Dear Congressional Members of the United States Government:
It seems no amount of blood on your hands proves a sufficient moral catharsis for action on the issue of gun violence. Your platitudes have devolved from measly to incendiary to static noise in a background of lawlessness and anarchy. Why do we keep writing to ask you to do your jobs and take legislative action on a solution— any solution — whether it’s removing violent video games or instituting metal detectors? Frankly, it’s because this is the only avenue that the common citizen that you are supposed to represent has to speak out and ask for change. Unfortunately the canals of your ears have been sealed with the saccharine voices of interest groups, your coffers filled with the money of the NRA, your sentiments and speeches scripted to satisfy rather than solve.
Reiterating the anger that many others, I am sure, have with greater passion and eloquence conveyed to you is but wasteful. I’d like to turn the conversation to what the Lt. Governor of Texas stated when questioned about the facts of the El Paso shooting. Stating that he couldn't give much detail, he turned his ire upon Antifa.
Let there be no confusion. I do not support violence as a solution to violence. Yet, has there been any consideration as to why people are turning to support Antifa? The citizenry has lost faith in you as our representatives. Your speeches don't keep our families safe. Your refusal to take donations, while honorable, aren’t metal detectors and tougher regulatory legislation. When violence becomes the law of the land, and people feel betrayed by their political parties and institutions of government, the last resort of safety for many are those who seem to offer a tangible fight. Instead of turning the lens towards bills, laws, and proposals you have to ensure this never happens again, Lt. Governor, you engaged in cowardice by shifting the focus to a group who is not responsible for this tragedy. Stopping Antifa’s organizing on the grounds of controlling the fallout from the shooting and preventing further polarization is acceptable. Using Antifa as a get-out-of-jail-free card for your own shortcomings is detestable.
The woeful irony is that Congress never themselves faces the fear, the sorrow, and the paranoia that the citizenry must endure. They didn't live in a generation of school shootings and an inactive government. They don’t know what it feels like, walking in a high school in America, to jump at every sound, every pop of a balloon, every drop of a pencil, fearing that it could be a bullet. They don’t know what it’s like to imagine that the Walmart many miles away in El Paso could have just as easily been the Walmart in walking distance.
As a member of Generation Z, I have one last request of you. My only wish is that you all take early retirements. Go play golf or something. Live well off of your pensions. All we of the current generation can look forward to is the day when all of you are retired, so that we can finally take control of our own lives and institute a government that listens to our concerns.
As to my own generation, we must continue to take and advance upon every opportunity presented to create change in Washington. The school walkouts after Parkland demonstrated that we can organize and protest on a national scale, and we must continue to use the power of that united voice. Only then will any of us have a chance to change this macabre situation.