Saturday, March 24, 2018 was a historic day. More than 2 million people in 830 cities across the United States—and tens of thousands more in cities all over the world—staged a coordinated populist protest demanding aggressive government action in closing loopholes in gun-sales laws and more strictly regulating gun ownership.
The protest, themed “March for Our Lives,” brought together several groups that had been working on gun issues for years, but the Feb. 14 2018 massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla.—in which a troubled former student killed 17 with an assault rifle before he was apprehended—was the catalyst for aggressive legislative action. The Stoneman Douglas students vowed to move legislators beyond their customary “thoughts and prayers” statements in the aftermath of disasters.
Leid Stories discusses the emergence of a new generation of leadership, born literally under the gun.