Page 30 - Top Cover Issue 9

30 TOP COVER ISSUE 9

FEATURE

RISKS AND

RESPONSIBILITIES:

COPING WITH THE

RISKY BUSINESS OF

FIREARMS

WRITTEN BY CHRIS BEIGHTON
TRAINER, NATIONAL FIREARMS INSTRUCTORS’ COURSE
CANTERBURY CHRIST CHURCH UNIVERSITY

his article comes with a health warning. I want in a debate where to be honest there’s no point referring to a
to talk seriously about risk. spade as a steel-shod-earth-inverting-implement. That’s because
As colleagues and I gear up for another I’m increasingly interested in risk, and who better to talk about
National Firearms Instructors’ Course based at risk with than colleagues in Firearms?
the Firearms Unit here in Kent, I’m reminded Risk is a sensitive question, of course, and academics have been
of the increasingly risky nature of what we do. making a bit of a meal of it over the last few years. Maybe it was
There’s nothing particularly dangerous about a predictable response to the millennium and its bugs, when the
Ttraining AFOs in teaching techniques, but academics like Ulrich Beck and Anthony Giddens wanted us to
what sometimes scares me is the temptation to assume that risk is believe that the modern world is a ‘Risk Society’. And who can
something faced by someone else, not something that we all take blame them after the Twin Towers, London, Fukushima, Charlie
responsibility for. AFOs know what I mean about passing the Hebdo, Germanwings, the foiled train attack in summer 2015 …
buck, because they are at the sharp end, where the buck can be No one needs paranoia, but we surely have as much reason as ever
passed no further. to take care of ourselves and those we are responsible for.
In fact, anyone familiar with past articles on the topic will be It’s not just that the modern world is a risky place though – life
aware that my colleagues and I (Sabrina Poma from Canterbury is unpredictable and frequently unfair. But something else has
Christ Church, Vince Leonard, CFI at Kent), are very conscious happened, and the idea of risk isn’t just something that someone
of the need to speak to colleagues in ways which help us to else does: it’s part of everything we do. Once upon a time plenty
understand each other so that the risks of the job are not left of us thought that a benign presence would look after us. Dixon
in the hands of just a few. After all, as academics in the field of of Dock Green was there, tapping bad guys on the shoulder
education and training, we are constantly proclaiming the value and saving your granny’s cat. Now though, your granny might
of learning from the people we work with. But how can we hope just be making IEDs, your neighbour could be running a Meth
to learn from each other if we are speaking different languages? factory and Weapons of Mass annihiliation in the shape of planes,
Academics often enjoy discussing this sort of thing in journals viruses and radioactive poisons seem to be in the hands of tinpot
which, ironically, are then criticised by other academics for generals, shadowy cold war throwbacks and vulnerable marginals.
being unreadable. Of course, there are many exceptions, but it’s Oh, and if that weren’t enough, global warming is asphyxiating us
certainly the case that academic writing often falls into the trap of all, the bees are all dying and sealevels are rising so quickly Brum
making itself inaccessible to those who would most benefit from will have to be renamed Birmingham-on-sea.
its findings. Is this change really new though? To our shame, we civvies
But I have a confession to make. After writing several pieces tend to forget that a few rough men and women have long
for TOP COVER in a fairly accessible tone, I find myself engaged been prepared to stay awake at night and do harm to those