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December 11, 2024 165 mins

**Listener Discretion Advised**: In this episode, the OMP team talks with their esteemed guest about very hard things, such as children being killed and the possibility of a protector, such as a School Protection Officer, being forced to kill a young person in the event there’s no other way to stop them from committing mass murder. We don’t dress up our conversations with nicer words to make these kinds of topics more “courtroom-friendly,” softer, or palatable.






Perhaps, somewhere inside our hearts and souls, we want topics like this to make us feel sick always. Listener discretion is advised.


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This week, Squamch, Kyle, Jason, and Jed are excited to bring on a guest that they have had an active, years-long role in training, influencing, and working beside in protective operations. Matt Johnson is a big, strong dude, and he’s an exceptionally dedicated husband, father, teacher, businessman, athlete, and recently - the School Protection Officer for Miller School District in his own hometown of Miller, MO.





This episode is a great follow-up to last time, as Matt is a flesh-and-blood example of living “The Art of Doing What You Can.”


Have you ever felt like you’re just not good enough, experienced enough, qualified enough, or just…_enough_ to make a real difference? Then you need to hear Matt’s story. He’s a man with a vested interest in protecting the kids in his hometown and he’s been busy checking the boxes.



By some accounts, he has not walked the typical Protector’s Path. He isn’t a cop. He wasn’t a soldier. Heck, he wasn’t even a violent _criminal_ before he decided to take the hard road and do the impossible and fight to create a job he believed in and then fight even more to be the one to fill it.



He’s already done great things to increase the defensive posture and response capability of Miller Schools, and we hope you recognize that he’s walking a path you too could follow.


And since the guys have him in the studio, they pick his brain about a topic that’s been hot on the socials as of late: The many “Echo Chambers” in our society today, and more specifically, how to _break them_.


Just as he’d do to anyone intending harm to the kids he protects.


Did we mention he’s a big dude?


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