the “R” in “AR-15” apparently doesn’t stand for “read the room”

schools are constantly trying to raise money…

…it was like that when i went through in the 70’s & 80’s and very, very little has changed.

but school has really changed. yeah, we had fights and bullying. we had kids that were “L”, “G”, and “B” that i knew of (although the latter were typically popular girls with one too many wine coolers in em) but no “T” or the rest of the alphabet (as i’ve stated, i stop my usage at the “Q” because “Q” is for “queer” which stands for “outside of heterosexual norms” and therefore literally covers all of it so enough already).

i only remember one “guns on campus” incident in my twelve years of public schooling (and subsequent college years, for that matter), and that was a kid who borrowed his dad’s truck because his mercedes was in the shop but unbeknownst to him his dad had left several rifles, a shotgun, and a decent chunk of ammo from his hunting trip in the toolbox so it was out of sight, but totally detectable by police dogs, who happened to be lead around the lot that day and…well…sucks to be lance.

yep, as in my buddy lance. friends since the 70’s. he missed senior trip due to that infraction. go back to our freshman year and before? you’d walk past this traipsing through the parking lot and not even blink…

but that was then, this is now. several dozen school shootings will change some shit.

which makes it all the more puzzling that, to raise money for the track and field team, an ohio high school is having a raffle where all prizes are guns. the hunting rifles? those didn’t raise an eyebrow – country folk are gonna country. the handguns? surprisingly little press around those? but the grand prize? that’s an AR-15. that got attention.

you can (inaccurately in many ways) argue second amendment, and hunting, and all that other shit. but nobody NEEDS an AR-15. you just don’t. i should know – i actually own one. bought a red dot and a forty round mag for it. why? because it sounded really fun at the time. but i’ve never even chambered a round in it. i was just discussing this with the ufc – i bought it because i thought it’d be fun at the range for me and the kid, but he had no interest.

i have a super short neck so shouldering rifles is usually fairly uncomfortable for me. i tend to shoot pistol grip stuff exclusively, or stuff that can at least be fired more from the hip. chances are i’ll take it to the range, put a box of rounds through it, and end up selling it to a friend. i’ve already had interest from folks that haven’t even seen it. they wanted to look up it’s value online since there’s about 4,687 companies that make em but i can’t even remember the brand. yeah, “america’s rifle” means that much to me.

you can also argue about how the swastika goes back centuries and is part of buddhism and all that shit – but try wearing one as a tie tack on your next job interview and see if you get hired. you won’t – and it ain’t because they think you’re too enlightened for them.

so what was this school thinking? the same thing a few of my friends who are on the inside were thinking – they put their greed ahead of their common sense.

all 500 tickets sold out so somebody won the damn thing – and it was probably a parent. as most school shooting happen from students raiding their parent’t gun cabinet, i won’t be surprised if we see this place in the news in a year or two…at least the “where did he get it?” question is already answered.