Alabama Lawmaker Doesn't Want to Arm Teachers Because Having a Gun Just Isn't Ladylike, Now Is It

In the wake of the Parkland shooting, the very dumbest idea that’s gotten perhaps the most traction is the proposal that teachers and school staff should be able to carry loaded weapons in schools, just in case one of their students gets the idea that they should commit mass murder.

In the past month since the Parkland shooting alone, we’ve been reminded multiple times just how bad this idea is, but still we press on with it because the only alternative would be to actually do something about access to the guns themselves. The gun control bill signed into law by Florida Gov. Rick Scott contained one such provision, and the Trump administration’s useless proposal to stop school shootings includes encouraging states to adopt similar laws.

Alabama, which suffered its own school shooting less than two weeks ago, is currently considering its own bill that would do just that. At least one Republican state legislator has already publicly come out against it, but for a decidedly very bad reason: he thinks most teachers are women who are terrified of firearms.

Rep. Harry Shiver, a retired physical education teacher himself, remarked that “our ladies” shouldn’t have guns because women and women teachers especially are “scared of guns,” in an interview with AL.com:

“I’m not saying all (women), but in most schools, women are (the majority) of the teachers,” Shiver told AL.com. “Some of them just don’t want to (be trained to possess firearms). If they want to, then that’s good. But most of them don’t want to learn how to shoot like that and carry a gun.”

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“I’ve heard … that 75 percent of Republicans support it, but I was there live and in person and I know what it is like in the schools,” said Shiver. “Most women wouldn’t like to be put in that position. I know from South Alabama, they wouldn’t.”

The comments came after Shiver, who sits on the Public Safety committee, told other lawmakers on Thursday that “it’s mostly ladies that’s teaching and they’ve got more things to worry about than carrying a gun.”

It’s true that most teachers absolutely do not like this idea, as a Gallup poll last week found that 73 percent of teachers oppose the idea and less than 20 percent would be willing to actually carry a gun in school, but their opposition is probably not because they’re women. Just spitballing here, but it’s probably because teachers don’t want be put in a position where they’re expected to kill one or more of their own students, irrespective of the teacher’s gender.

Shiver also told AL.com that he has another reason for opposing the bill: because cops responding to a school shooting could open fire on a teacher who has a gun, thinking that the teacher is the shooter. That’s a very good reason! He probably should’ve just stuck to that one and kept his thoughts about the ladies and the guns to himself.

Despite Shiver’s opposition, the bill made it out of committee and will receive a vote in the House, and at least one Republican in the Alabama Senate has indicated he might support the idea.