On Saturday, a myriad of pro-gun control high schoolers took to the stage of the March for Our Lives to misinform Americans about gun rights, the National Rifle Association, and Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), among other various and sundry targets. Their speeches offered no real solutions other than blanket condemnation of firearms and Second Amendment advocates.
The ubiquitous David Hogg, who has routinely claimed that his political opponents have blood on their hands, yelled, “We will come together. We will get rid of these public servants that only serve the gun lobby …You are those heroes.” Cameron Kasky stated, “Shooting after shooting, the American people now see one thing they all have in common: the weapons. Politicians, either represent the people or get out. The people demand the ban of assault weapons.” This sort of talk predominated at the rally; the students wore tags that read “$1.05,” supposedly the amount of money Rubio was willing to take from the NRA per student to allow them to die.
Needless, to say, none of this is going to result in any serious conversation about gun control.
But at least former President Obama loved all of this:
The kids are entitled to their opinion, of course. But we’re entitled to criticize those opinions as shallow and uninformed, as well as nasty and non-evidence-based.
Except that many in the media and on the Left say that such criticism amounts to an attack on the students themselves. They claim that to critique the bad arguments leveled at the rally would be inappropriate, that the students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School have been invested with both wisdom and moral authority — unless those students, like Kyle Kashuv, oppose the gun control agenda. Then they’re to be ignored, for the most part (Kashuv’s recent spate of appearances has only happened thanks to belated attention after conservative media began highlighting the media’s willingness to ignore him).
Here’s the truth: the media have been using these kids to push their preferred message. It is that simple. That’s not the fault of the kids, who get to make their case to whomever will hear it. It is the fault of the adults who claim to be objective, but covered the March for Our Lives in blanket fashion, even though it was attended by approximately 200,000 people — a number that has been repeatedly surpassed by the media-ignored March for Life.
The gun control debate is a serious one. Everyone should take part. And every opinion should be taken with precisely the same amount of attention to evidence and logic. It’s a pathetic form of identity politics to say that arguments made by victims are unimpeachable.