The Tennessee Insurrection. That is what some legislatures called the gun protest that took place in the Tennessee Capital, an Insurrection. There was no violence. There was no damage. Most importantly there were no injuries. What there was is a lot of lying by White Representatives about what happened. Just calling it an insurrection was a lie. One thing that they did wish to show was that the Black Representatives are less of a Representative than the White’s are. They expelled from the legislature two black State Representative Justin Jones and Justin Pearson for their disruptive behavior as they supported student’s protests. A White female Representative was also part of the protest but she was not expelled. When she was questions why she wasn’t expelled and the other two were she said that it was probably because of the color of her skin.  Children are dying from guns but Black Representatives disrupting mostly White Representatives in support of those children is what the real problem is to some. It was not to me, but in Tennessee I think they feel that they have to put the “Uppity Black Representatives” in their place.  

On January 6^th we saw a real insurrection that injured over one hundred police officers. It was live on TV and seen around the world. In Tennessee we see children, young people, crying for help and not being heard being called insurrectionist. They were in the Capital to be heard and their cries fell onto deft ears from the mostly White Republican legislature. I am glad of one thing. That is, these were young students and not adults. I think much of the response from the authorities was subdued because these were mostly young students. They knew that it would have looked terrible if they were seen beating up children. I have written before that when the police become the tool of the oppressor we are going to be in for a terrible hair day. Tennessee’s day was pretty bad but it could have been much worse.

I couldn’t believe my eyes when I read that some Tennessee Republicans cried “Insurrection”. This was a peaceful protest by mostly students that want to see an end to School shootings. Hey, I am on their side and support them whole heartedly. Do we think that these Children are just stupid? They see and read about all the violence in not only their schools but also in their neighborhoods. They are standing up to have their voices be heard and the only one that is listening are the Democrats. Why is that? The Democrats did not lead these children but when they came they supported them. Even if the Republicans didn’t agree with them why didn’t they welcome the students and celebrate the fact that these students were exercising their First Amendment Rights. What a teaching moment for those kids. What lesson has the Republicans taught these students. Sit down and shut up? You are just a child so you have no First Amendment Rights? The King of England wanted the American Colonists to just sit down and shut up. But we didn’t then and the Students shouldn’t now. You can blame that damn liberal education all you want, but, that too would be a lie. Our history and even White American history is filled with groups that would not sit down and shut up from the Boston Tea Party to the Anti-War marches of the 60s.

The next generation is coming to age. I grew up with the “Communist Scare” and the “Bomb”. We practiced “Bomb Drills” by hiding under our desks because of the “Communist Threat”. To this day calling a person a Communist is like calling someone a dirty word. We had about four different channels that they could watch on TV and we had about an hour of news a day. If you were truly serious about the news you would read the paper. Now look at what the latest generation, Generation Z, is growing up with. First they are growing up practicing “active shooter drills” so that they know how to protect themselves when a person comes into their school with a gun. Just like me, being constantly reminded that the Communists were a threat, the students of today are constantly being reminded that a person with a gun is a threat. They are growing up knowing that our schools are not being made safer and that many in our government has chosen the gun over the child. Where we had only about an hour of news a day kids today kids get a news overload. There are now 24 hour news channels. They are growing up with Conservative News Channels, Liberal News Channels and everything in between. The thing that they are using the most is the Internet and Social Media. Today there is a news overload. The hate that I mostly was not expose to when I was young is now there in black and white on Social Media and the news for them to see. You put a post on twitter about gun control and you just watch the hate that comes at you. You put up a post on Black History and you watch the hate that comes at you. This is what the latest Generation see. We treat them like they don’t communicate, well because they spend so much time on their electronic devices. In reality, they can communicate with someone just as easy on the other side of the world as they can a person down the street.

We have to stop treating our children as they are stupid because they aren’t. They know that their schools are not grooming them to be gay. They know that Black History is American History. They know that they don’t need to be embarrassed for what people did in the past but they know that they should learn about it. They know when they are being told to sit down and shut up and they don’t like it. They know when their free speech is being attacked. You can’t say gay in school but it is all over the TV and social media so how stupid can that be. They know that guns kill people and they know that they are being lied to when it comes to gun control. They can read the 2^nd Amendment and look at the history of the 2^nd Amendment and know that they are being lied to just as well as you and me. It is not hard to see that the 2^nd Amendment has been interrupted very differently today than it has been throughout most of our history. In today’s digital age that Generation Z has grown up in they have all the information at their fingertips. History is not written by politicians or even by governments. It is written by the observers and the researchers of history and those observers and researchers are all over the world who constantly update a revise history as more truths get discovered. That is what history is.

I have always heard that the Children are our future. Children eventually become young adults and voters. They may be marching to the Capital of Tennessee now but they will be marching to the polls in 2024 to really have their voices heard.