 Think Tech Hawaii. Civil engagement lives here. Aloha and welcome to What's On Your Mind Hawaii. I'm Tim Apachele, your host. This week Parkland Florida shooting dominated the news. High school students took control from the adults and covered the news channels, the streets, Florida State Capitol and the House of Representatives. The issue of semi-automatic gun control increased background checks and age limits placed on those who can purchase a semi-automatic gun was raised. Additionally, the idea floated from President Trump was to arm 20% of all teachers nationwide with guns and provide them training to act as the first line of defense to protect students in the event the school was invaded by a shooter. As you can imagine, the idea of arming teachers versus a ban on automatic rifles, especially the weapon of choice for shooters, the AR-15, has raised emotions and a national argument. In yesterday's Star Advertiser, the big question survey asked the following, if they volunteer, should trained teachers be allowed to conceal or carry a gun into school? Out of 1,419 responses, 64 said no. It's a bad idea. 30% said yes, it will help boost school security and 6% had no opinion. Where do you stand on the issue? Feel free to contact Think Tech Hawaii and let us know or what's on your mind Hawaii, that's all one word, what's on your mind Hawaii at gmail.com. We'd like to hear from you and we'll share your thoughts on the next show. On the issue of guns in our schools, our interviews are with two Honolulu residents and one preschool worker. Our last interview is with a longtime Hawaii surfer who wanted to share what was on his mind about Hawaii losing the pipeline master of the Vans Triple Crown Surfing Championship. And now, here are their opinions. This is Tim Appachella with Think Tech Hawaii for what's on your mind Hawaii. I'm here with Carlos and Keith and they're both residents of Waikiki and we're going to ask, what do they think about providing teachers with firearms in our schools in the nation? Carlos, what do you think? I think it's a terrible idea because I think, I agree it's not the goni cell, but it's who have access to it and it's pretty easy. I don't know what's the problem to have minimal background checks or whatever they want to do to control who's going to get access to those and pay attention to the signals. There's a lot of communication given to the FBI this time and we're neglecting that kind of fence. If we give these guns to everybody, it's going to be like a western town and then it's going to be everybody under violence. How are you going to trust that teacher? How do you know the mental stability of that teacher? What if he overreacts and starts shooting people? I mean, I don't think the answer is to put more guns on the street. It's the other way around. Well, there's an argument saying rather than give the teachers firearms or train them, why not just pay the money to have a counselor in every school? I think that's a good idea. I think it's not just trying to control the weapons on the wrong hands. It's also trying to address why these people are afraid of the need to be violent to other people. It's all about social behavior. So we need to address that instead of giving guns on the streets. That's what I think. Keith, what's your thoughts? Well, I think there are a lot of angles to it. I think a counselor is a great idea with the idea of being that we're proactive and we try to identify the risks in advance. But nevertheless, we got to be ready for when the bad thing happens. I think if a teacher is maybe retired military or has experience using a weapon and they're comfortable, they qualify with all the requirements associated with a concealed weapons permit, which is impossible to get in Hawaii, it might make sense. But I don't think the expectation should be on the teachers to have weapons and protect the students. I think we've got to have either security hired or some kind of relationship with the police force and actually have people that are paid professionals to protect the students. And there's no guarantee even a paid professional security officer will be able to stop a gunman. I mean, in this case where we had a 30-year-old professional sheriff deputy, and he failed to enter the school. And so there's no guarantees, even if they are trained and a seasoned career professional. Well, I think in that case, maybe there's an argument that we shouldn't be using the sheriff's department for protecting the schools. Maybe we have to look for, you know, unfortunately as time goes on and we have these things happening, maybe we have to go to the next level. Maybe there's some kind of a more advanced professional organization that can provide the security that's needed for schools. You know, we keep seeing this happen. I suspect it's going to happen again before we find the right solution, but the solutions we have right now just aren't working. So I think we've got to step it up a notch. Most police organizations would say it takes constant, constant training to get over your fear of flight or fight. And you know, we just don't know if you're going to be that person who wants to flight a situation. And that just takes ongoing training to overcome that. And there's no saying that we're going to have the kind of ability to train teachers to do that throughout the year, every year. Right. So that's why I don't think we should depend on the teachers to provide that. I think it's got to be some organization and maybe not the sheriff's department. Maybe we've got to go to a more, I don't know if the word's aggressive, but a more advanced type of organization that is comfortable putting their lives on the line to protect the children. Now, the National Rifle Association has a very strong lobby in this country. I promise I wouldn't get too political. But other than giving teachers guns to have in the schools to protect our children, do you think there's another solution that might be brought to the table and actually implemented other than that one? I think it's all about the control who have access to those guns and why they allow people to be able to make easier to kill more people. I mean, if you make it difficult to just get one revolver, you can just kill one or two people maximum. But you're giving all these facilities to give all these kind of weapons that can kill 20 people at once. We need to avoid that. Nobody can probably avoid somebody shooting somebody that you can avoid shooting many people at the same time, you know, just controls. So the rapid fire automatic rifles are an issue in your mind? Nobody, even a sports person, what we need to do that. I mean, it's fun for a while, but what you like to collect those or buy those for, you know, that's why it's so easy for them to kill that many people. So in your mind, do you think there should be stringent controls on who can purchase an automatic rifle or do you just think automatic rifles are an inappropriate period? I think it should be only military people, people that are, they need to work with it. It's the sport people. They just use stuff that is a challenge for you rather than have something that we shoot 20 bullets at once. I mean, they think more fun if you can just get one shot that is accurate than 20. That's my tip. Kevin, what's your, what's your thinking on this? Well, you know, it's a tough one because both arguments sound good. You know, it sounds good to say if everybody had weapons, then they could protect themselves from the bad guy. What I'm wondering is it's got to be out there, but what are the statistics? What if you look at the statistics of maybe a state like Hawaii, where it's nearly impossible to get a concealed weapons permit and tell me how many weapons related crimes are there here versus maybe some other state like Texas, where guns are more prevalent. How, how do the statistics compare and guns related crimes? Well, I can tell you that Hawaii is definitely one of the hardest states in the country to get a concealed weapons permit period. I mean, it's very, very difficult and it's almost, I won't say it's near impossible, but it's very difficult to get one. So that might be the correlation right there because we have very few gun incidents here in Hawaii than we do probably anywhere else in the country. So that's the statistics I want to see. How, just exactly how does it compare? Now I do know and, and the tour operators aren't going to like hearing this, but I do know that I have a friend that stepped off a bus right on Kalakaua about a month ago. And as he stepped off the bus, the person in front of him getting off the bus was met by a robber, a bad guy with a, what appeared to be a pistol. Now the bus driver called the police and by the time the police got there, the bad guy had already run away. So was it a real gun? I don't know. Was it a fake gun? I don't know. But even with the controls that Hawaii has, it appears that there still may be some weapons related crimes. I'll just ask the question. Do you think that this issue is really not making much headway as a direct result to the political action campaign dollars they receive from the NRA? I think it is true. I think there's a lot of money related activities that prevent people to really claim about it. But I guess there's a group of people now saying this enough. I mean, we should not allow this anymore. There's a group of students trying to claim. I think it's, bottom line, I think the other people are more powerful. They still will win and get away with what they want. But I think people is getting tired of that now. Carlos, let me ask you this because I've heard this exact same thing. And isn't it a little strange that we're asking our high school students to carry the heavy, to carry the water for what our politicians should be doing a long, long time ago? Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying. They don't have any interest because there is a lot of money in that, right? So they're trying to do a portray, they're trying to help, but they're not helping. So now it takes the people who are really suffering to initiate something, a movement that's going to try to change it. So I think that's the time. I hope they start picking up. Kevin, your thoughts? I like that the high school kids are getting involved. You know, I think it's very good that they're getting involved and they're wanting their voices heard. I hope the adults do the right thing and take some action based on the feedback we're getting from the students. Now, we have on both sides of the aisle, Republicans and Democrats, all supporters of NRA, and they do get their money from NRA. There was an identified list here in our own legislature of those that are receiving campaign funds from the NRA. Do you see this as a Republican Democrat issue or do you just think it's a human interest story that needs to be fixed and rectified? I think the political environment is so, I don't know, that's what it is about, is concession, giving money, help, money for campaigns. So they're going to probably do and try to keep everybody happy. And that's the problem. They're not really addressing what the major problem is. This morning I was doing some news and some of these companies are now trying to cut links with the NRAs. Talk about like automobile companies, rental companies, hotels. That's a good start. That's promoting from probably these students initiating a movement. I'd like to see more of that. And finally, politicians will not do anything unless they feel the pressure from the people. And when the voting time is around, they're going to listen to the people. And their selection this year which should take advantage of that. In your opinion, do you think there's enough motivation come November of 2018 that people will vote on this particular issue one way or another about candidates that do or do not receive political action campaign dollars from the NRA? I really hope so. I start seeing that and I hope two people keep up with that and start picking it up. Kevin? Absolutely. This will become a hotbed like so many other topics. You know, pro-choice and abortion. There's a hot topic. What's right? What's wrong? This is going to become the same type of thing. You'll have people that have great arguments why people should have weapons, semi-automatics, concealed weapons permits, and then others who absolutely insist the only way to a safe environment is no guns. So you don't think this is a media news cycle event? You think this is going to continue on for months and potentially well until November of 2018? It will continue on. Every time there's a shooting, it'll go to the forefront of the news, which is why we're here having this interview right now. Unfortunately, it'll continue on till we find a solution. To me, we've got to have the protection of the schools. Permits are no permits. Guns sold, not sold. We have to have some kind of good professional protection in the schools. All right. Do you have any last words? If you had a chance to say anything to the federal legislature or even our state legislature, is there anything you would want to say to our congressman? Yeah, I would say this is not about the Second Amendment to bear arms. You know, how they write to bear arms. This is how to, uh, the responsible people get, you know, a hold of those arms or those weapons, because ultimately it's the people that person is going to be the one doing the, you know, killing people. And again, it's more difficult if you don't provide this easiness for them to shoot many people at one time. It's trying to get these weapons away from people that should not have it and trying to make it more difficult for them to kill more than one people. Okay, Kevin, you have any, any words? Yeah, I mean, I think I'm just kind of repeating the same thing. Let's, let's make sure we don't make it easy to get the weapons, especially in the hands of the wrong people. And we got to protect the kids. Absolutely. Okay. Well, Kevin, and Carlos, I want to thank you for taking your time and sharing what's on your mind for what's on your mind. Hawaii. I'm Tim Apachella. Aloha. Hello, I'm Dave Stevens host of the Cyber Underground. This is where we discuss everything that relates to computers that's just kind of scare you out of your mind. So come join us every week here on thinktecawaii.com, 1pm on Friday afternoons. And then you can go see all our episodes on YouTube. Just look up the Cyber Underground on YouTube. All our shows will show up and please follow us. We're always giving you current relevant information to protect you. Keeping you safe. Aloha. I'm going to the game and it's going to be great early arriving for a little tailgate. I usually drink but won't be drinking today because I'm the designated driver and that's okay. It's nice to be the guy that keeps his friends in line, keeps them from drinking too much so we can have a great time. A little responsibility can go a long way because it's all about having fun on game day. This is Tim Apachella for thinktecawaii for what's on your mind Hawaii. And I'm here in Hawaii Kai and I'm speaking with Connie and Connie, you work in the education field as a preschool in the preschool and the question is how do you feel about some of the ideas about giving teachers or personnel in schools handguns or weapons to protect students? I don't really feel comfortable with that idea. It's just not really something that I think should happen in the schools. There's no reason for teachers to have guns. So it just doesn't make sense at all. Some people think the proposal is enough that that would stop a would-be shooter inside of school and I guess the question is do you think that would be the case? Whether the gun should be allowed with teachers or not, do you think it would be effective? No, I don't think that would change somebody's mind if they're going to go into a school and shoot people. I don't think they would care if the teacher has a gun. In the case of Parkland, there was a sheriff who had 30 years experience as a trained security personnel and he had his weapon with him and yet failed to go inside the school to stop the shooter. So it really doesn't matter how much training or what you have, it's a question of whether or not someone's actually effective of stopping the shooter and so that might be your point. Do you think that's your point? Yeah, because I don't really think that a teacher would want to pick up a gun and yeah, they're there for the safety of the kids but I don't think most teachers would want to have a gun anywhere around the kids and I don't think it would matter at all. You think it would be possible for accidents to happen when you have a loaded weapon? Yeah, of course that's one reason that they shouldn't have guns in schools. Accidents can happen but also, I don't really think that people should have guns. It's not something that I believe in. One idea was rather than go through all the expense and trouble of training teachers all the time, really the problem is with students that have some you know emotional issues and problems. So the one idea was to take that budget that would be set forth to train teachers on how to use weapons and buy the weapons is to take that money and actually provide a mental health professional in every school. That sounds like a better idea, maybe. Yeah, I mean if that is the troubled child really going to go to that person, that's the other question like if there is a troubled child is he really going to go and seek help? I think they're too into the media, social media and most of the time they're kind of withdrawn and don't have a lot of friends and so I don't think they're going to seek help. So it's a matter of trying to find the signs of a troubled student and trying to report that. In the case of Parkland there were plenty of signs and yet the system failed. It just failed all the way through and the question is, is there an alternative to trying to fix this problem? Is it the issue just guns in general or are there other strategies that could be used trying to fix this problem? Whether it be a school or a movie theater or the malls, we just have a national epidemic of people using automatic rifles to kill people. I think it's guns in general. You don't see it happening in Sweden or Europe as a whole in Japan. I mean it's only happening here and I think we have really lenient gun laws and they got to change. If you had a message for anyone in the federal congress or even our state legislature because our state legislature is also receiving a fairly healthy contribution from the National Rifle Association, if you had a message to anyone either in the state or in the federal government what would it be? I don't know. I just don't think that everybody should be able to buy guns. I know there's a First Amendment but you know what guns have proven to be nothing but hardship right now. You know there have been so many shootings and it just has to, something has to be done about it and I think the first step is to make it harder to purchase guns for anybody. So more stringent background checks, close to loopholes at gun shows and internet sales and what do you think about a minimal wage for people who can buy guns? Well internet sales should, there shouldn't be any. I mean anybody can buy anything on the internet. The background checks aren't really working. Supposedly they're doing background checks but it's all falling through the cracks anyway and I'm not sure. What was your last question? Well there's also the fact that we had the age. Yeah I mean I guess if you're gonna, I just don't believe anybody should buy guns but if there has to be an age I guess 21. I mean 18's too young. You're not really an adult. 21, I mean in my opinion nowadays you're not really you know thinking as an adult at 21. Okay well you know I appreciate very much your willingness to come and speak to this issue. It's not easy particularly in light of the parkland shootings and we appreciate it and thank you for appearing on What's on Your Mind Hawaii. Okay thanks. This is Tim Appichella with What's on Your Mind Hawaii for Think Tech Hawaii. Aloha. I'm Tim Appichella for Think Tech Hawaii. This is What's on Your Mind Hawaii and I'm with Jimmy and Jimmy's a surfer for a long time here in Hawaii and we're going to talk about what the impact is of losing part of the triple crown which was the pipeline. So Jimmy you have some feelings about it so tell me what you think about losing that kind of important aspect of the triple crown. Well I have both sides kind of on my mind. It's a good thing and it's a bad thing. I mean most of the people here they appreciate winning the triple crown for sure because this is the mecca, this is Hawaii, this is where it ends and it all boils down to this you know and that's awesome for future surfers that want to like inspire to be like those guys or want to try and surf like those guys and try and share you know what they've learned through what they've taught them but I also feel on the other side of the realm is that like it does bring a lot of interest to come here and I mean Hawaii is overpopulated by tourists in my opinion most of the year and sometimes you know people on the beach they litter they you know they leave their trash and stuff which I'm not I'm not opposed for tourists coming here that brings us. You know you mentioned that to me and I we spoke yesterday before this interview and I kind of assumed that the sponsors of the triple crown they brought in their own personnel to clean up after the event and that's not the case is it? No no there's volunteers actually that sign up for this job yearly and annually and they are very proud to you know clean up the beaches of Hawaii but they don't want that to be a necessity you know they want the triple crown to be jeweled as you know something that is that is loved by everyone. Yeah it is bit of a sign of disrespect if people come to these events and they delete their beer bottles and cigarette butts and it's just not a good it's not a good thing to leave for for for us to look at and this is our home. Yeah and they don't really show that you know when they show the contest they don't really show that part of the contest you know and that's fine you shouldn't put it on blast you know but at the same time you should you should try and share a little bit more mana'o or some some intelligence you know or show yourself that I am a good person I left my trash on the beach and I'm gonna pick it up you know and and that's that's just the other side of it there's a lot of people there which I incorporate tourism tourism should be blown up in Hawaii Hawaii's a beautiful place it gives us that monetary you know self-ness that we can live here you know and stuff like that but at the same time the triple crown brings a lot of a lot of people from all over the world so I'm down for that let's let's have a lot of people blow up Hawaii and and in the surfing industry for sure. What do you think other surfers feel when they've lost this part portion of the triple crown I mean you just think there's something missing would you like to see it come back if that's possible if if that organization can mend their way with a city of Honolulu and try to make nice and and bring it all back do you think do you think it should come back? Of course yeah I think it should come back that's my first thought for sure but um what the triple crown means to more than just pro surfers is uh those amateurs or those be those those uh you know those beginners that come on on tour that want to that want to succeed and do good um Sebastian's Eats is a great you know example he was a rookie on tour he won the triple crown as a rookie you know that's that's amazing you know and being from the island of Kauai it's like that's awesome for our island as well it's going to attract more surfers to want to surf there and stuff like that he didn't win the whole world title you know but he did win in Hawaii and that's an important aspect is that it's an opportunity for local surfers to show how good they are during this the triple crown event and if they take a third of it away does that kind of diminish a little bit on on the luster of the triple crown the double crown doesn't make sense to me I just you know I'd rather have a triple crown and end it pipe I mean pipe is where everyone grows up looks in the magazines they grow up from Australia from Brazil from Africa from South Africa from West Oz from Oz everywhere all over the world they look at that as like they want to surf the pipe so explain to those who aren't familiar with Hawaii the different beaches that the triple crown takes place at and kind of run us through each beach and why that's unique in its own way well my opinion you know halliva is a nice you know starter to introduce you to the north shore and then you got the starter just straight to the finish line which is sunset you know the the world the world cup and that's that's just right into the bigness of things and then you got that perfect wave that you draw when you're in math class you know you got that perfect wave called the pipeline and it ends there and I'm getting goosebumps right now talking about it well sunset when you when you're at sunset it's way out there too so pipeline is the closest waves in for people to be a spectator and really really see it up close well being a spectator at sunset yeah that's it's it's it's really cool and awesome but it's more awesome to see them at the pipeline where you can feel the force of the spray coming off of the wave on the beach you can feel everybody's energy on the beach and you can see that surfer and just watch him do wonders to whatever wave comes his way and you know to me in my eyes that's more majestic than even trying to win a triple crown is just to like experience that moment as a spectator as a athlete as a announcer as anyone like that I know I promised you that we wouldn't get into the politics of how this all happened but we do know that you know the mayor's office you know through some interaction just things kind of went you know this thing's untangled and we lost this event do you think the mayor should try to put his best foot forward and try to bring it back or is it too late I think it's too late and we're gonna see what happens whether we like it or not and I think that maybe in the future he's gonna recognize that wow that did bring some prosperous fortune to our islands and to our island you know so I mean I I'd hope that he would recognize that lost feature and recognize it as a international feature more than just like island kind of vibe it's not just an island kind of thing you know and I don't know maybe the waves are going to be too big next year who knows maybe he's keeping some surfers safe I don't I don't I don't really know you know so I I bicker with both sides and I don't try and you know express too much anger too much thought about it because I really want to see it happen but whatever is going to happen is going to happen I mean this kind of falls on the heels of the loss of the eddy and the sponsorship for for that and how does that impact you know I know that's what's in the topic that we were talking about but how does the the sponsorship loss of the eddy impact you and how would you feel about it well I mean I I buy quick silver clothes you know so I'm from Hawaii I buy quick silver clothes I I support them so they supported us for that long you know and sometimes it's it's not my choice as to what corporate wants to do and you know whoever's in charge man if you see this right now I sponsor you if you sponsor me and come back to Hawaii with the 50th eddy yeah all right well jimmy I want to thank you for spending your time on uh presenting your opinion on what's on your mind Hawaii and uh we all hope it comes back so my pleasure hey thank you very much for your time no problem this is tim mapichella what's on your mind Hawaii aloha that's all we have for this week come and join us on march the 13th for our next what's on your mind Hawaii aloha