Saturday is what tomorrow can look like
Saturday’s March for Our Lives event was what hope looks like. It was what change sounds like. This day resonated with what tomorrow can be like.
It was a Miami Beach chant: “Never again!”
It was a San Francisco sign to politicians, “What if these kids are the answer to your thoughts and prayers?”
It was Emma Gonzalez standing in silent honor for the six minutes and 20 seconds it took to kill 17 schoolmates and teachers and injure 17 others at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High on Feb. 14.
It was a voice coming from Washington, D.C., and Parkland and Tacoma and Hartford and Wichita and 800 cities across America and from 37 countries that said the National Rifle Association’s time is coming to an end in this generation like it did to Vietnam and cigarettes in other generations.
It was the faltering voice of a Chicago man whose brother was killed by guns.
It was the defiant voice of a Los Angeles woman whose brother was killed by guns.
It was 11-year-old Naomi Wadler in Washington, saying: “I am here to acknowledge and represent the African-American girls whose stories don’t make the front page.”
It was a full day where only teenagers spoke on the nationally televised stage in Washington, because they started all this, and they continued it full of eloquence and resolve and optimism — perhaps optimism, most of all.
It was David Hogg saying, “Let’s put the USA over the NRA.”
It was Jaclyn Corin saying, “Thank you for standing up — we are on the right side of history.”
It was Yolanda Renee King, the 9-year-old granddaughter of Martin Luther King Jr., saying, “I have a dream enough is enough.”
It was hundreds of volunteers fanning through the crowds to register voters, because if anything was learned from Las Vegas, Sandy Hook, San Bernardino, Columbine and other mass shootings involving an assault weapon it’s that the only effective way to get them banned is at the ballot box.
It wasn’t just the estimates of 800,000 marching in Washington. It also was a USA Today poll saying one of three Americans between the ages of 13 and 24 intended to join the protest in some form.
It was a 99-year-old World War II veteran, who fought in the Battle of the Bulge, holding a sign on Twitter that read, “Listen to the young people.”
It was also Miley Cyrus singing with a “Never Again” sign, Paul McCartney marching near where John Lennon was shot in New York and Lin ManuelMiranda singing a prophetic line from “Hamilton”:
“Raise a glass to the four of us/tomorrow there’ll be more of us.”
Yes, the famous were part of this day. But a small part. The students were the stars. And the crowd.
It chanted in Washington, “Vote them out!”
It chanted in San Francisco, “We want change!”
It teared up everywhere at times, like in Washington when Gonzalez cried in silence and Parkland when Max Schachter, whose son, Alex, was killed in the shooting, said, “I would give everything to have one more second, one more hour with the sweetest boy.”
Most of all, best of all, Saturday felt like the first day of what’s next as these students teach America.
It was Cameron Kasky saying, “The fight begins today and it will not end until we get what we need.”
It was was Hogg saying, “This is the not the ending. This is the beginning of a revolution. And this revolution is going to take every single American going out there and being politically active. This is not a Democratic issue. This is not a Republican issue. This is an American issue.”
It was Corin tweeting, “Thank you all for coming out today. I will never forget this day — we WILL be the change. And don’t worry, we’re not going anywhere.”
It was a lot of us wiping away cynicism and apathy from not trusting our generation.
We trust this one.
dhyde@sun-sentinel.com