By Elena Unger
Class of 2021
My social media has been flooded with the horrifying tragedy at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and student opinions on gun control. Quotes have been re-posted on VSCO, Snapchat stories have been dedicated to following the high school walkouts all over Florida, and Facebook has served as a crucial tool for sharing the tremendous strength and passionate words of students like Emma Gonzalez and David Hogg. It doesn’t take more than scrolling through my cell phone to see that this mass shooting has provoked deep fear in students all across the nation. We are afraid of getting shot while at school, and we are terrified that our own children will face the same situation we do now.
After the shooting in Parkland, I delved into learning all I could about gun control. During my research, three questions about our nation’s reluctance to take action against gun violence clouded my mind:
Why is the Second Amendment viewed as a valid argument against enacting laws governing how guns are purchased and used?
Since the origin of the political debate on gun control, the Second Amendment has served as a basis for the argument of gun rights supporters. When giving The Right to Bear Arms to the American people, our Founding Fathers intended for citizens to be able to defend themselves from an oppressive regime and people who posed a serious threat to their well being; they did not have a desire to endanger American students. Yet the world we live in today is not one of muskets and early pistols, it is a place where people who are not even seen as responsible enough to drink alcohol can purchase a semi-automatic rifle and fire hundreds of rounds a minute into the halls of our schools. This must change.
Additionally, the Supreme Court ruling of District of Columbia v. Heller from 2008 established clear limitations to one’s ability to bear arms by saying, “we do not read the Second Amendment to protect the right of citizens to carry arms for any sort of confrontation, just as we do not read the First Amendment to protect the right of citizens to speak for any purpose.” We must draw lines somewhere and we must be able to discuss those lines without the constant pushback of people who worry that they will completely lose their right to bear arms with the mere mention of gun control. We cannot make progress when the discussion is between all guns or no guns. This must change.
Why is the CDC unable to advance its knowledge on the complicated subject of gun violence using national funds?
Something counterintuitive I learned: while Finland has one of the highest numbers of guns per capita, it has one of the lowest crime rates, and the city of Chicago has some of the strictest gun laws in our nation, but still faces an extremely high number of gun related deaths. It is hard to truly understand the gun culture in the United States compared to the rest of the world, and why the examples above are the case. But the possibility to make progress in this understanding is stunted by Congress’s outrageous decision to ban the CDC from using national health funds to research gun violence. Are they afraid of what they’ll find? Gun violence is a public health crisis; data from the CDC shows that on average 96 Americans are killed with guns every day, yet gun safety is not regarded as a public safety issue by our government. This must change.
Why are gun safety and responsible ownership laws seen as a threat to gun ownership?
I can’t see any logic to the argument of those against gun safety laws. The requirement of a license to own a gun won’t prevent adults from being able to obtain and use guns, closing gun-show loopholes to the Brady Act, and more extensive background checks with a review of mental health history will in no way prevent law-abiding, mentally stable American citizens from bearing arms and protecting their families. These measures will help make sure that parents who send their children to the bus stop in the morning will see them again after school. With a ban on semi-automatic weapons, Americans would still be able to hunt, and protect their homes with weapons such as shotguns or handguns that aren’t semi-automatic. As for the use of semi-automatic weapons at shooting ranges, if this is a crucial piece of some people’s culture and recreation, then we can create the opportunity to shoot these types of guns inside highly secured shooting ranges. Reforms focusing on safety and responsible ownership do not jeopardize people’s freedom to protect themselves, hunt, or shoot for sport, so why has nothing been done? This must change. And here is how.
From a student to politicians, know that this is a movement to go down in history, and you do not want to be on the wrong side of it. The NRA is not the only group who can give grades to politicians. We are watching and keeping track. Stop letting the NRA dictate what’s on your agenda. Stop protecting yourselves and start protecting American school children who are the nation’s future. The thousands of innocent people whose lives could be saved need you to push for common sense gun safety measures.
From a student to parents, VOTE! We cannot use our voices to vote yet, so we need you to balance the efforts of the NRA. We know from polls that most adults support common sense gun laws so please vote for candidates who do too. This is life and death.
From a student to other students, I beg you to get educated and keep asking questions. It is when we become educated and truly act as advocates for our own safety that we will be able to outweigh the historic roots and rule by fear of the NRA. But don’t be fooled, because understanding gun safety will not be enough. We need to get loud. Get involved at school, start a club, write letters to politicians and to the NRA, make sure your parents vote, and most importantly keep it up. Be persistent- we cannot rest until we’ve made change.
