Action needed to keep others from being added to the list

Kent Bush/Gatehouse columnist

Our culture is collapsing on itself.

Alex Schachter - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

We are fighting an uncivil war and both sides are so busy projecting and protecting their platforms that neither side has time to stop the carnage.

Alaina Petty - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

Another high school has claimed a tragic moment in history. When future generations look back on us, they will wonder why school shootings were viewed through partisan lenses.

Jamie Guttenberg - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

Dozens of children and teachers are dead and injured. No one mourns. No one grieves.

Cara Loughran - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

Empty platitudes introduce repetitive refrains. Politicians offer thoughts and prayers but never any action.

Martin Duque - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

Gun fetishists immediately begin defending their sweet side arms before the bloodstains are even dry.

Peter Wang - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

If you see dead children being pulled from a high school and immediately worry about the NRA or your own stash of guns, you are devoid of both decency and humanity.

Meadow Pollack - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

Voices from the other side immediately call for gun control as though dead children are nothing more than political capital.

Nicholas Dworet - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

I don’t care about your guns. I care that my soon to be high schooler is very aware that only good fortune stands between him and that headline at his school.

Students at Santa Fe High School in Texas knew that they could be next - and they were.

Carmen Schentrup - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

More high school students have died in shootings this year than members of the military have in war zones. That is an indictment on gun owners, the NRA, those who support gun control and those of you who don’t care at all.

Helena Ramsay - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

Solutions are available. This doesn’t happen in other countries. Instead of seeking solutions, we fight over definitions of the Second Amendment. 

Joaquin Oliver - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

Thoughts and prayers. Multiple funerals. Prayers and thoughts. Political posturing. Expensive lobbying.

Gina Montalto - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

Then other news pushes the story off of page one and people forget until another dozen children are killed in a mass shooting and we start the cycle all over again.

Luke Hoyer - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

When we hear 911 calls from students hiding in closets while a gunman kills their friends, no one should think about their right to own a gun or using the tragedy to take the right away from someone else.

Alyssa Alhadeff - Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Fla.

Lackey lawmakers need to stop trying to impress lurid lobbyists by passing laws that make it legal to drive tanks to the grocery store and actually find compassion for parents losing children because campaign contributions are more important than mothers picking out clothes in which to bury sons and daughters.

Sabika Sheikh – Santa Fe, Texas High School

The NRA and it’s bought and paid for legislators claim that gun ownership is a right guaranteed in the constitution. So is free speech, but libel laws limit that right. Public decency laws make it illegal to curse on public transportation. The right to freely assemble is abridged by permitting processes in most cities and states.

Chris Stone – Santa Fe, Texas High School

Any rights protected in the Second Amendment are equally capable of being curbed in order to increase public safety.

Angelique Ramirez – Santa Fe, Texas High School

It is time to have that discussion. We can’t keep celebrating when celebrities offer to pay for the funerals of high school students.

Aaron Kyle McLeod – Santa Fe, Texas High School

It’s a nice offer.

Kimberly Jessica Vaughan – Santa Fe, Texas High School

A better offer is to take action to decrease the likelihood that this could happen again. Will it mean less privacy for people dealing with mental health issues? Maybe.

What about limits to the number and types of guns a person may own. That is a consideration.

Jared Conard Black – Santa Fe, Texas High School

If anything is off the table, you are saying that thing is more important than the lives of high school students and teachers, people attending concerts or going to a clubs who should have the right to make routine life choices without coming under fire from heavily armed assailants.

Shana Fisher – Santa Fe, Texas High School

This isn't political. It isn't a game to be won by one side or the other. When we find a way to stop the carnage, we all win.

Christian Riley Garcia – Santa Fe, Texas High School

It is time to rip up the NRA talking points and voting records. It is time to stop listening to voices that don't recognize that some gun ownership is important and protected.  

You don’t have to read between the lines to see that lives hang in the balance - specifically the high school students whose lives were taken in the last 90 days in mass shootings at their schools.

I listed their names here so readers might remember who they are and what is at stake. It is too late to help them, but we can take action now to make sure there are no more names added to the list.

Our debate and legislation should rise to the level of the challenge. 

Kent Bush Publisher Shawnee News-Star  www.news-star.com