Giving up the gun: a message from a high school student
Three years ago, I wrote a piece detailing my experiences in the American public education system in relation to gun violence. At the time, I was merely 14 and about to enter high school, believing I would be risking death upon walking through those front gates.
Three years ago, I was still trying to process Parkland, grieving the lives lost and dumbstruck that any effective gun control legislation was discarded by Congress. Three years ago, our country was healing from the fresh wounds of losing 17 innocent lives to yet another preventable tragedy.
Three years later, 19 children are dead. Again.
I’ve grown up surrounded by messages regarding the danger of guns. Little did I know that the reason my second-grade class practiced hiding in a cramped bathroom was that 21 children had been killed only weeks beforehand.
These drills were routine. Hiding in that bathroom was a monthly occurrence. We all dreaded huddling together to hide from a “bad guy coming on campus to try to hurt us,” as our teacher would delicately put it.
In eighth grade, we were then taught how to defend ourselves with classroom objects. Our teachers spent a school day instructing teenagers how to stack desks into a barricade and accurately throw projectiles at attackers.
These days we’re just shown a video demonstrating a rather ineffective door-lock mechanism narrated by a monotonous police officer. Though he may assure us that law enforcement will arrive on campus in a matter of minutes if anything were to happen, this is unconvincingly and far from reassuring. Every year, learning how to protect myself has become an even larger reminder of the fact that the government refuses to protect me, a child.
So here we are again in 2022, desperately trying to process the loss of 19 young children and two teachers. It is another violent, avoidable moment forever etched into our nation’s history next to elected officials' hollow pledges to solve gun violence and the empty “thoughts and prayers” that National Rifle Association-endorsed conservatives put out solely for image’s sake. I could not be angrier.
Republicans for decades have refused to consider common-sense gun control initiatives. It is baffling that the party which primarily claims to be “pro-life" barely bats an eye when kids are murdered.
On the other hand, Democrats need to stop making unfulfilled promises and take legitimate steps to enact effective legislation. Soapbox performances are unhelpful and only sow further distrust in liberal ideology when such goals cannot be achieved easily. Responsibility is shared.
At 17, I am haunted by the memories of Parkland and Sandy Hook. I am haunted by Robb and Buffalo. They are the ghosts that come and go, forever in the back of my mind.
No longer do I fear the dark. I fear the sound of bullets piercing through the air, of my peers screaming in terror as a shrouded figure opens fire.
At 17, I am haunted by the notion that my life is on the line the second I enter the classroom. And such is the circumstance of every American student.
Claire Rotchford lives in Gainesville.
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This article originally appeared on The Gainesville Sun: Claire Rotchford: U.S. students live in fear of gun violence
