Children are terrified of school shootings, gun violence. Tennessee lawmakers should listen.
When crowds of young people flooded the state Capitol this spring to protest gun violence, I felt inspired and hopeful for change. They showed up day after day to demand safer gun laws, but their cries for change were ignored.
The Tennessee General Assembly controlled by a GOP supermajority showed indifference. Young people who’ve come of age in the endless cycle of school shootings were disregarded by lawmakers who’ve never had to hide under a desk or sit through a lockdown drill.
For parents like myself whose heart follows their children into an elementary school every weekday, it’s difficult to make sense of a state legislature unwilling to prioritize the safety of our kids over unfettered access to high powered guns. It’s difficult to understand how a piece of metal is valued over the life of my kid. It’s impossible to understand how one amendment has become more important than the future of my child and their classmates.
Instead of making decisions from the comfort of their chamber, the Tennessee General Assembly needs to visit a classroom of third graders and explain why they refuse to act on commonsense gun legislation. They will probably receive the same response I got when discussing school shootings with my kids – scrunched faces, furrowed brows and confused eyes. Children view this problem with a refreshingly simple mindset not influenced by propaganda, fearmongering and legalese. They understand the source of the problem. Dangerous people have access to high-powered weapons, and they wonder why the grownups aren’t stopping them.
Constitutional absolutism reigns
Parents have waited the past several months for Gov. Bill Lee and lawmakers to bring forth legislation to address gun violence. But as the special session looms, there are no signs meaningful change will happen this summer; the proposed legislation lacks language that addresses gun reform. Even the extreme risk protection order legislation supported by Gov. Lee will not be given serious consideration.
Are school shootings common? As students head back to school, should parents worry about shootings? The math says no.
Since late March, after a shooter killed six people at Covenant School, I’ve listened to lawmakers who oppose gun reform attempt to justify their opposition. Many of them speak of the Second Amendment as if it were Scripture and not an amendment written by imperfect human beings in an era much different than our own.
They are unwilling to consider that one can respect the Second Amendment while thinking critically about its function in the 21st century. Their absolutist view leaves no room for reasonable debate of what weapons should be allowed by law.
Is America safe for our kids? If the US won't protect children from gun violence, should I protect mine by leaving?
We will not forget what happened at Covenant School
As time passes, the Tennessee GOP hopes we forget about what happened at Covenant School. But I won’t be forgetting, and neither will my neighbor who hid in a closet the day of the shooting on March 27.
The violence will forever be etched in her memory. On that Monday morning, as the shooter shredded the bodies of three 9-year-old kids and three adults, she barricaded her classroom door and hid in a closet with small children for an hour. From the cramped closet, she listened to gunfire and texted her husband not knowing if she would see him again.
Take a moment and place yourself in that dark closet with terrified children not old enough to be quiet; consider how powerless you would feel sitting on the hard floor, begging kids to be silent, trying to keep yourself calm and listening to gunfire on the other side of the wall.
The members of the Tennessee General Assembly need to close their eyes and imagine themselves sitting with those children while a stranger roams outside the classroom unleashing hundreds of rounds from an AR-15-style rifle. And then they should ask themselves: What do those children packed in that closet deserve?
Billy Kilgore of Antioch is a parent of two children in Metro Nashville schools, a writer and an an at-home dad. This column first published at The Tennessean.
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This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Kids are begging lawmakers to act on guns. Can Tennessee lead the way?
