They studied for the finals from the Student Union on the Spring Day of Gossamer and grabbed snacks. Each flashcard in the lawn, along with burritos and blankets, constituted the implicit curriculum of life. The harvest of new adults will be who they become.
And then something happened. Honestly, things they always knew came. Something they’ve trained for the rest of their lives.
After all, today’s college students grew up in secret. They grew up preparing shooters to infiltrate safe spaces between lunch and the fourth period. They learned regular tables along with how to stay quietly in the supply closet. They were trapped in prison-like classrooms, packed with transparent backpacks, walked through medical detectors, hoping for the worst.
What happened on Florida State University’s campus is still unfolding. A young man, the son of the sheriff’s aide, took his mother’s gun and fired fire on Thursday, killing two people and apparently injured him.
A future where adults promised that those students were fulfilled. They are still adults, and their terrible burdens become heavy. He sprints into a strange dorm, hides in a bathroom stall, and tries to keep him from dying. Have you ever finished?
America smiled with hollow eyes and handed this reality a long time ago. When 20 children and six adults were killed in Newtown, Connecticut, and once again when 17 souls were erased from a high school in Parkland, Florida, and once again when 19 children and two adults were wiped out in Ubarde, Texas. Reports have been filtered out that several FSU students survived the Parkland shooting and have returned to this muscular memory nightmare.
Of course they did. Every Floridian knows someone who knows someone on that campus. We all saw our bait as our friends panic and delighted for our kids. We scrolled through photos of students hugging, crying, and marching in one file with hands in the air.
Of course, we did.
Once again, America has chosen the idea of gun fetishism and cartoonish freedom over complicated safety tasks. Arch conservatives and activists have fought teeth and nails for reckless rights to cause what happens in the name of the ambiguous notion that regulation of deadly weapons is at odds with freedom.
After the Parkland shooting, Florida lawmakers worked towards stronger gun safety protocols, raising the minimum age to buy rifles and shotguns, closing loopholes, and enacting the Red Flag Act to protect weapons from the hands of dangerous people. A Columbia University study found that the latter law was associated with an 11% reduction in firearm homicide rates.
Now, Florida lawmakers are trying to reverse progress. In Capitol, about a 30-minute walk from FSU, Gov. Ron Desantis is actively aligning with gun activists to roll back restrictions. He believes people should be allowed to openly carry firearms in the way they carry their phones. In his view, Florida is behind other red states, helping people get their guns easier.
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why? There is one argument that in many cases Americans must be able to protect themselves from authoritarian acquisitions. If the government goes too far, it should be able to increase the power of the total artillery, and step on the strength of the artillery as rulers seek absolute power, maniacs begin to ignore the court’s dict orders, and framers begin to ignore the core principles that have built this country.
What do you think? stand up?
But even in the darkest moments there is a cause of hope. Bids to roll back age requirements have stagnated in the Senate, where similar bills have withered in the past. A bill to allow hidden weapons at schools and college campuses failed last month at Florida Senate Committee. For those who say, “Well, it didn’t stop this tragedy,” no, that wasn’t the case. That’s not a reason to stop trying. That’s not why I think it didn’t stop anything else.
President Donald Trump was unaware of his desire to change gun laws at the federal level. But the mission of saving lives survives by taking wise positions, thinking creatively, and pushing boulders uphill to slow the country’s death culture.
That’s part of becoming an adult too. Even if evolution seems like a fantasy, we can find the ability to believe that systems and people can change.
Through the rage and tears of justice, these new adults will find comfort in the community in the surplus of friends and strangers trying to provide shelter, embrace, and check-in text. Let them believe that most people are really good.
And let’s tailor them to who they will become, on their journey of who they will become, and see who they will become to take a walk to the Capitol, where they will preside over their university town. They only tell them once that they live this well.
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