Journalism's Future

Here's an Op-Ed by a freshman journalism student. It's on guns and distorts the case so melodramatically that one wonders if this person even did any research.

Every day the public finds itself more acquainted with the misuse of guns, either by seeing it on the news, hearing about it from friends or watching it first hand. In the last couple of years, this has been becoming more and more of a problem whether it is children finding guns in their home, people getting into fights, thinking the only way to solve a conflict is with a gun or police not knowing when to use a gun and when not to.

Let's start with that bit about the police. That just doesn't jibe with reality. Police departments country wide have to put officers through training and ensure they have an understanding about conflict scenarios. If her conjecture is the shooting of the Penley boy was a result of the police not knowing what they are doing, she is completely incorrect. The rest of her characterizations of guns is again right out of the journalist's guide to guns. Don't mention anything about reasonable or real world uses, just villify the gun.

She goes on to describe the Penley case where a student brought an altered toy gun into school and pretended it was real and faced the police with it. I'll link an actual reasonable report on the case to note the Op-Ed distortions.

Op-Ed.

Meanwhile, Penley'’s father had been informed of the incident at once and came to the scene. He then told the officers that his son did not have a real gun - Penley'’s brother told the officers the same thing. The officers did not take the information they had received into consideration. That means the officers in charge knew from three people that the gun was not real. So, why they still did not believe them was probably just a precaution, or was it a miscommunication?

There are some leaps of imagination. None of the reports that I have found can say in any way if the officer on scene was notified of the possibility of the gun not being real. This student makes the case that they simply ignored the information. The officer in charge is not necessarily the one on the firing line. There also seems to be questions as to the timing of the information. From a news report:

The parents of a 15-year-old boy accused of terrorizing classmates with a pistol warned authorities that the weapon likely was fake before police shot him in a middle school bathroom, a family attorney said Saturday.

So you have what looks like a real gun pointed at you and someone says it's likely not real. You really want to risk your life on that?

She also contends that another student, Cotley, told police that the gun was fake. Odd thing is that he didn't know and didn't tell the police it was fake.

A student who grappled with a classmate over a gun says he told school officials he wasn't sure the weapon was real when he felt it pull apart, but law enforcement officers did not question him until after the other teen was shot.

Wasn't sure?

He said he told school officials he felt Penley's gun start to separate when he grabbed it, but did not talk to law enforcement officers until after the shooting.

"I wasn't really sure if it was a toy or a real gun," Cotey said.

Didn't say anything until after is pretty telling here, don't you think?

But back to the Op-Ed.

The outcome could have also been prevented if only the deputy who fired would have used common sense. Even if the gun was real, the officer could have shot Penley in a non-fatal area. The police seemed to overlook the fact that they were dealing with a child. They could have easily stopped the victim by shooting him in the leg, making him release the gun as he would have fallen to the ground.

There was no reason for the police to have carried out the situation as they did. The improper use of communication, common sense and gun control led to the horrible outcome, which sadly enough could have been prevented.

Clueless loser. And how many police have died from a wounding a threat? And since when does a leg shot make someone drop a gun. Especially if it is real.

This little waltz by a journalism student really makes one wonder why journalism in the real world is so bent. A little common sense and, god forbid, a little research would have gotten this person a little way to a commentary that would have been at least responsible. Can one actually think that this person as a reporter could give an accurate report on guns in any form?