fandomhigh | Study Hall -- Wednesday, September 28th

Study Hall -- Wednesday, September 28th

Welcome to Wednesday's study hall. I'm in a considerably better mood than yesterday, which mostly means none of you will be getting set on fire today. I reserve the right to threaten you with it, though. You have no fucking idea how entertaining the looks on your faces are when I do that.

*grins wickedly and takes a drag off her cigarette*

The announcements for today --

-- Biff is missing once again from the front of the teachers lounge. If somebody could find that stupid goddamn bear and drag it back, I'd appreciate it. (I won't be rettaching any limbs you might lose, though. That's your fucking problem, not mine.)

-- After the events of last weekend, I'm thinking of lifting the weapons ban. I'll be opening up a discussion section in the comments for those opposed and those for the weapons ban to hash out any differences they might have, any requests they might have for licensing or policing those who wish to carry their weapons, and any other problems they might wish to discuss.

-- Parents Weekend will take place on October 28th, 29th, and 30th. For the record, you may make one new RPG journal for whichever parent, guardian, relation, or mortal enemy you might wish to bring in for your character. These characters cannot already be enrolled in the school or exist in town, and if you can find someone not already involved in the game to play them just for that weekend, all the better. However, these characters will not be allowed posting access on FH or any related communities, they will only be allowed to comment in designated threads -- open houses for classes, the Halloween dance, etc. They're only here to visit for one weekend, folks -- they won't be hanging in the dorms or taking classes or anything. Also, teachers will be allowed to call parent/teacher conferences with any of their students they might wish to meet with (or any "parent" they might wish to interview ... *snerk*).

(OOC: Also, for the record, I'm not playing John Connor anymore -- I've passed him off to someone else. Now he can get a little more play, the poor antisocial bastard. :))

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"With the sheer amount of underage drinking that goes on around here, we think it's a bad idea. The weapons locker was opened up during the zombie attack, and that worked well. It would've worked a lot better and a lot more efficiently if we had a warning system, as Alanna is campaigning for in her Student Council platform. Those of us with the innate ability to harm others have been required to take measures to ensure that we don't hurt our fellow students or teachers even by accident, and we feel it would be extremely unfair if other students were allowed to have their weapons ready to hand while we are required to peace-bond ours."

She shrugs. "Frankly, until a better definition of 'weapon' and a better list of the rules and regulations for weapons exists, we think it would be a very bad idea to lift the weapons ban."

Defining weapons is a good idea, but banning half and leaving others with natural 'weapons' seems unfair to me. And what are you going to do? Throw those students out because they can do magic or what else it is they can do?

"So why do you need a weapon? Why not make unarmed combat classes mandatory? A gun or a sword isn't going to do much good unless you're really good with it, and if you're not, it's far too easy to hurt a bystander.

We're left with our 'weapons' because we can't take them off. That doesn't mean we get to blithely go around rampaging, it means we're watched far, far more closely than you 'normal' people. We all know what will happen to us if we step out of line - the Principal made that expressly clear to us before we enrolled. Plus, if we step out of line, it's much easier to trace. Someone's exsanguinated and has puncture marks somewhere? Vampire. Someone's turned to stone? Me. Someone's harmed by magic? Limited pool of who it could be and the faculty has lists and would interrogate all of them.

Contrariwise, someone dies by a sword, how do you even begin to figure out who did it? Guns, slightly better off but even easier to foul the trail on - just ask any of the forensic experts on staff.

We also take exception to the insinuation that because we have innate 'weapons', the nats feel they need weapons to protect against us. Show me somewhere that one of us has threatened or harmed another student using anything but normal human physical prowess. We can show you an example where a student was harmed by a gun, completely by accident."

"As noted by Spider and Connor... the security system here at Fandom high is everywhere. Any shots fired/puncture marks/sword fights mad by an individual will be sure to taken notice of and be recorded for Rover to review and for Connor to consider said person's punishment."

The weapons are against things like those zombies we ran in to this weekend. It's not about using them against each other. I never claimed anything else and I'm not about to either. I'm saying that the same sort of control can be and should be excecuted on students with weapons.

And let anyone who owns a weapon get a sort of weapon locker only they can access.

If anyone who has a weapon doesn't have a weapon locker that only they can access, that's...wrong. If it's not on you, it should be locked away.

*nods* I agree. Weapon lockers are a must.

Why do they/you need magic? Why do they/you need a mutant power, a soul-bonded sword, a bad attitude, or martial arts abilities?

What's the difference? All of them can kill, but only those with guns are being targeted.

It could be they were 'targeted' because they were the most vocal and visible and demonstrating the most potential for violent use?

It's fairer to take measures to those who were overstepping the line than just taking actions against everyone because one or two individuals don't know how to behave. Wasn't this whole ban started because of one person?

*shrugs* Probably. By then, the hysteria was building. There was a student who was bunkered down with guns, in defense of someone, because of rumor. Where was it going to stop? So, maybe they (the administration) just jumped the gun *snickers at funny* and banned them all before people started to dig fox holes?

Robert Heinlein said an armed society is a polite society.

That sort of breaks down when someone with a gun does something impolite. It ceases to be polite and becomes vigilante. Who are we to enforce law and order?

If a system of checks and balances can be put into place for all weapons bearers, this may all be a moot point.

Just thinking outloud really. Coach Ash says he's getting something together to hash all this out.

*nods* No, you're right. There needs to be some sort of control, but this was more of a "one person does wrong and everyone gets punished" sort of situation. Coach Ash seemed to have some great ideas so I'm curious what he comes up with.

It's a damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don't situation. If the administration had cracked down on just those that 'did wrong', what's to say they wouldn't have turned around and started pointing to others saying 'they get to keep their guns, why are you taking mine? they pulled theirs/threatened/shot theirs too! it's so unfair!'

Sort of like now, actually.

Because they would have been acting against the rules? It's kinda normal to get your toys taken away from you if you disbehave.

Re: Weapons Ban

positive-angel.livejournal.com - 2005-09-28 19:17 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Weapons Ban

cameronmitchell.livejournal.com - 2005-09-28 19:22 (UTC) - Expand

((Ooc: Confused. Is this comment in character or not? My comments are entirely in character. Half the things listed aren't things the characters had a choice in.))

::pulls out his clipboard::

You got a list of people in this "We"? Just for the record, I mean. And can you specifically state what sort of measures you've taken to make sure you can't hurt anyone?

Not trying to be skeptical, but seeing as last I heard you were the one around here with the ability to turn into a giant window-smashing snake, I just want to make sure you and this "we" are as "peace-bonded" as you say. For the record.

::looks at 'Duce, calmly, pen poised to write::

Duce points to her hair, "They're sentient, their consciousness is bonded with us. We don't speak for the other non-natural students."

She also points to her glasses. Closing her eyes, she takes them off and displays the lenses for Ash. They are completely opaque - she couldn't see through them if she wanted to. Placing them back on, she comments, "Want a list?" She ticks off on her fingers, "We're venemous. We've made sure the school is supplied with antivenom in case an accident does happen. We can turn people to stone with our gaze. We've got glasses to prevent that, and since we can move significantly faster than a nat, no-one's going to be able to get them off our face before we can get our eyes closed. We can turn into a really big lamia. The one and only time we have done that was to help people get out of a flooded library. In that form, we're pretty goddamn distinctive.

We were also informed before we enrolled that if we used any of our non-natural powers to get into any sort of mischief, the Principal would go to great lengths to find out just how much pain an immortal could withstand. Our safeguards were checked over before we were enrolled, or we wouldn't have been enrolled.

Frankly, unless all you people with weapons are willing to go through at least as many safety precautions as we have to, it's a bad idea to lift the ban."

Marty butts in again.

"In the past two weeks, there was a werewolf attack on a student that ended up in the clinic. Obviously not everyone with 'special abilities' has taken the same percaution as you have. That's not to say that everyone who owns a gun or a sword is as responsible as you have been. I've been guilty of waving a gun around myself, however I was caught and am now being punished."

"I think what everyone is trying to say here is that we are all responsible for our conduct on school grounds and if we violate that responsibility by harming another student, that student should lose the right to carry any kind of weapon."

Frankly, unless all you people with weapons are willing to go through at least as many safety precautions as we have to, it's a bad idea to lift the ban.

Aren't we saying just that?

::scribbles down notes::

Alright, you've got valid points. But here's the thing... No one's saying that these weapons are gonna be used on fellow students. These are self-defense measures, given we've had to deal with Zombies, Werewolves, Gremlins, heck, I even heard something about Tentacle Demons.

If you were attacked, you could easily remove these measures you have in order to defend yourself. A normal, unarmed student will be very lucky to get out unharmed, baby.

You want to talk safety measures? Gun locks. Safety caches. Proper, visible holsters. Nobody'll be hiding anything. And everyone will require certification on anything they want to carry. We're talking proper measures here, not a willy-nilly let everyone carrying a weapon plan, just so we're clear.

Thanks for the info. ::nods, and turns to another student::

Couldn't have said it better myself, sir.

"Right, but so far, nobody's come up with a concrete, viable plan for weapons safety. Again: Nobody's defined weapons, safety measures, lock plans, etc. We'd like to see all that in place /first/ before the ban is lifted. Also, we'd want to see other safety measures acted upon, like dorm patrols to bust the copious amounts of drinking - or something stating that there's a weapons ban at parties or open invite events. So far, none of that has even been discussed, much less put in place. There've been vague murmurrings of 'some sort of certification' 'some sort of safety training' - and we're fine with that. However, lifting the ban before that's in place would be counter productive.

We'd also point out that nobody's commented on the unarmed training thing. Guns and blades won't help against most enemies. Better yet? Work out training with some of the non-natural students to learn defensive measures against them. Granted, we can't teach anyone how to not get turned into stone, however, we could teach counterpoisons and antivenom measures, and first aid for what to do if you're bitten or stung by a poisonous insect, reptile, or monster. Until today, noone's asked us what we can do, and even then, noone asked what they could do to prevent or stop it.

We're not saying don't ever let the students have their weapons. We're saying that -right now- it's not a very good idea. Get your training in place, get the safety measures in place, show the rest of us that you're willing to be responsible with it just like we had to do and hey, you won't hear any more objections from us."

I think you weren't listening to coach Ash then as he's taking initiative on the whole thing. Dorm patrols against alcohol? Don't you think you're going a bit far there? We're discussing weapons here, not putting everyone on a dry spell.

I'm all in favour of those classes. Sounds like a good idea to me. And I'm sorry, but that wasn't how your argument came over. *shrugs*

"We're listening. What we're saying is get all that in place, then drop the ban. And we don't know about you, but we sure as hell aren't happy with the thought of people with weapons getting blotto."

*shakes his head* Let's just keep it to one argument? People are already unhappy with losing their weapons, I don't think anyone is going to be happy if you're going to tackle alcohol on top of this.