Injustice can be a long but successful road

Changing

Once upon a time it took a thought-provoking book to arouse a nation to action and change the course of human behavior: Harriet Beecher Stowe’s “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” an indictment against slavery; Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle,” about the unclean environment of the slaughter industry; John Steinbeck’s “The Grapes of Wrath,” about the plight of farmers during the Dust Bowl; and Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring,” about the dangers of pesticides. These books changed public opinion.

The tragic shooting deaths of 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., in February shocked the nation, moving high school students to action.

The students are also revisiting the massive, rituallike, protest marches of the 1950s, ‘60s and ‘70s — a tactic used by their parents and grandparents to bring about change in civil rights and to help end the Vietnam War. One reason for the successful outcome of those actions is that the causes — discrimination against people of color and a war being fought by a divided nation — were “morally wrong.” The peaceful marching by students we see on TV and read about in newspapers is morally just.

The issue of gun control has been with us since the 1930s and has waxed and waned toward control down to this day, when there is little control of dangerous military-style weapons.

“Is it morally wrong for civilians to have these weapons?” The hope of protesters is to convince the nation of the moral wrongness of people having such guns that can kill dozens of people in minutes. Will the students marching and protesting succeed in putting an end to senseless murders? Perhaps in time. It is a long road. FREDERICK J. ROKASKY

Squirrel Hill