DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

An article by Cassandra Basler from National Public Radio (reprinted as non-commercial use)

April 19: When Lane Murdock, a high school sophomore, heard that 17 high school students and educators had been killed in a shooting in Parkland, Fla., she says she felt numb. To her, and so many others, mass shootings can feel all too common in the U.S. “In the time I’ve been in high school we’ve had the Pulse, Las Vegas and now, [the Parkland] shooting,” Murdock says.

So that same day, Feb.14, Murdock started a  Change.org petition  that so far has received more than a quarter-million signatures. Her ask? A walkout to protest violence in schools that she planned to coincide with the anniversary of the mass shooting at Columbine High School in 1999. Murdock was born in 2002.

Lane Murdock, a high school sophomore, says she felt numb after the school shooting in Parkland, Fla., and knew it was time for her to try to make some change.

On one of the last days of spring break, she and seven other students from her high school in Ridgefield, Conn., gather around a few tables at their town rec center. They have been working hard, even losing sleep, trying to get organized for the day. As Murdock says, “Success knows no sleep.”

This is, by far, the biggest event they have ever planned. She and her team have more than 2,500 walkouts across the country registered through their website. They’ve drafted a long to-do list, including everything from securing a stage for speeches for their local walkout, to reaching out to the national press.

“Prioritize,” Murdock tells her team, “We’re not going to be able to get 100 percent of these things, I can guarantee that, but it’s important that we get the important things.”

Murdock wants the walkout to go down in history but acknowledges that it won’t represent every student’s perspective. Some polls show that young people are no more liberal  than older generations on gun control.

And other students who live with gun violence regularly have said they don’t feel represented  in the social movements following the shooting at Parkland.

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“There’s gun violence that’s been happening every day that isn’t a school shooting,” Murdock says. She wants the day to be inclusive. On the other hand, she knows it will be uncomfortable.

“We get hate comments online all the time because we’re angering people, and we’re angering people because we’re scaring them, and if we’re scaring them it’s because we’re doing something,” she says.

She wants people to know that she’s imagining this day to be very different than the March For Our Lives  or the 17 minutes of silence on March 14 in honor of the victims in Parkland, Fla. This walkout will last from 10 a.m. through the end of the day.

“People ask me, like, ‘Why? Why all day?’ ” Murdock says. That’s because “this is a topic that deserves more than 17 minutes.” Part of the plan for the day is to get students together in what they refer to as “a call to action,” registering voters or writing to elected representatives about the need for further gun control, for example.

These student organizers have gotten help from a national nonprofit called Indivisible, a group that says it aims to “fuel” young people to “resist the Trump agenda.” Paul Kim, a senior at Ridgefield in charge of communications for the event, says Indivisible helped the high school organizers map their outreach online.

“I got every chapter signed up in Texas,” Kim says, talking about all the walkouts they’ve registered. “And these people emailed back … I could like feel the Texas in the email. The accent, everything.” The group laughs.

To Murdock, the widespread support she says they’ve seen shows that sensible gun control doesn’t have to be partisan.

“It is not conservative or liberal. It is just about making sure our children don’t get harmed in school and we don’t live in a community and in a country that has institutionalized fear,” Murdock says. “I think we’re all sick of it. That’s why we’re doing this.”

She grew up with that fear. Her school had regular lockdown drills after 26 students and educators were killed in a shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School when she was in fifth grade. It happened just 20 miles from her classroom.

She says there is a reason why she felt desensitized when she heard about Parkland. She and her team of fellow organizers at Ridgefield say that gun violence in the U.S. has gone on for too long.

“Change happens through patience and this fight does not stop after April 20,” Murdock says. “There is going to be a lot of work to be done after April 20 and that is going to include you guys and it’s going to include tons of students all across this nation,” she says talking to the group.

At 10 a.m. local time on Friday, thousands of students will march out of their classes wearing orange for gun safety and chanting for change.

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

An article from Reuters (reprinted by permission)

Leaders of the student-led anti-gun movement, who inspired classroom walkouts across the country on the 19th anniversary of the Columbine High School massacre, say they plan to maintain their activism through the long summer break.

This week’s protests [on April 20] marked the second mass student walkout since a 19-year-old man opened fire at a Parkland, Florida high school in February, killing 17 people. It signaled the emergence of a growing national campaign led by young people to lessen gun violence and toughen laws on firearms sales.

Youths take part in a National School Walkout anti-gun march in Washington Square Park in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York, U.S., April 20, 2018. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

But the movement faces a major early challenge as the traditional three-month summer break approaches for most U.S. public schools at a critical moment in their bid to be heard by politicians in their home states and Washington, D.C.

“The reason why this has been so huge (is that) we’re in school, we talk to our classmates, we spread it around, everybody’s around so it’s kind of easier to show up,” said Vivian Reynoso, 17, a junior at Tucson High Magnet School in Tucson, Arizona, who helped organize rallies for both nationwide demonstrations in the past month.

“Of course you fear (losing the momentum),” said Reynoso, who like her peers in the campaign was born a year or more after the Columbine shootings. “I’m pretty sure even the Parkland victims are afraid of that. That’s why we need to be pushing, even if it’s summer, to keep telling people to keep talking about the issue and not to forget to about it.”

In the nearly two decades since Columbine seniors Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold went on a shooting rampage in 1999, killing 12 students and a teacher before committing suicide, school shootings have become almost commonplace in the United States.

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Students at Columbine, which has not held classes on April 20 since the massacre, did not take part in the walkout, and were encouraged to do community service instead.

Even as students prepared for Friday’s protests wearing orange, the color of the anti-gun movement, news began trickling out that a 17-year-old student had been wounded in a shooting at a high school near Ocala, Florida, some 225 miles northwest of Parkland.

SECOND AMENDMENT

The debate over guns in America, where the right to bear arms is protected under the Second Amendment of the Constitution, has raged nearly since the nation’s founding.

The students hope to succeed where other activists have failed in enacting stricter legislation on gun ownership, either at the state or federal level.

As anger fades over the Parkland shootings, the test for students will be in organizing for gun reform. Many of the protests featured voter registration drives, with students aiming to make it a major issue for midterm elections in November.

“Who knows whether they maintain the energy or not but there are historic examples of student-led movements that have played an important role in moving things forward, (for example) the Civil rights movements,” said Adam Winkler, a professor of constitutional law at the University of California, Los Angeles.

“We’ve seen these kids take a real leadership role on this issue,” said Winkler, author of a history of the debate over gun control in America. “Whether they can sustain it not remains to be seen.”

The March 24 “March For Our Lives” rallies in cities across the United States were some of the biggest U.S. youth demonstrations in decades, with hundreds of thousands of young Americans and their supporters taking to the streets.

Friday’s walkouts, though smaller in scale, signaled the determination of the students to press on with their movement.

“The way we’re viewing the summer right now is it’s really an opportunity to put in a lot of work on some really big plans we have going for the return to school in August,” said Gavin Pierce, 21, a college junior studying film in Los Angeles and an organizer of the “March for Our Lives” pro-gun control group.

    “Everyone is really eager to keep this going and to keep on organizing until we see real change,” Pierce said.

Reporting by Jon Herskovitz in Austin, Texas, Ben Klayman in Detroit, Zach Fagensen in Miami, Edgar Mendez in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin, Karen Dillion in Mission, Kansas and Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Editing by Richard Chang

. DISARMAMENT & SECURITY.

An article by Irene Kai / Ashland Culture of Peace Commission in the Ashland Daily Tidings

This is a journey of pure magic and grace. I went with my daughter to the U.K. for an art exhibit in early September 2015, and on a whim we decided to tour the Snowdonia National Park in Wales. We drove deep into the mountains on a narrow two-lane road with hair pin turns on the “wrong” side of the road. As dusk fell, we decided to go back to town. The nearest turning outlet was behind the mountain, so I drove into a hidden nearby space to turn. As I turned, I suddenly saw a two story tall glass tower with a flame inside near the top of it. An inscription on the glass said: “The World Peace Flame.” I was awed. Deep in the mountains in the middle of nowhere, I was greeted by a living flame representing World Peace. At that instant, I felt as if the flame ignited the sacred flame in my heart. I realized World Peace begins with me.

World Peace Flame Monument, Snowdonia Mountain Lodge, Wales

I went into the building behind the monument where a woman told me the history of the World Peace Flame. In 1999, the princess of the Netherlands went to five continents to collect seven sacred flames, flew them via military and commercial jets and united them in Wales. The Asian flame was from the eternal flame that burns at Gandhi’s memorial. The monument in Wales is the original World Peace Flame Monument. I was invited to light a candle from the flame and I brought it back to Ashland.

I came to Ashland 20 years ago via Hong Kong, New York, London and Los Angeles, not knowing anything about Oregon. Over a decade ago, I was attracted to the local Native American culture, and became very involved with the Ashland Native American group and befriended Roy Hayes, Chief Joseph’s great-great grandson. 

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How can culture of peace be developed at the municipal level?

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I learned deeply about the culture of the Native American’s history in the Rogue Valley. 

Jacksonville was once a thriving Chinatown 200 years ago. Hundreds of Chinese migrants came to southern Oregon as laborers for the gold miners. The ditches they dug are still visible today. When the gold dried up, they were chased out and some were killed. They vanished without a trace. This group of migrants were from Toisan, southern China, the village of my family. They were my ancestral relatives.

On Sept. 21, 2015, the International Day of Peace, my partner David Wick and I launched the Ashland Culture of Peace Commission (ACPC). During the launch, I lit the candle I brought back from Wales. During the ceremony, I was inspired to bring the World Peace Flame monument to Ashland, to honor our ancestors and to heal their sufferings.

By bringing healing and peace to our ancestors, we, the descendants will be able to release the burden of the sufferings of our linage and learn to practice living in peace for ourselves, our children and their children. 

The physical official live eternal World Peace Flame on our city ground will become a beacon of light that represents hope, healing, forgiveness, unity and humility for all who see it. The only other World Peace Flame in the United States is in the Civil Rights Museum in the Lorraine Motel, Memphis, Tennessee, the assassination site of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

For almost three years, I told anyone who had influence in the city of Ashland that I would like to install a World Peace Flame Monument in Ashland. Everyone thought it was a great idea, smiled and said: “Good Luck.” One day, David Wick and I wandered into the Southern Oregon University Sustainability Center. We walked into the old farm house and saw the architectural drawing of the “Thalden Pavilion — The Center of Outrageous Innovation” on the wall. I saw a tower next to the main structure and said to David, “That is the perfect place for the World Peace Flame!” 

Barry and Kathryn Thalden, strong supporters of ACPC, agreed to have the World Peace Flame installed at the base of the obelisk and informed us that it will be flanked by two 28 ft. cedar teaching poles, carved by Russell Beebe, a local Native American sculptor. How perfect!

ACPC is responsible for our part of the construction for the housing of the World Peace Flame. I invite you to join me on this magical journey of grace to bring the World Peace Flame to Ashland. With your generous donations, it will become a reality. Please visit our website at www.ashlandcpc.org.

. .DISARMAMENT & SECURITY. .

An article by Greta Zarro for Common Dreams (reprinted according to a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License)

America is up in arms about guns. If last month’s “March for Our Lives,” which attracted over one million marchers nationwide, is any indication, we’ve got a serious problem with gun violence, and people are fired up about it.  
But what’s not being talked about in the mainstream media, or even by the organizers and participants in the March for Our Lives movement, is the link between the culture of gun violence and the culture of war, or militarism, in this nation. Nik Cruz, the now infamous Parkland, FL shooter, was taught how to shoot a lethal weapon in the very school that he later targeted in the heart-breaking Valentine’s Day Massacre. Yes, that’s right; our children are trained as shooters in their school cafeterias, as part of the U.S. military’s Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (JROTC) marksmanship program.  

Members of the Patch High School drill team compete in the team exhibition portion of the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps drill meet at Heidelberg High School April 25. (Photo: Kristen Marquez, Herald Post/flickr/cc)

Nearly 2,000 U.S. high schools have such JROTC marksmanship programs, which are taxpayer-funded and rubber-stamped by Congress. Cafeterias are transformed into firing ranges, where children, as young as 13 years old, learn how to kill. The day that Nik Cruz opened fire on his classmates, he proudly wore a t-shirt emblazoned with the letters “JROTC.” JROTC’s motto? “Motivating Young People to Be Better Citizens.” By training them to wield a gun?  

I want to know why America isn’t marching against the military’s marksmanship programs. I want to know why millions aren’t knocking on their representatives’ doors and refusing to pay their taxes, until congressionally-approved firing ranges are removed from schools. Meanwhile, military recruiters hobnob with students during lunch break, then train them how to shoot in that same cafeteria and lure them to enlist. No doubt, the military’s pitch is slick, and economically enticing. That is, until the trainees turn on their classmates and teachers.

Perhaps what’s key above all, however, is that JROTC, and U.S. militarism as a whole, is embedded in our sociocultural framework as Americans, so much so that to question it is to cast doubt on one’s patriotic allegiance to this nation. To me, this explains why the Nik Cruz JROTC connection is not even an option on the table in the dialogue about gun violence. Why, at last month’s March for Our Lives in D.C., when my colleagues held up signs about the JROTC marksmanship program, marchers nodded in approval and bragged that they were JROTC trained.  

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The culture of war is pervasive in our society, through military-funded Hollywood films and video games, the militarization of the police, and JROTC and ROTC programs in our schools. The Pentagon receives the names, addresses, and phone numbers of all of our children, unless parents tell their children’s schools to opt them out. Nearly all of us are culpable, wittingly or unwittingly, in supporting the spread of U.S. militarism through our silent complicity and our tax dollars.  

The average mass shooter in this country is, by and large, an American male with a history of mental illness, criminal charges, or illicit substance abuse, according to a recently released March 2018 report by the U.S. Secret Services. He is not an ISIS terrorist or Al-Qaeda plotter. In fact, findings show that, above any ideology, mass attackers are most often motivated by a personal vendetta. What the Secret Services report does not talk about, however, is the disproportionate number of mass attackers who have been trained by the U.S. military. While veterans account for 13% of the the adult population, the data shows that more than 1/3 of adult perpetrators of the 43 worst mass killings between 1984 and 2006 had been in the U.S. military. Further, a 2015 study in the Annals of Epidemiology found that veterans kill themselves at a rate 50% higher than their civilian counterparts. This speaks volumes about the damaging psychological impact of war, and, I would argue, the deleterious potential of the warlike “us vs. them” mentality that JROTC and ROTC programs instill in the minds of developing youth, not to mention the very real marksmanship skills that they teach.  

While military recruits with access to a gun pose a risk to Americans at home, meanwhile, our soldiers abroad are not much more effective at policing the world. As military spending has skyrocketed in recent decades, now accounting for over fifty percent of U.S. federal discretionary spending, according to the National Priorities Project, so has terrorism.

Despite our country’s endless state of military “interventions” in other nations, the Global Terrorism Index in fact records a steady increase in terrorist attacks from the beginning of our “war on terror” in 2001 to the present. Federal intelligence analysts and retired officers admit that U.S. occupations generate more hatred, resentment, and blowback than they prevent. According to a declassified intelligence report on the war on Iraq, “despite serious damage to the leadership of al-Qaida, the threat from Islamic extremists has spread both in numbers and in geographic reach.” With the U.S. government spending a combined $1 trillion annually on war and preparations for war, including the stationing of troops at over 800 bases worldwide, there is little left of the public purse to spend on domestic necessities.

The American Society of Civil Engineers ranks U.S. infrastructure as a D+. We rank 4th in the world for wealth inequality, according to the OECD. U.S. infant mortality rates are the highest in the developed world, according to UN Special Rapporteur Philip Alston. Communities across the nation lack access to clean drinking water and proper sanitation, a UN human right that the U.S. fails to recognize.

Forty million Americans live in poverty. Given this lack of a basic social safety net, is it any wonder that people enlist in the armed forces for economic relief and a supposed sense of purpose, grounded in our nation’s history of associating military service with heroism? 
 
If we want to prevent the next mass shooting, we need to stop fueling the culture of violence and militarism, and that starts with ending JROTC marksmanship programs in our schools.

. .DISARMAMENT & SECURITY. .

A multimedia gallery from Telesur

Thousands demonstrated across the United States [on March 24] to demand gun controls in the wake of February’s school shooting in Florida, which killed 17 people. The nationwide March For Our Lives rallies, some led by student survivors, aim to break the legislative gridlock stymying efforts to restrict firearms in a nation where mass shootings like the one on Feb. 14 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School have become frighteningly common.

Across the United States and outside U.S. embassies, hundreds of thousands of campaigners took part in the ‘March for Our Lives’ anti-gun protests. Photo:Reuters

With slogans such as ‘If they choose guns over our kids, vote them out,’ protesters in Washington jammed Pennsylvania Avenue as students from the Florida high school where 17 people were murdered called on lawmakers and President Donald Trump to confront the issue. Photo:Reuters

Celebrities sang and survivors spoke, rallying the crowds with chants of ‘Never Again’ and promising that the Florida Parkland students would challenge congressmen and ‘Vote Them Out.’ Photo:Reuters

Students listen as Emma Gonzalez, a survivor of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School mass shooting in Florida, addresses crowds at the ‘March for Our Lives’ event. Photo:Reuters

Protesters hold photos of school shooting victims during a demonstration demanding stricter gun controls in New York City. Photo:Reuters

Parkland shooting survivor Emma Gonzalez addresses the ‘March For Our Lives’ event before pausing for a full 6 minutes and 20 seconds silence – the time it took for the gunman to kill 17 of her Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School classmates. Photo:Reuters

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On Friday, Trump signed a US$1.3 trillion bill that includes modest improvements to background checks for gun sales and grants to help schools prevent gun violence. Photo:Reuters

“I have learned to duck from bullets before I learned to read,” said Edna Chavez, 17, a student at the Manual Arts High School in Los Angeles, who lost a brother to gun violence. Photo:Reuters

“Politicians: either represent the people or get out. Stand with us or beware, the voters are coming,” Cameron Kasky, a 17-year-old high school junior, told the crowd. Photo:Reuters

Student marchers filled streets nationwide, including in Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis, New York, San Diego and St. Louis. Photo:Reuters

Shooting survivors from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida led the demonstration. Photo:Reuters

More than 800 demonstrations were scheduled, with events as far afield as London, Tokyo, Mauritius and Stockholm. Photo:Reuters

.DISARMAMENT & SECURITY.

An article from Thomson Reuters

Chanting “never again,” hundreds of thousands of young Americans and their supporters answered a call to action from survivors of last month’s Florida high school massacre and rallied across the United States on Saturday [March 24] to demand tighter gun laws.

In some of the biggest U.S. youth demonstrations for decades, protesters called on lawmakers and President Donald Trump to confront the issue. Voter registration activists fanned out in the crowds, signing up thousands of the nation’s newest voters.

Frame from video on Reuters website

At the largest March For Our Lives protest, demonstrators jammed Washington’s Pennsylvania Avenue where they listened to speeches from survivors of the Feb. 14 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

There were sobs as one teenage survivor, Emma Gonzalez, read the names of the 17 victims and then stood in silence. Tears ran down her cheeks as she stared out over the crowd for the rest of a speech that lasted six minutes and 20 seconds, the time it took for the gunman to slaughter them.

The massive March For Our Lives rallies aimed to break legislative gridlock that has long stymied efforts to increase restrictions on firearms sales in a nation where mass shootings like the one in Parkland have become frighteningly common.

“Politicians: either represent the people or get out. Stand with us or beware, the voters are coming,” Cameron Kasky, a 17-year-old junior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas, told the crowd.

Another survivor, David Hogg, said it was a new day.

“We’re going to make sure the best people get in our elections to run not as politicians, but as Americans. Because this – this – is not cutting it,” he said, pointing at the white-domed Capitol behind the stage.

Youthful marchers filled streets in cities including Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis, New York, San Diego and St. Louis.

More than 800 demonstrations were scheduled in the United States and overseas, according to coordinators, with events as far afield as London, Mauritius, Stockholm and Sydney.

‘Take Their Liberty Away’

Underlining sharp differences among the American public over the issue, counter-demonstrators and supporters of gun rights were also in evidence in many U.S. cities.

Organizers of the anti-gun rallies want Congress, many of whose members are up for re-election in November, to ban the sale of assault weapons like the one used in the Florida rampage and to tighten background checks for gun buyers.

On the other side of the debate, gun rights advocates cite constitutional guarantees of the right to bear arms.

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“All they’re doing is asking the government to take their liberty away from them without due process,” Brandon Howard, a 42-year-old Trump supporter, said of the protesters in the capital. He had a sign saying: “Keep your hands off my guns.”

Wearing a red “Make America Great Again” sweatshirt, 16-year-old Connor Humphrey of San Luis Obispo, California, said: “Guns don’t kill people. People kill people.”

Humphrey, who was visiting Washington with his family for spring break, said he owns guns for target shooting and hunting and uses them responsibly. His school had a lockdown exercise last week.

“I think teachers should have guns,” he said, echoing a proposal made by Trump after the Parkland killings.

Still, rallies for tighter firearm restrictions also sprang up in rural, Republican-leaning communities ranging from Lewiston, Idaho to Logan, Utah where there is strong support for the Second Amendment constitutional right to own guns.

Among those marching next to New York’s Central Park to call for tighter gun controls was pop star Paul McCartney, who said he had a personal stake in the debate.

“One of my best friends was shot not far from here,” he told CNN, referring to Beatles bandmate John Lennon, who was gunned down near the park in 1980.

Taking aim at the National Rifle Association gun lobby, teenagers chanted, “Hey, hey, NRA, how many kids have you killed today?”

The young U.S. organizers have won kudos and cash from dozens of celebrities, with singers Demi Lovato and Ariana Grande, as well as “Hamilton” creator Lin-Manuel Miranda, among those performing in Washington. Actor George Clooney and his human rights attorney wife, Amal, donated $500,000 and said they would be at the Washington rally.

The U.S. football team the New England Patriots loaned its plane to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School students and their families to travel to Washington.

At the march in Washington, an elementary school student from Virginia, Naomi Wadler, 11, captivated demonstrators when she spoke up for African American girls who were victims of gun violence but whose stories “don’t make the front page.”

White House deputy press secretary Lindsay Walters said the administration applauded “the many courageous young Americans” who exercised their free-speech rights.

“Keeping our children safe is a top priority of the president’s,” said Walters, noting that on Friday the Justice Department proposed rule changes that would effectively ban “bump stock” devices that let semi-automatic weapons fire like a machine gun.

Also on Friday, Trump signed a $1.3-trillion spending bill including modest improvements to background checks for gun sales and grants to help schools prevent gun violence.

Former President Barack Obama said on Twitter that he and his wife Michelle were inspired by all the young people who made the marches happen.

“Keep at it. You’re leading us forward. Nothing can stand in the way of millions of voices calling for change,” Obama said.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson, Lacey Johnson, Katanga Johnson and Lauren Young in Washington, Alice Popovici in New York, Phoenix Tso in Los Angeles, Zachary Fagenson in Parkland, Robert Chiarito in Chicago, Jim Oliphant in West Palm Beach and Andrew Hay in Taos; Editing by Daniel Wallis, James Dalgleish and Nick Zieminski)

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

An article by Marcia Chambers from the New Haven Independent

Abby Boyle, a junior at Branford High School, remembers the moment she took her cell phone to sign up her high school for the national student walkout to raise awareness about gun violence in the nation’s schools. 

It was a moment she and others will never forget because it was part of a national event that has transformed her and hundreds of other Branford students, an event they organized. 

“A big part of this was to show that our generation is going to make the change because we are the future, and we are soon to be adults. So it is like this is our time to really get out there and have them listen to us,” said Jayleen Flores (pictured), a senior and the president of the school’s Student Council.

Abby Boyle, Jayleen Flores, Andrew DeBenedictis, Mary Olejarzyk
(Bill O’Brien photo)

The national student walkout idea began on social media shortly after 17 students and teachers were gunned down in their classrooms on Feb. 14 at Florida’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. A former student armed with a high-powered assault rifle and determined to open fire went into the school and executed his plan.

Branford students created their own program, encouraged by school administrators to do so. The Walsh Intermediate School also had a program. The high school program held last Wednesday was led by Boyle and three other student leaders, Flores, a senior; Andrew DeBenedictis, a junior; and Mary Olejarzyk, a junior. Flores is student council president. The others all hold officer positions in various school organizations. (See photo)

The four students met with the Eagle last Friday in the office of High School Principal Lee Panagoulias, Jr., who said about 500 to 600 students attended the walkout program, which had been planned for outdoors, but was redirected to the school gym because it had snowed the day before. Those who did not participate went to the school auditorium. Faculty chose their destinations as well.

Olejarzyk said, “I think in terms of finding our voice, we were never told no. This administration was willing and excited to help us. In a lot of different schools in other parts of the country and even in Connecticut, kids were told they would be suspended if they walked out, and that is not personally what I think they should be saying. Young people were the lowest number of voters turning out in recent elections. I think we need to encourage voting, and I appreciate what our school did. They let us have our voice.”

The students said they would have liked the press to be there and one of them said she had contacted a local television station. “I think the press being there would have been nice, especially for us. I think it would have been nice because more people could have heard our story,” Boyle said.

Before last Wednesday’s event, the Eagle contacted Hamlet Hernandez, the district’s superintendent, to ask if we could cover the student program at the high school. He said it was closed to the press. He would not explain why it was closed to the press except to say some events were open and some were not. 
 
Growing Up With Sandy Hook

Boyle, one of the high school’s leaders, wanted her school to be part of a program to commemorate the lives of those lost that day and to find a way to talk about safety for students. The attack on the Florida high school was the 17th school shooting in the U.S. in the first 45 days of 2018. 

These Branford teens have lived with kids being killed in their classrooms since they were 12. They said they all remember well when a young man named Adam Lanza walked into the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, five years ago and opened fire, killing 20 children, ages 6 to 7 years old, and six educators, including teachers and the school principal. Then he killed himself. He had earlier killed his mother. 

Abby Boyle, a junior at Branford High School, remembers the moment she took her smart phone to sign up her high school for the national student walkout to raise awareness about gun violence in the nation’s schools. 

It was a moment she and others will never forget because it led to a national event that has transformed her and hundreds of other Branford students.

When Olejarzyk spoke before those in the high school gym she read a letter she wrote to U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, who in the aftermath of Sandy Hook has devoted himself to changing how the nation deals with guns and the law. In her letter she told Murphy what it was like “to be our age and to grow up in an age of Sandy Hook. This has to stop.”

Murphy, along with U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal and U.S. Reps. Rosa DeLauro and Elizabeth Esty spoke to the thousands of students who assembled at the National Student Walkout in Washington, D.C. 

Olejarzyk told Murphy what it has been like “with this constant news of new mass shootings in schools in other places. This affects us.” She said she wrote Murphy that “we are ready to make the change; we are ready when we are 18 vote for officials who will make the change on what should be adopted.”

Boyle said she started the process to involve BHS in the national student walkout “about one month ago,” after she learned about the walkout on social media. “The idea was to get kids involved and to raise awareness against gun violence and to show remembrance for all the victims lost due to that violence and to show Congress that we care.”

Thousands of students in schools across the state and country walked out on the morning of March 14, each school doing it their own way. In nearby Guilford the students walked out of their classrooms and onto the street, standing in front of their school. Other kids took to their local town or city halls. But some Connecticut school districts threatened to suspend students for walking out, not happy with the idea that students would create their own independent program. 

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Student Chosen Themes
 
At the Branford High gym, each of the four student leaders, led with a theme. Boyle began with a Remembrance, reading aloud the 17 names of those shot to death. Flores spoke about students finding a voice. DeBenedictis spoke about student unity, and Olejarzyk spoke about teenage life and its challenges. 

The Branford students defined the walkout as leaving their classrooms, not necessarily leaving the building. “We all physically left the classroom. There were a lot of different ways to do this and this is the way we chose it,” DeBenedictis said. He added that it had snowed the day before and the student leaders didn’t feel comfortable forcing everyone out. We decided it was better to have it in the gym,” he said, adding it was easier to hear in the gym than on the field.
   
Flores got right to the point on the location issue. “When I spoke I made the point that it doesn’t matter where we’re standing, but that we are standing. Some people were pretty upset that we weren’t going out, but it shouldn’t matter where we are. It is what we are standing up for.”

All four were highly aware of the fact that they may well be the generation to change America’s thinking about guns, violence, and schools. Each has come to see how they empowerment works; each has now discovered an inner voice they want to share with others.

DeBenedictis said, “And what we are seeing in Congress is that actions that should have been happening haven’t taken place over the last 20 years where school shootings have become increasingly more common. And because our politicians really aren’t taking care of this we felt it was time for students to step up and start fighting for ourselves.” 

Olejarzyk agreed. “I think what happened in Florida really resonated with people our age because we are very politically aware and after what the students in Parkland started we felt really inspired to help make their message louder up here.”

The Eagle asked each student what he or she took away from the experience.

Boyle said, “I guess what I felt thinking back a few weeks ago when I found this (demonstration) on the internet, I said I am going to set up my school for this and see what happens. I was thinking this probably won’t be a big thing. And it is just so surreal to see that we were part of this movement and that we are such a small little school, in a small town, in a small state, but it really shows that our actions matter, that we could do something really huge.”

DeBenedictis said, “When all was said and done, thousands if not hundreds of thousands of students at schools participated in this across the country. We are writing history in textbooks for one of the largest student movements in history.

“This really helped us find a voice, a united front. I think this is an issue that students need to be organized on.  As young people we found a voice on this issue. With the march on Washington coming, it is really good that we are making this all happen,” DeBenedictis added. 

Panagoulias, who let the students do virtually all the talking at the interview, was asked by the Eagle about earlier student movements in American history.

He remembered demonstrations of decades past. “During the ’70s it was a lot of us versus them, students versus the institution. I think one of the things Branford chose to do is to support their kids. This was a great opportunity for the entire learning community. Some teachers went out. Some didn’t.”

The principal asked the four students, “If you wanted to go outside do you think we would have supported that?”

“Yes,” Boyle said. “It didn’t matter where.” DeBenedictus observed that in the gym “we could hear each other speaking.”

What the four students said they learned was that coming together changed how they think. Each seemed to have found new goals and a new direction that would take them outside themselves in the future.

Voting in Elections  

Asked if they had registered to vote, all said they have pre-registered to vote so that may do so when they turn 18.  The principal said “We will have the Registrars of Voters here in the spring when more kids are of age so that they can register.” 

Boyle delivered the register to vote message to the hundreds of students gathered in the gym. “Our decisions matter. Each and every one of us has to register to vote. We need support. Our generation needs to have a voice.” The energy in the gym after a walk-out that lasted 17 minutes was intense, she said. “ This was an overflowing of energy, of positivity. Everyone was commenting. It was really awesome,” she said. 

Flores said, “Everyone I talked to left with a great feeling afterward. They were inspired.”

DeBenedictis pointed out that for many people “this was their major political event, for many this was the first time they made a poster, or came out because they were passionate about something and that was a really big deal for a lot of students. I think that will inspire them in the future, to stand up for what they believe in.

“One other thing I want to add. I think this idea that young people are completely apathetic about politics, I think that is declining. If you look at our generation, how passionate we are about these issues that are affecting us, I think young people are really waking up. I think it will explode in 2016 and especially in the presidential election in 2018.” 

Other Points of View
 
Those students who did not walk out may still be involved in many of the issues, Panagoulias observed. 

“Those students may be involved but they may have different opinions. Because they chose not to participate it may mean they have different viewpoints but they may still be involved.”

Boyle said that while the focus of her program was not guns or violence “we brought it up and mentioned it, and some people have really strong opinions about gun restrictions and gun laws.

“Even if you may have a different opinion than me or any of us here today, we can still work together to come up with a better solution. You know it is not always about being so left or so right. Like sometimes you have to be in the middle to find a solution. I think many do not realize that.”

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .

An article from Democracy Now (reprinted according to terms of Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License)

In a historic day of action, more than a million students from over 3,000 schools walked out of classes to protest gun violence on Wednesday [March 14]. Walkouts occurred in all 50 states as well as some schools overseas. The nationwide student walkouts occurred one month after 17 students and staff were shot dead at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. At many schools, students walked out for 17 minutes—one minute for each person murdered in Parkland. The students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School are now organizing a massive March for Our Lives on March 24 in Washington, and solidarity marches are planned across the country. We air moments from marches in New York and talk with Luna Baez and Citlali Mares, two students in Denver, Colorado, who helped organize their school’s walkout for gun reform Wednesday.

Video on Democracy Now website

Transcript

NERMEEN SHAIKH: In a historic day of action, more than a million students from over 3,000 schools walked out of classes to protest gun violence on Wednesday. Walkouts occurred in all 50 states, as well as some schools overseas. This was the scene outside one school here in New York City.

PROTESTERS: No guns, no violence! No guns, no violence! No guns, no violence! No guns, no violence! No guns, no violence! No guns, no violence! No guns, no violence!

CHELSEA: My name is Chelsea. I go to the High School of Fashion Industries. And today we’re here to protest against what happened at Parkland. We’re here to stop gun violence in schools and everywhere.

PROTESTERS: I’m a student, not a target! I’m a student, not a target! I’m a student, not a target! I’m a student, not a target!

LAURA RICHMOND: My name is Laura Richmond. I go to High School of Fashion Industries. And we’re here protesting gun violence all across America. Guns don’t solve problems, they create problems. And obviously, as you can see, we all feel strongly about this. This is something that’s been going on for far too long. And if people—if adults aren’t going to take action, we need to take action.

PROTESTERS: No guns, no violence! No guns, no violence! No guns, no violence! No guns, no violence!

KAYLA CONCEPCION: My name is Kayla Concepcion. I go to the High School of Fashion Industries. We are protesting to disarm the NRA and the mass school shootings that has happened across the country. It has to end now. And it starts with every school protesting. And we are here today to stop this shooting! Today! Every school should walk out right now and go and protest!

PROTESTERS: Disarm the NRA! Disarm the NRA! Disarm the NRA! Disarm the NRA! Disarm the NRA!

AMY GOODMAN: The nationwide student walkouts occurred one month after 17 students and faculty were shot dead at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. At many schools, students walked out for 17 minutes—one minute for each person murdered in Parkland. The students at Majory Stoneman Douglas High School are now organizing a massive March for Our Lives on March 24th in Washington, D.C. Democracy Now! will be there, broadcasting live the entire march. Solidarity marches are planned for across the country. In Brooklyn, New York, a walkout occurred at Edward R. Murrow High School.

ANASTASIA BEIRNE-MEYER: We are standing here today, halting our education to show that we will not be living in fear of a school shooter. We will not be next. We will not sit in our classrooms wondering why Congress is not working as hard as we are. We will not overlook the fact that it is the students’ responsibility to speak out against the dangers of guns. And I’m not just talking about mass shootings. I’m talking about the militarization of our law enforcement and the normalization of these weapons in our communities. We will not let our future be dictated by the millions of dollars from the National Rifle Association that prevent stronger gun laws.

AMY GOODMAN: We begin today’s show in Denver, Colorado, where we’re joined by two organizers of a student walkout at Kunsmiller Creative Arts Academy in Denver, Colorado. We’re joined by Lali Mares and Luna Baez. Luna is the daughter of the undocumented activist Jeanette Vizguerra, who’s one of the founders of the Metro Denver Sanctuary Coalition. Jeanette Vizguerra took refuge, sanctuary, in Denver, but now is now out, because there is a private bill that protects her.
Luna Baez and Lali Mares, we welcome you both to Democracy Now! Luna, let’s begin with you. Talk about what happened yesterday at your middle school.

LUNA BAEZ: What happened yesterday at our middle school was we walked out in support of better gun laws and for the 17 that fell during the Parkland school shooting.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: You talk about what kind of response you and Luna received when you started to organize this protest. What did teachers and students at your school say to you?

CITLALI MARES: Some of our teachers were very hesitant about the walkout. A lot of them supported us, but we knew that there are some that weren’t going to be able to help us to the maximum we needed. And then the students felt like it was very important, and it was important for them to walk out with us, because they knew that it affected them in a very big way.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: And what about your school principal and other school administrators?

CITLALI MARES: We didn’t hear much about our principal. Our vice principal was out there while we were walking out. So, it was good to have that kind of support while we were there.

AMY GOODMAN: Luna, can you talk about why you chose to be one of the organizers of this protest? And what grade are you in?

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LUNA BAEZ: I am in eighth grade. And the reason I chose to be one of the organizers was because from what I know. Me and Lali had a bit more experience than the other children—

AMY GOODMAN: In organizing?

LUNA BAEZ: —and the other students. Yes.

AMY GOODMAN: And would you say that experience comes from organizing around your mom, Jeanette Vizguerra?

LUNA BAEZ: Yes.

AMY GOODMAN: And do you see these issues as linked? Can you talk about your mom just for a few minutes? I visited her in Denver at the Unitarian Church, where she had taken sanctuary, before she was able to come out because she’s protected by a bill that was passed in Congress.

LUNA BAEZ: So, I would say it would be linked, because my experience with media and all things related to that are from my mom’s process.

AMY GOODMAN: And, Lali, why did you choose to help organize this student walkout? And what demands are you making of President Trump, of Congress, of the NRA?

CITLALI MARES: I chose to organize, to help organize the walkout because I knew that this wouldn’t just affect us as a school, it would affect everyone in the United States and out of the United States, because this is something that’s bigger. And with a bigger group of students, it can allow us to create a bigger impact.

And I would just want the president to pass something that says that we can—we have better laws about guns, not necessarily taking away the guns, but nobody needs that type of weapon in their house, where somebody who doesn’t need that has it in their hands and something like Parkland can happen.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: And, Lali, how many students participated from your school in the walkout? Were you surprised by how many did or how many didn’t?

CITLALI MARES: Yes, we expected maybe 20, 25, 30. We didn’t expect that big of a group, and we thought it would just be eighth graders walking out with us. As Luna and I were walking the halls, we noticed that high schoolers were joining some of the sixth and seventh graders. So, I would say about 70, 80. It wasn’t a big a—like a big size, but it was large for us as our first walkout.

AMY GOODMAN: And, of course, 2,000 Denver-area students also walked out all over, many marching to the state Capitol. I want to thank Luna Baez and Citlali Mares for joining us from Kunsmiller Creative Arts Academy in Denver, as we go back to more voices from the nationwide student walkout on Wednesday.

PROTESTERS: No more silence! End gun violence! No more silence! End gun violence!

AHRIANA MERRYWEATHER: All these people have come together today so that they can express how they feel about gun violence and all these things and how kids don’t feel safe in their schools, which is the one place we should feel safe, because that’s where we spend most of our time.

REEM ARAJAI: I hope that the president will step up, stop accepting money from the NRA, because if all of the deaths that have occurred aren’t enough to convince him, then I guess it just has to be us protesting right now.

SIMONE HICKS: If you can protect guns this much and don’t have the same regard for the people who are going to create your country in the future, then we’re in trouble. The kids are the future. If you’re not protecting the kids, then what’s left?

PROTESTERS: I call BS! I call BS! I call BS!

NUPOL KIAZOLU: My name is Nupol Kiazolu. I’m 17 years old, and I’m president of the Youth Coalition for Black Lives Matter New York. I’m out here also because I lost my father to gun violence, and I lost many family members and friends to gun violence. Gun violence is not a new issue. It affects our communities every single day, and it affects black and Latino communities disproportionately. I came here to give honor to those 17 lives that were lost, because those people were heroes. But we don’t need any more martyrs. We need justice. And that starts here and now.

PROTESTER 1: This is about people—gay, straight, black, white, religious, nonreligious—coming together so their kids don’t have to be afraid to go to school.

CAROLINA THOMAS: Hi. My name’s Carolina Thomas, and I’m 12 years old. And I’m here today because I’m sick and tired of hearing that someone has died at school innocently. I am sick and tired of hearing that someone has been killed at school while learning how to read or write. Why are we fighting for something that the adults should be fighting for? Why are we here marching and walking out of school, when the people of Congress should be protecting us?

PROTESTER 2: It makes sense to me that the only problem is the guns. Get rid of the guns, get rid of the violence. We have the most guns than any country on the face of this world. We’re the richest country that’s ever existed on the planet, and we can’t deal with these issues? It doesn’t make any sense.

PROTESTERS: Donald Trump, Mike Pence, gun control is common sense! Donald Trump, Mike Pence, gun control is common sense!

MARIA LOPEZ: As students, we’re here uniting our voices to advocate for like more stricter gun laws and for a safer school environment, because that’s why we come here. We come here for an education, and we don’t come here to be worrying, “Am I going to go home or not?”

JOEY ZARATE: In order to get our stronger message across, we needed to hold it here, where everyone gets to hear that we are together, we are one, we are with Florida. At the end of the day, we just want our schools to be safe and never be shot up again. That’s why we say, “Never again.”

PROTESTERS: Enough is enough! Enough is enough! Enough is enough!

PROTESTER 3: We grow guns. We place them in the hands of Americans and say, “Go play.” The inevitable senseless violence that follows is succeeded by senseless silence.

AMY GOODMAN: Voices from the nationwide student walkout on Wednesday. It’s estimated about a million people walked out, not only in the United States, but calling for gun control all over the world, in solidarity with the students at Parkland.

This is Democracy Now! We’ll be in Washington, D.C., on March 24th, covering the March for Our Lives, organizing the student survivors of Parkland, organizing around the Valentine’s Day massacre, calling for comprehensive gun control.

This is Democracy Now! When we come back, we go to Alabama to hear about another school shooting, just a few weeks after Parkland, that hasn’t gotten anything like the attention of what happened in Florida. Stay with us.