Professor Elam

Thursday Nov 13 2014

You are riding a bus to your destination. An aggravated individual boards the bus. He aggressively engages one passenger after another with taunts such as 'who you lookin' at?'  He is trouble looking for a place to happen. After failing to get a rise from other passengers, he confronts you. Who you lookin at he sneers, You meekly reply no one, and then the aggressor pulls a gun and mortally wound you. He exits the bus. 

This week Zachary Gonzales is charged with the above crime accused of  shooting Donovon Rae Arzola, 23. Zachary apparently did not know Donovon. And yet this happened right here in San Antonio at 2 30 PM in the afternoon. 

Jeff Cooper addressed this threat potential with what he termed The Combat Mindset and the Cooper Color Code. Please take time to read the article link. It might save your life at one extreme. At the other extreme it might make you more prepared as a student.

Cooper served in the USMC in bvoth WW II and Korea. He formed the Gunsite Training Center to reflect his beliefs on preparedness for law enforcement and military personnel. 

RAther than describing it, here is hte excerpt form the article on the Color Code. 

The color code, as originally introduced by Jeff Cooper, had nothing to do with tactical situations or alertness levels, but rather with one's state of mind. As taught by Cooper, it relates to the degree of peril you are willing to do something about and which allows you to move from one level of mindset to another to enable you to properly handle a given situation. Cooper did not claim to have invented anything in particular with the color code, but he was apparently the first to use it as an indication of mental state.^{[citation needed]}

• White: Unaware and unprepared. If attacked in Condition White, the only thing that may save you is the inadequacy or ineptitude of your attacker. When confronted by something nasty, your reaction will probably be "Oh my God! This can't be happening to me."
• Yellow: Relaxed alert. No specific threat situation. Your mindset is that "today could be the day I may have to defend myself". You are simply aware that the world is a potentially unfriendly place and that you are prepared to defend yourself, if necessary. You use your eyes and ears, and realize that "I may have to shoottoday". You don't have to be armed in this state, but if you are armed you should be in Condition Yellow. You should always be in Yellow whenever you are in unfamiliar surroundings or among people you don't know. You can remain in Yellow for long periods, as long as you are able to "Watch your six." (In aviation 12 o'clock refers to the direction in front of the aircraft's nose. Six o'clock is the blind spot behind the pilot.) In Yellow, you are "taking in" surrounding information in a relaxed but alert manner, like a continuous 360 degree radar sweep. As Cooper put it, "I might have to shoot."
• Orange: Specific alert. Something is not quite right and has your attention. Your radar has picked up a specific alert. You shift your primary focus to determine if there is a threat (but you do not drop your six). Your mindset shifts to "I may have to shoot that person today", focusing on the specific target which has caused the escalation in alert status. In Condition Orange, you set a mental trigger: "If that person does "X", I will need to stop them". Your pistol usually remains holstered in this state. Staying in Orange can be a bit of a mental strain, but you can stay in it for as long as you need to. If the threat proves to be nothing, you shift back to Condition Yellow.
• Red: Condition Red is fight. Your mental trigger (established back in Condition Orange) has been tripped. "If 'X' happens I will shoot that person" – 'X' has happened, the fight is on.

The USMC uses condition Black, although it was not originally part of Cooper's Color Code. Condition Black: Catastrophic breakdown of mental and physical performance. Usually over 175 heartbeats per minute, increased heart rate becomes counter productive. May have stopped thinking correctly. This can happen when going from Condition White or Yellow immediately to Condition Red.

In short, the Color Code helps you "think" in a fight. As the level of danger increases, your willingness to take certain actions increases. If you ever do go to Condition Red, the decision to use lethal force has already been made (your "mental trigger" has been tripped).

In the situation on the bus, we now know that the victim had mere minutes, if that, to move from Condition White all the way to Condition Red – Fight. And the victim needed to take initial action, not a defensive stance, as the perp was armed nd the victim was not. 

Would you have recognized the deadly threat in time?

On another level we can apply this to taking an exam. In one class yesterday the students asked for more time to take exams. Yet all certified exams are timed. The best way to prepare is to take timed exams from thet get go. And in my classes you receive thorough exam prep on what will be on the test. All questions are culled from a test bank that represent problems we have worked in class. Allowing unlimited time to take an exam at home on line would simply result in a group project of looking up the answer or copying from someone who cold work the problem. That is anything but content mastery. THis would not prepare you for any advanced class after this one. 

I typically receive very few questions in class. This reflects a condition white mindset, It reflects that little to no time has been spent trying to work the problems prior to class. This means the student will learn little watching the solution.l That is because the student is watching not participating. 

Passing an exam is a matter of thorough preparation. It is a matter of practice just as one would practice pistol shooting or playing volleyball. 

Plan on raising your alert level, it could be a life altering experience.