the worst: the notion that, if concealed handguns weren't forbidden on campus, this tragedy could have been prevented. I'm not interested in taking up the obvious other side of this debate, in the form of arguing against gun ownership in general. I don't like guns, and don't want them near me, but that's not really the point. The point is that of course colleges have anti-concealed weapon laws, and of course changing those laws wouldn't prevent tragedies like this.

I found myself wondering, reading Derbyshire's post, if he'd ever actually been to college. Well, let me tell you, not only have I been to college, I teach in one. A large public university, on the scale of Virginia Tech. And I am here to tell you that the notion that faculty should be walking into class with concealed weapons on their person is about as daft as it gets. Can you imagine? I stand at the front of the room, facing 65 eager students. I'm wearing natty black pants, high-heeled boots, a pink scoop neck top, and....a fucking holster???? Come on! How often, on average, will something freaky enough occur that I need to pull out my piece and wave it around? If I accidentally shoot a student, because I'm just so damn vigilant, what's the university's position on that? If a gunman walks into my classroom, and starts shooting (and believe me, he'll shoot me first), I'm supposed to increase the chaos by taking my (by Derbyshire's account, highly inaccurate) handgun out of my holster and spraying that motherfucker down? Seriously??? This is where higher education is heading? Could we please, for one second, GET SERIOUS???

All right, I'll get serious. Universities are, at their core, about trust. The fact that this trust is constantly violated doesn't change the fact that it is the basis of the contract between students and faculty. We make them show up, sit still, talk when we tell them, write what we tell them, and scribble out exams on our cue. In return, we promise to give them accurate information and interpretive skills that, we hope, will prove advantageous to them throughout their lives. It works because it is a simple, and beautiful, contract -- and every person involved believes deeply in this contract. Believe me, we're not here for the money. The idea that I am supposed to interject the idea of violent force into that contract is obscene. The notion that I am supposed to tolerate the legalized possibility of my students' choosing to interject violent force into that contract is downright dangerous. The fact that the rules against the presence of instruments of violent force on campus may well be violated does not mitigate the basic social contract that underlies those very rules. In short, I cannot go to class thinking that the university will tolerate the means of my getting shot if I give out a bad grade, even if it is true that I may get shot for giving out a bad grade.

But Derbyshire fails to understand colleges at an even more basic level. Why, he wonders, did no one do anything, as the shooter went from class to class? Let me tell you something about classes. They are little islands, isolated from the world. Because my field of expertise is largely visual, I teach in subterranean classrooms, which are blacked out. We turn down the lights, and I start talking. There is silence, and a sense of total concentration. I am oblivious to the outside world, and, for the most part, so are the students, who are busy taking notes, because I talk fast. Often, there are noises outside. Classes overlap with mine, and doors bang, and people shout in the hall. As a more dramatic example, I should say that the building I teach in has a wide variety of sirens. They go off occasionally, and no one budges. I typically wait and see if the thing shuts off after a couple of minutes. Once I told the class that it was entirely possible that a nuclear holocaust was taking place up at ground level, and that if so we would never know about it down in the bowels of the building. "You will have to single-handedly repopulate the earth," I said, "so take a good look at your classmates." Last semester, a persistent alarm began going off in the hall. No one left the neighboring classrooms, so I kept teaching. After several minutes, I stepped out and went across the hall to where the department chair was teaching, figuring I'd follow his lead. He was carrying on as usual, so I went back, closed my classroom door, and ignored the alarm.

I say these things not as an advertisement for oblivion -- written out like this, they actually look quite irresponsible -- but to point out that, when you are teaching, the class has its own internal life, one that is relatively impervious to the outside world. I don't doubt for a second that classes were rolling on at VT while the shooter was doing his bloody work, with people dutifully tuning out an unnamed, unidentified, and, had this been an ordinary day, benign distraction. And I have no doubt that, when the classroom door was flung open and a madman with a gun was standing there, the last thing anyone thought was, "Jump him!"

The first lesson of the Holocaust, as every Jew knows, is that virtue and courage did not divide the dead from the living. This is also the gist of the Fundamental Attribution Error, which is our tendency as a species to overly attribute the causes of behavior to personality differences, rather than to their actual source, namely the pressures exerted by particular situations. The fact is, if a gunman burst into Derbyshire's classroom -- should he ever choose to experience the pleasures of higher education -- he would do what you would do, and what I know for a fact I would do: stand frozen in shock, petrified by the sudden rupture of the membrane between the dream of the classroom, and the shock of the real.