The Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department kinda/sorta wants you to be able to survive an active shooter incident:

According to the FBI, almost half of active shooter incidents happen in places of business, such as a mall or the workplace. One out of every four incidents takes place at a school.

The vast majority of active shooter incidents in the U.S. are carried out by males acting alone. Although they are tragically successful in inflicting many casualties, they also are often a lone threat. For victims, that means only one person to get away from, to fight off and/or disarm.

Since 2000, 13 percent of active shooter gunmen have been stopped by unarmed citizens.

Sheriff Jim McDonnell said his deputies constantly train for these scenarios, but in most cases the shooting is over before law enforcement can arrive.

“Whatever the venue you’re going to is a potential site for one of these incidents. You can’t rule out that it will happen this trip to the mall, this trip to the supermarket, and you need to be prepared,” McDonnell said.

What Sheriff McDonald actually means to say is that he wants you partially prepared. He doesn’t actually want you to be able to fight back against active shooters. He just wants you to be difficult targets.

He doesn’t propose repealing the laws that create the “gun free zones” that are the locations chosen almost exclusively by would-be mass murderers. 92-percent of all mass killings in the past six years have been in “gun free zones.”

He doesn’t propose issuing more concealed carry permits (California is may issue, and until the Peruta decision, Los Angeles County had issued just 900 active concealed carry permits in a population of 10 million).

Instead, Sheriff Mcdonald wants you to be good little sheep, and find ways to escape from the active shooters, shelter in place, or if all else fails, attack an active shooter with improvised weapons that will have little chance of success. Perhaps while you’re busy getting shot after attacking the killer with a stapler in your cubicle or a tray in the food court, some of your fellow victims can make a break for it.

I don’t completely disagree with the Sheriff. I do, for example, agree that the best option in most circumstances is to put distance and cover between yourself and an active shooter if possible, and if you can’t escape for one reason or another, sheltering in place behind cover is your second best option.

But I’d rather not be limited to an improvised weapon when encountering someone with a firearm, nor do I want to be put in a position where I can’t help others.

I’d prefer to legally being carrying a firearm of my own, in a state that recognizes my inalienable human right to armed self-defense.

Armed “victims” make an incredible. As Nick Meli proved at Clackamas Town Center Mall, Assistant Principal Joel Myrick proved at Pearl High School, and Jeanne Assam proved at New Life Church, the most effective way to stop a mass killer is introducing a good person with a gun to counter the mass shooter.

At Clackamas Town Center Mall in Clackamas, OR, the attacker saw Nick Meli’s drawn weapon as Meli maneuvered into position for a shot. The murderer ran away, committing suicide before the police could arrive. Meli saved perhaps dozens of lives.

At Pearl High School in Pearl, MS, Myrick retrieved his 1911 pistol from his personal vehicle and stopped the attacker at gunpoint as the killer stalked towards the nearby middle school to continue his killing spree. Myrick saved perhaps dozens of lives.

At New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Jeanne Assam shot a heavily-armed mass killer before he was able to murder dozens more among the hundreds of people still inside.

Sheriff McDonald and the anti-gun Democrats in power in California don’t really want citizens to be able to defend themselves against active shooters, and it says a lot about their disdain for citizens that they only prepare them to be victims, instead of victors.