The first hint that something might be different this time came the morning after the shootings, from a Douglas High School sophomore named Sarah Chadwick, who informed the President of the United States, via his favorite medium, in words that quickly went viral, “I don’t want your condolences you fucking piece of shit, my friends and teachers were shot.”
Their grief was raw, their rage palpable. Emma Gonzalez, a senior at Douglas, had the most searing indictment:
“The people in the government who were voted into power are lying to us. And us kids seem to be the only ones who notice and are prepared to call B.S.
“Companies, trying to make caricatures of the teen-agers nowadays, saying that all we are are self-involved and trend-obsessed and they hush us into submissions when our message doesn’t reach the ears of the nation, we are prepared to call B.S.
“Politicians who sit in their gilded House and Senate seats funded by the N.R.A., telling us nothing could ever be done to prevent this: we call B.S.
“They say that tougher gun laws do not prevent gun violence: we call B.S.”
The crowd was now joining in.
“They say a good guy with a gun stops a bad guy with a gun: we call B.S.
“They say guns are just tools, like knives, and are as dangerous as cars: we call B.S.
“They say that no laws would have been able to prevent the hundreds of senseless tragedies that occur: we call B.S.
“That us kids don’t know what we’re talking about, that we’re too young to understand how the government works.” The crowd was now in a frenzy of anger and sadness, the people around me were tearing up as they yelled, “We call B.S.”
And then, in unison, the people gathered began to chant, “Vote them out, vote them out, vote them out.”
If you stand with the students and activists of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and the 30,000 people killed by guns every year, we’re asking you to turn out for the March For Our Lives. It’s time we say #NeverAgain and end gun violence.
There are 828 sibling marches planned in conjunction with the main march in Washington DC. This is global, and chances are there is one near you.
We understand that not everyone can attend a march, so we want to make it easy for everyone to participate. Your voice matters, even if you can’t be there in person. That’s why we’re creating a virtual space with optional ways for everyone to participate:
Join us this Saturday as we livestream the March For Our Lives starting at 12 p.m. EST. The livestream will be at the top of every dashboard on every phone, computer, and tablet that uses Tumblr that day.
There’s going to be an @action-packed dashboard takeover with original art sourced from the Tumblr community and @creatrs.
You can show your support that day by posting your illustrations, your poems, your promises—anyway you want to express yourself. We even have stickers to add to your photos, if you want. They’re a collaboration between Tumblr Creatrs (@creatrs) and our friends at Kanvas.
They’re in your app now. Make sure to tag your posts with #NeverAgain so everyone can see your support.
This is it, Tumblr. This is how change happens. When people ask #WhatWillYouDo, you can point them to Saturday, March 24; To the march you participated in, the money you donated, or the messages you spread across the globe with social media.
Props to Bess Kalb (@bessbell on Twitter) for compiling the amount of blood money each of these members of Congress receive from the NRA. Vote to remove these T&P generators.
wupacing 