Guest Post: Iowa Students Ask Lawmakers To Protect Kids, Not Guns – Iowa Starting Line

Each day, folks throughout america wake to information of one other mass capturing.

In 2021, an individual was shot and injured or killed of their automotive each 20 hours. This yr, 120 People are killed with weapons every single day. There have been 146 mass shootings of four-or-more People shot or killed with weapons, as of April 10, 2023. That’s a couple of mass capturing per day. Weapons are the main reason for loss of life for kids in America. Simply over per week after we misplaced six lives to a faculty capturing in Nashville, there was information of one other mass capturing in Louisville. America doesn’t have time to mourn the casualties from one capturing earlier than the following one occurs. It’s a fixed, vicious, and lethal cycle. Sadly, we will not be stunned when one other record of names crosses our information channels. Kids, dad and mom, grandparents, nieces, nephews, associates, and cherished particular person lives misplaced to rounds of numerous bullets. 

These shootings, these deaths, are simply preventable. As a nation, we personal extra firearms per capita than every other nation and are the one developed nation on this planet that grapples with this stage of gun violence. Our legislators ignore this reality and blame gun violence on the folks behind the weapons — not the weapons themselves. This hypocrisy is putting, as they refuse to move crimson flag legal guidelines or common background checks; efficient methods which were confirmed to make it tougher for people searching for to hurt others to entry weapons within the first place. 

Right here, in Iowa, our legislators declare to be pro-life, but flip a blind eye to the 1000’s of kids who’re killed by weapons yearly. Our legislators declare to be involved about defending the innocence of our youngsters by banning gender-affirming healthcare, however ignore pupil activists throughout the state after we are screaming, pleading with them, to guard us from gun violence. As a company, the innocence of March For Our Lives Iowa was stolen as we recited the names of all 21 individuals who have been killed in Uvalde, Texas, most of them below the age of 11. Our compassion was cripped as we posed for images amongst the numerous victims, most youthful than us, as a photograph op is far more digestible than a Home File. Our hope for humanity was questioned as we have been inspired to combat towards payments, as a substitute of encouraging protecting literature. 

We have now determined sufficient is sufficient. We’re sick of the hypocrisy. We’re sick of strolling into faculty every single day fearing for our lives, and the lives of these we love. Individuals who oppose widespread sense gun laws are the people who declare their proper to personal an assault rifle, a weapon whose harm would have been unimaginable to the Founding Fathers, is protected by the Second Modification. We ask them- when did your proper to personal a gun turn into extra essential than youngsters’s proper to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? Why do our lives maintain much less worth to you than a gun? Our legislators have an obligation to guard children, not weapons — but their actions hardly observe go well with. 

Our leaders are selecting to prioritize the rights of a loaded, dangerous, inanimate object over our rights to a future free from violence. At present, the Iowa legislature is proposing a invoice that may strip property homeowners’ proper to ban firearms from being in vehicles on their property. This invoice, referred to as HF 654, would carry weapons onto faculty and church grounds the place they may be stolen, or worse, used to homicide dozens of individuals.

Remind your legislators that the lives of youngsters and the rights of property homeowners are extra essential to you than wielding firearms. Electronic mail and name your representatives, and demand they oppose HF 654 as a result of sufficient is sufficient. The time is now, and we won’t look forward to the following capturing to take motion — change is lengthy overdue. 

Observe March For Our Lives Iowa on Instagram @mfoliowa to remain updated on methods to get entangled within the combat towards gun violence.

by Hannah Hayes, a junior at Roosevelt Excessive Faculty in Des Moines, and Keiana James, a senior at Cedar Falls Excessive Faculty.
04/12/2023