Enough is enough. Enough talk about school shootings without really talking about school shootings. Stop skirting around the topic on campuses and in government buildings. I’m calling a silence not as a moment but as a way to actually give people a chance to open their eyes and look at what can be done. Look at how we can stop this cycle of shootings not only amongst schools but shootings in general because no one should fear for their safety. A silence because students also fear talking about this graciously import topic because teachers and classmates alike will tell us it is not our fight and that we can do nothing to help this except follow the rules of the newest safety precautions. Our doors are already locked so what’s next; metal detectors? Am I going to be pulled aside because it registered something like the airport registered something on my ankle when there was nothing there? Is there going to be an all-call to any quiet students with a limited number of friends? The Trench-Coat kid, we all know one, will be tackled to the ground and wrongfully searched because he looks suspicious? What is the next step in these safety precautions because we avoid talking about the real issue? All our government officials and school board leaders talk, talk, talk about everything but this matter. We’re deterred from protesting and from talking about it as a real issue in our classes. Not our problem? Not our fight? The fight became ours when the previous generation closed their eyes and wouldn’t shut their mouths. It became our problem when students not even belonging to our school, our friend groups, our community were turning up dead faster than service members whose lives are on the line without a second thought. My life is not on the line when I enter a classroom. There shouldn’t be a line unless it is a line in the sand drawn by people who believe they are more capable of making change than a “couple of kids”. That line should dictate stricter gun laws. That’s the only line I ever want to pick a side or be part of in general and plenty of other students across this country would agree with me. I don’t want stricter safety measures I want the school board, the government, our PRESIDENT to shut their mouths and open their eyes. A country-wide month of silence from those who say we cannot discuss something that could happen to us at a moments notice. No student should question “Will I Be Next?” No student should have to be presented on the media after a shooting saying “It Could Have Been Me.” They should shut their mouths but me? I’m done being silent. I’m done being told I can’t talk about it because it’s a sensitive issue. When people die, it will always be sensitive yet we openly discuss 9/11 in class each year. We eagerly talk about our service members, we thank them for their service, as we learn the number of those who never come home. On the anniversary of any major war, terrorist movement, or anything not involving schools, we openly celebrate it and discuss how it could have been prevented, changed, or made better. Any historical mass shooting or school shooting event is shut out from our daily lesson plan because it is not our problem to look toward the future and figure our how we are to change it because we should be focusing on our careers and our schooling such as college. Enough is Enough. How do we change our predominate history before it becomes the basis for our futures? How will we stop the onslaught of gun attacks across this country before it reaches our school? Our community? Our homes? Let us be the ones to open our mouths when told to keep them shut and force those with closed eyes to open them wide.

I’m sick of being silent when our future and safety hang in the balance, what about you?