Squid vs. Whale
Three Birds, One Pistol
They canceled pistol. Really? I know desperate times call for desperate measures, but times must be really desperate if the Institute’s last resort was to anger a bunch of expert marksman. These guys can shoot the clubs out of a playing card from 20 yards, and you want to make them upset? Check the endowment. We must be more broke than Harvard. At least Harvard only had to evict some of the most preeminent biologists in the world to save money.
I’m sure the administration didn’t want it to come to this. Facts are facts, the economy sucks and we need to save money by cutting costs in athletics. But despite these cuts, the Institute remains committed to upholding a strong athletic program. After all, nothing says commitment like demoting the best pistol team in the nation. It’s not like these guys can’t blow the candles off a cake from 50 yards out. Blindfolded.
Sure we get it, guns are expensive. So are bullets. Pistol was not a particularly cost effective sport. No other sports team takes perfectly good pieces of metal and explosively deforms them as they shoot smiley faces into pieces of paper while hanging upside down from 200 yards out. Perhaps there were ulterior motives in this cancellation.
This is — if you think about it — a higher educator’s dream. Next year instead of holding a bake sale to pay teachers, the students of MIT will be selling cup cakes to buy .22 caliber full metal jacket rounds. It’s bitter and perfect irony. Take that, Air Force and your bombers.
But whatever the administration’s motives, the truth is, we need pistol. The value of the pistol team extends far beyond their ability to hit quarter sized objects 300 yards out while reciting the digits of pi. They were a source of pride for MIT. They were our one really good sports team. Thanks to pistols, we were able to proudly proclaim that we were better than Army at something considered a sport.
We have to do something to save pistol, something more substantial than selling pistol-shaped cookies and brownies. What if we could harness the pistol team’s uncanny abilities for good? What if we could keep pistol and cut costs for the Institute?
It’s not an easy compromise, but I think I have a solution. Deputize the pistol team. If they can make Shaq a deputy sheriff, why can’t we make the pistol team deputies for campus police? We could improve campus security at a nominal expense. Seriously, what kind of person would commit a crime on campus knowing that an MIT pistol team deputy could take them down in pitch black darkness from 500 yards out at a dead sprint?
Yes, I realize that the pistol team is only trained to use deadly force, something any competent officer knows is a last resort, but in the spirit of the non-lethal craze, we could just issue them Tazer guns. Can someone say, “Don’t taze me, bro?”
And yes, I know that there’s more to law enforcement than knowing how to use a gun, but these things can be taught over IAP in the form of house courses. We can have classes on proper procedure, civil rights, and not stealing copies of the student newspaper.
It wouldn’t be a perfect education, but as most students are aware, it’s not like the police never overreact (especially to Lite-Brites and LED sweatshirts).
Even better, as MIT has always aspired to be a leading and transformational institution, by arming our students on campus, we would catapult to the forefront of the on-campus concealed carry movement.
Granted, this might make the administration uncomfortable. And I’m sure many would harbor deep and serious reservations about the safety and liability of armed students. However, as with hacking, the administration has plenty of experience promoting something to prospective students that they secretly despise and abhor. They’ll just have to grin and bear it, while telling tour groups of our imaginative and creative gun-toting students.
With all the added recognition from supporters of the Second Amendment, money will come flowing in to MIT. We will have a safer campus, and the pistol team can train in real world situations. It’s a win, win, win situation.
MIT is lucky enough to have an extremely skilled pistol team that can shoot three birds with one bullet while taking a swim test from a half mile out on a stormy night. Why not make the most of it?