There have been 211 incidents with guns at schools since Columbine. Thousands of students are affected by these shootings and have suffered the loss of their friends, teachers, and faculty members. Nothing has been done to protect the lives of children. Champions of the Second Amendment prove that their main priority is to protect their weapons over the lives of American children. NRA CEO, Wayne LaPierre, says, “They care more about control. Their goal is to eliminate the Second Amendment and our firearms freedoms so they can eliminate all individual freedoms.” It’s so bewildering to me that people would believe that students who are speaking up for gun control are pushing a radical agenda to take away American citizens’ freedoms. In reality, students who are advocating for gun control are just trying to prevent more innocent children’s lives from being taken.

There seem to be many people in this country who choose guns over the safety of their children. Imagine if it was your child that was killed during a shooting. Would you still protect the right to give guns to mentally unstable people? Wayne LaPierre says, “It’s not a safety issue, it’s a political issue.” LaPierre is arousing chaos. He does not understand that the main goal is not to ban guns completely but to make sure only stable people can access them. When the goal is to save the lives of thousands of people, that means it’s a safety issue. LaPierre also states that “To stop a bad guy with a gun, it takes a good guy with a gun." However, having a “good guy with a gun” will not stop a person trying to shoot up a school, but rather will end in more tragedies. The NRA is not trying to protect people; they’re trying to encourage people to buy guns. If this slogan becomes true, the NRA benefits; they gain more power and money. People need to realize that arguments like the one Wayne LaPierre is making are dishonest.

Youth are the backbone of America. They are the people who are going to be voting and taking action in the next era. If a student survives a school shooting and sees their friends die before their eyes, they deserve the right to be angry and to be heard; they deserve the opportunity to advocate for change. Rush Limbaugh and other right-wing media figures like him who say that these young adults are “crisis actors” are lying. They have no idea what else to say. They have no retaliation against the kids who are fighting for gun control, so they lie. NRA board member and rock guitarist, Ted Nugent, says “The lies from these poor, mushy-brained children who have been fed lies and parrot lies, I really feel sorry for them...It’s not only ignorant and dangerously stupid — it’s soulless. … I’m afraid to say and it hurts me to say this, but the evidence is irrefutable: They have no soul.” Ted Nugent has no right to say anything about what the students think. These students have firsthand experience with the horror of a school shooting. They have the right to speak up about the incident and demand change. According to a study by UC Berkeley, Wellness, “an estimated 32,514 people die from gun violence in the United States each year” and “there are over 17,000 children (age infant to 19) who are shot by firearms per year.” Students have the right to speak about these 17,000 children because they have firsthand experience dealing with people who destroy lives. They are not soulless but are advocating for change because politicians haven’t made the changes the people have asked for.

There have been 211 incidents with guns at schools since Columbine. Thousands of families have been split up because of an unstable person with a gun. The students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas stood up to politicians; they demanded stronger gun control laws. Right-wing extremists do not understand the difference between gun control and banning guns altogether. They choose to ridicule these Parkland victims for advocating for change. And even if those right-wing extremists do know the difference, they choose to blur the reality and push their base to fight and oppose gun control. Although they have been successful thus far, the NRA should take note of who they are up against. The next generation of student activists will push for gun control laws that the NRA has tried so hard to avoid. These students are becoming a voice for the people. The more that the students expose the NRA, the more people will wake-up to the lies that they have been fed by NRA-funded politicians. People must understand that the NRA’s stance on the topic of guns over safety is evil. These student activists are using their platform to speak directly to Americans and reveal the morally bankrupt figures behind our dishonest gun dilemma.