If you care about the lives of children, stop taking the power that is rightly theirs.

Seventeen people die at the gun of one person and America seems capable of only one of two reactions:

--Having armed adults to protect children in schools makes great sense.

--Having loaded guns in a place with children is an asinine idea.

It’s a breath mint. It’s a candy. Tastes Great. Less Filling.

What if you’re both wrong?

If you arm teachers, the first time a teacher takes out an aggressive intruder, conservatives will cheer and the first time someone is shot accidentally, liberals will yell “told you so.” The status quo arguments you know all too well and in either scenario, all either side is doing is creating a cost-effectiveness model of the issue using children’s lives as the capital.

Fear of children and what they might do drives almost all all safety decisions made in school. When discussing something as innocuous as Halloween costumes the educator refrain sings out “what if the kids ________?” “what if they use it to __________?” “We can’t do that. The kids might________!”

Look at city policing as the anti-model. When you have an institution that lives in fear of what people on the lowest rung of power (read: people of color) might do, and people in power have guns, black people get shot. Shit flows downhill.

Until that power dynamic, which also exists in school, gets changed, it really doesn’t matter if you have guns or not. There is enough existence proof that both of the following are true: No guns: people who are broken by the stress, anxiety, and depression that comes of being at the bottom power rung will get weapons and attack the source of their stress. Have guns in the hands of people in power and they are going to accidentally shoot the people they’re afraid of.

If you really care about the lives of children, stop taking from them the power that is every person's right. With it, they might even solve the problems that you certainly aren't.