The events at Parkland School in Florida last week seem to have touched a raw nerve — one that runs far deeper and widespread than the normalised emotional backlash that has followed so many mass shootings in the United States and with such regularity. Yes, there are always the tears and anger of those who lost their loved ones, those who survived, and those who campaign for meaningful control measures — and all invariably come to little if anything. But this time, it seems different.
Whether it be the current political environment in the US, the lack of unity, or a lack of leadership at the highest level, it now appears as if the anti-gun movement has reached a critical mass — one that has found a voice in the students of Florida who are prepared to ask the hard questions of their political representatives, take the National Rifle Association (NRA) to task, and highlight the inaction and inadequate response to such tragedies when they have occurred before.
What is different this time around is that the voices now speaking out and demanding stiff gun control measures from all levels of government, are not beholden to politicians who may have received lobby funds and payments from the NRA. And it is the young who are taking on their parents’ rights to own guns, bear arms and buy arsenals of automatic weapons simply because they can. This most recent mass shooting has shown there now is truly a generation gap that is fundamentally shifting the gun control debate in the US. Let’s hope it is a shift that is lasting, has far-reaching success, and finally changes the mentality of a nation that thinks it is wrong to have medical insurance for all but right to have weaponry that can inflict such a high toll so quickly.
US President Donald Trump has suggested that one answer to thwart the shooter behind the Parkland School tragedy would be to arm teachers. For this growing gun control movement, that simply is not an option. The answer is less guns, not more; disarming, not arming; stigmatising those who carry weapons rather than normalising their presence in a classroom where lessons in algebra and geography are imparted. No. The lesson for all politicians now, from the Oval Office to every state legislature needs to be that Americans have had enough. They are tired of the NRA, tired of the political excuses — and tired of being killed by people with guns.
