Good Samaritans Massacre

In 2011 and 2012 I was at Olympic College when they had their 2nd Amendment drama about weather or not faculty could carry firearms to defend themselves on campus. I was in security meetings with the colleges security experts, and know exactly what the technical concern was. If the teachers were armed, why wouldn't this make the campus safer?

Let us say we have an active shooter situation, in the food court in the center of a shopping mall. This active shooter is killing people at random. Now the 1st Good Samaritan pulls his firearm. Hopefully he'll shoot the active shooter without hitting any innocent bystanders, and it won't be a gruesome prolonged gun battle that kills more people than the active shooter originally intended. Hopefully. In theory, all good so far.

Now, imagine two people have guns are drawn shooting at each other in the same food court, bodies and blood on the floor, people screaming, pissing themselves, running, hiding, paralyzed with fear. Now a 2nd good samaritan pulls a gun. How does he know who is the 1st good samaritan and who is the active shooter? What about a 3rd good samaritan, or a 4th?

The following situation, which I call the Good Samaritans Massacre, is nearly inevitable now: there will be an active shooter in a public place, and the good samaritans will create a situation that is highly resistant to the survival of victims and bystanders, and the total body count will be far higher than what the active shooter could have accomplished on his own in the same amount of time. This almost happened in the Gloria Giffords shooting. Multiple people had guns drawn, and couldn't figure out who to shoot first. The active shooter was taken out - as they usually are taken out - with a tackle when he was reloading or switching weapons. (The exception to this rule only happens when the people in charge of emergency response are wielding the defending firearm, be they the business owner, security guard, assistant principle or police... they are not random good Samaritans with concealed permits or open carry agendas.)

Think about how much training it takes to train a solider of police officer to properly use a firearm. Civilian gun owners rarely have a fraction of the training it takes to react effectively against an active shooter in a public place with other civilians. Are potential good samaritans training on simulators to train their reactions to not shoot innocent people, playing paintball against others really shooting back a them, practicing fast loading and quick drawing their weapons, or even getting out to the firing range once a month? If you are in a situation like this, you are better off without an armed yet unprepared good samaritan.

I am not particularly for or against various gun control policies in the USA. I am very concerned about the very specific point I have illustrated above. The only gun restriction that impacts massacres is clip size, because usually the active shooter is stopped when they reload by a charge from a grappler. But one of these days someone is going to be enjoying a leisurely stroll at the mall or university when there's going to be a run and gun battle between 2nd Amendment Cowboys so severe and so bloody that it will take hours for the police to finally finish sniping all the good samaritans so that the other civilian lives can be spared.