Librarians Would Rather You Die Than Shoot Back

Time and time again, we have said that the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. When a disturbed young man decided to shoot up the library in Clovis, New Mexico, killing two and wounding four, he only stopped when police arrived. The murderer thankfully did not continue his spree or engage the responding police. Nor did he kill himself. Instead, he meekly surrendered. In fact, most high-profile spree killers either surrender or kill themselves on the arrival of police or application of force.


One wonders what would have happened if an armed citizen was there that day. If the killer knew that someone inside the library might well be armed, would he have gone there? The killer almost certainly targeted the library precisely because it is a location where police are not. It is perceived to be a place of safety, like schools, but instead of acknowledging the threat and planning accordingly, librarians prefer to bury their head in the sand.

So the take-away is not that libraries need more tools to ban guns; rather it is that libraries need to encourage responsibly armed citizens to patronize them and for employees to carry firearms for their own protection. Violence can strike anywhere and encouraging the innocent to remain defenseless only emboldens and encourages psychopathic murderers. Nevada library officials need to understand this point and drop their illogical and emotional opposition to the legal carry of firearms.