When delving into the complexities that come with explaining to a five-year-old child upon entry to education what a “shooter drill” is and the repercussions that come with such drills, many may wonder how we have collectively gotten to this point as a society. In a country where oftentimes the first response given by the masses to an act of school-related gun violence is ‘Don’t take away our guns,’ mentions their second amendment rights, etcetera, it is without much question that, as a total, the American population’s concern with the safety of our fellow people’s children, along with our own, has declined substantially in favor of protecting firearm access.

     While the idea of maintaining a laissez-faire attitude concerning weapons has always been a staple of Republican culture, the subject concerns the relevance of young people’s safety in everyday life, namely their safety within the public education system. Anxieties encompassing youths every day regarding school-related violence have been on the steep rise; Pew Research states that as of 2022, when surveying students 13-17, 44% of those questioned state that they feel consistent apprehension that a shooting will occur in their schools and communities. This adamantly displays that almost half of American schoolchildren conceptualize the idea of becoming a victim of gun violence as a preventable situation occurring for the appeasement of a gun-toting society.

     While the average conservative may be less reprehensible for their lack of knowledge of these such events occurring, gun rights lobbyists, along with pro-second amendment politicians, have benefited off of the average uneducated American prevailing a harmful narrative to the American people, stating that ‘Guns do not kill people, people kill people,’ however this way of thought is inherently problematic for a multitude of reasons, one being the lack of solution it ultimately provides. When conditioning society into processing gun-related violence as solely a burden placed upon their fellow person, it only allows for a limited degree of preventive action. Preventative action is essential when tackling this issue, mainly due to the fact that it concerns the lives of others. Often, the opposing side of this argument loses the sentiment that this perspective provides; humanity is lost in their argument, which is inherently inhumane and presents the lack of genuine interest they may have in the regular of others.