Seventeen lives were lost in the shooting of Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, Feb. 14. Fourteen students, three adults, all between the ages of 14 and 49. What must have started as a normal day of school for teenagers just like us ended in a tragic event that has left all of our nation with raging emotions. Some call for change, some say there’s nothing to be done.

America has a ridiculous rate of mass shootings, an event defined as a gun incident that has left four or more people injured or killed, minus the shooter. According to The Guardian, nine out of 10 average days, a shooting happens. Also according to The Guardian, there have been about 1,624 shootings in the last 1,870 days, and this fact is what brings many people to call for a change in gun laws.

With the events that continue to unfold, our nation is chaotic. Students from high schools all around our nation, including schools as close as Placerville, held walkouts to protest the lack of “sufficient” gun laws and call for change. Although it’s been two weeks since this event, new discoveries continue to rile people up. It had just been found that there was a deputy, Scot Douglas, who had been at the school, and had chosen to not engage with the shooter; this discovery has led to a nationwide outrage.

During the week following the event, I’ve heard a lot about this. Being with my grandparents and other family members in Florida for the break, I’ve heard their own opinions on the matter, some ranging from thoughts of “There is nothing we can do,” to thoughts like “We need to take action, this is ridiculous!”

I find it extremely insane that we deal with these kinds of things. I met a lady in Florida, who had taken a trip to the West Coast to distract herself from her hometown, Parkland. She had two funerals to go to upon return, and her grief and anger showed as she told us her story. Common people lost loved ones, common people have been scarred beyond repair. Could you imagine a regular day turning into something like that?

Personally, I think that regardless of the actions we take, there’s still going to be people out there who will find ways to hurt people. Even before shootings became so common, there were serial killers and bombers; the world has always held wicked people. I can’t think of much that could help this problem, because there isn’t much that will. Some signs I saw from the protests made claims to “melt the guns!” and “don’t protect guns, protect everyone!” Yet even if the guns were melted, there would still be those who had them or were able to make their own. Guns were made to be used as defense or protection, not as weapons of mass destruction. Though that is what they seem to be used as now; they should be used to hunt and protect, not as weapons to take the lives of others.

Change is a hard thing, especially in a scenario like this. You could call off guns, make them totally illegal, and yet people would still find a way to get what they want. You could let it be, and it might fix itself or spiral out of control. There are so many outcomes, but nobody can claim to have an ultimate solution to the gun violence problems. There’s no telling what people will do; we’ve always had our societal dangers.

It seems that the widespread opinion is that the solution to this is as simple as the push of a button. Something as huge as this is not as simple to solve. You can’t just make guns illegal, there are too many in ownership already and people would still be able to obtain them illegally. I will support anything that can be done, but I don’t know what those options are. America’s gun violence is spiraling out of control, and I don’t think there is an ultimate solution to this issue.

by SHANNON BONE