BANNER IMAGE CREDIT: ANDREW GOMBERT/EPA-EFE/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK
This is not a post about guns. This is about our future.
When I was in middle school, I didn’t have to worry about being shot. I clearly remember the day we had an armed intruder drill, and learned how to hide, low to the ground, along the wall closest to the door so the bad guy couldn’t see us if he looked in. I remember the spike of fear I felt as I imagined the possibility of someone really coming to shoot us. I was huddled under a computer desk. I didn’t know how a gun worked but I knew what it meant.
Today is Pi Day, March 14th. It was at that same middle school that I first celebrated the fun quirk of today’s date. But today, in 2018, American schoolchildren aren’t excitedly awaiting 3.14 1:59 pm, they’re standing silently in school yards to protest gun violence and stand up for their lives.
They recognize the gravity of the situation. And yet grown adults are taking to twitter to discredit their message, attributing their protest to naivety instead of seeing this as a horrific reflection of a broken society, one in which children have to fight for their lives because the adults won’t. Somehow we’ve created a society where the right to bear arms is more important than the right to a safe childhood.
We must never forget that the future is in the hands of our children. What are we building all this technology for, all these amazing and inspiring and exciting innovations, if not to hand them off to the next generation?
To my young American readers, I commend you for your bravery. I’m sorry you have already had to face fears beyond your years. It is always the young, the strong, who rise up to correct the mistakes of generations past. Keep fighting, keep standing up for what you believe in, keep speaking your mind, and you will shape this world into one you’ll be proud to live in.
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