Teenagers aren’t just marching for stronger gun laws. They’re ready to continue their fight in their communities and at the polls—even if, in some cases, they have to wait a couple years to vote:
[Madison] Leal, 16, a student from Stoneman Douglas, said she would hold a sign at the march bearing 17 blood-red hands and the message: “How many more?” If elected officials do not act, Ms. Leal said, “I’m going to vote them out of office.”
“And so is my entire generation,” she added. “And they’ll be sorry then.”
Being in school while your classmates are killed around you is not the sort of thing you forget between 16 and turning 18 and voting for the first time.
The sheer power of a mass march could be a turning point because, while there are many kids out there who’ve been touched by gun violence without the media spotlight or the privilege the Stoneman Douglas students have, too many have felt ignored—have been ignored. The New York Times talked to 21-year-old Dantrell Blake, a shooting victim as a teen, who will be marching … but who also said of politics and politicians that “It’s still rigged and they’re still going to do what they want.” The challenge is to bring voices like Blake’s in and empower them to be heard, too, and to shape the broader movement and to believe that they can make a difference and act on that.
That’s when Madison Leal’s message—that she and her entire generation are going to vote out of office lawmakers who don’t act—can be fulfilled.