What happened at Michigan State is a rare thing. It’s not rare just because, contrary to what you hear in the media, mass shootings don’t happen that often. It’s also rare because pretty much everyone can agree on something, that what transpired was awful.
However, let’s also be realistic. What happened there didn’t cause some kind of divine revelation for the students. They’re no more experts on things like guns, violent crime, or mass shootings than they were five minutes before the shooting took place.
It doesn’t matter, though, because the media and lawmakers are holding anti-gun Michigan students up and we’re all supposed to listen.
They’re young, angry, and scared.
A group of Michigan students spoke out Tuesday about the need for gun control following the mass shootings at Oxford High School and Michigan State University.
“Everyday we lose someone we love or someone close and it’s all because of gun violence,” said Taylor Jackson, a junior at Dearborn High School. “This has to stop.”
The news conference follows legislation introduced by Democrats in the state Senate just three days after the massacre at MSU on Feb. 13. The legislation would require background checks and safe gun storage, as well as enable courts to temporarily seize guns from people deemed a danger to themselves or others.
Julia Begley, a sophomore at Oxford High School, said the bills “are only the beginning” of what’s needed. But the legislation is a critical first step, she said.
“By passing these bills we will be able to ensure a future and a life for the youth of America,” Begley said.
Students questioned why it took a mass shooting to prompt an urgency in passing the legislation. Republicans shelved similar bills in the past. But now Democrats have control of the Legislature for the first time in nearly 40 years and are poised to pass the bills.
What’s missing from this report, though, is any counter by students in Michigan who disagree with this bunch.
We know they exist. They’ve already made their voices heard once since Michigan State. Where are they in this conversation?
The answer is obvious. They don’t conform to the narrative, so they’re not given a microphone to show that support for this nonsense is far from universal from this particular demographic.
All around the nation, we have numerous students who recognize that gun control doesn’t stop mass shootings. It didn’t in Monterey Park or Half Moon Bay. It didn’t in Hamburg, Germany–and that’s just this year alone!
Gun control, however, means that law-abiding citizens in Michigan who might be willing to protect students are legally forbidden from doing so. That’s about all that’s accomplished with gun control.
Let’s remember that the Michigan State killer wasn’t a convicted felon. There’s little reason to believe that his gun would have been taken from him by a red flag order–especially since he denied even having it. There’s no reason to think that any gun control would have stopped that shooting or any other.
As for the students, they’re not experts on guns, gun violence, the Second Amendment, violent crime, mass shootings, or anything else. At best, they’re just a group of citizens who want something from the government.
Please, folks, stop acting like there’s some reason we should take their concerns more seriously than our own.
