Children and the National Security of America

The latest mass killing in Florida at the school that left 17 children dead and an equal number wounded, including teachers, recalls the apology poet Askia Toure gave for our generation leaving work undone in the 60s struggle for liberation. When I listened to him speak at the University of California, Merced,  I rejected his apology, even took the mike to explain that we who fought America's domestic colonialism faced the military might of the United States, the awesome power of the US Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, National Guard, CIA, FBI, snitches and agent provocateurs. In short, we suffered a military defeat, especially with the additional force of drug and chemical warfare. We thus left this generation in obvious peril at the hands of an inept, corrupt society of adults, whether politicians, educators, law enforcement, religious leaders and others duty-bound to secure our children. And race is totally and absolutely irrelevant, for our children are in danger from inner cities to suburbs, from urban centers to rural communities.

We saw the inability of the US military machine to prevent 9/11, and all the terrorist acts that have taken place on this soil before and after 9/11, including school shootings, church shootings, Las Vegas, Florida's LGBT nightclub, Fort Hood Military Base, etc.

I am at a loss to tell our children we have passed the baton of a wretched land to them, which was the reason for Askia's apology. . We did what we could to make America the so called land of the free and home of the brave.

A few months ago my daughter begged me to pass the baton to her generation because they are qualified and ready. Well, recent events in Florida appear to be the straw that broke the camel's back. But this time it is not the adults but the children themselves who, in spite of their trauma and grief, have transcended the horror of their lives to take authority over their situation.

Initially, they are appealing to adults to solve the problem of their security, but we know from past events adults are incapable of securing their lives because of political expediency, thus we suspect our children shall  be  left with no alternative but to secure they own lives.

After they march on Washington and see no solution, we suspect they will gather to secure themselves. We think their ROT C's may be one answer. Alas, the killer at the Florida school was a member and wore his ROTC T-shirt on the day of death.

Yet, as we discovered in our teaching career that peer teaching is a great method to exhibit leadership and diffuse chaos in the classroom, the ROTC or some other student led security project may be the alternative to the utter failure of adult leadership in school security.

Anytime authorities visit the house of a mentally ill student 39 times and can't discern a serious problem, yes, even after the sick boy announced on social media he wanted to be a school killer, and it was reported to the FBI, we know adults are useless and no faith must be placed in them. Students are thus on their own and have no choice but to secure their own lives.

Even their parents are useless, thus they have no choice but to configure plans to save their lives themselves. Dismiss the notion their brains are not fully developed until age 25, they must take authority immediately to secure themselves since adults cannot. Let us not hear about mental health treatment and gun control, the hour for talk has passed and our children have no choice but to take authority over their lives.The best adults can do is shut up and let their/our children take control.

During the Crack Era, many parents were out of control so children who had to take control of the household, even going to work or even prostituting to put food in the house, sometimes to pay the rent, since their parents were lost in the world of addiction.

Today adults are lost in political agendas that persist with each election, no matter whether Republican or Democrat, so let children take control until adults crawl out of their world of make believe that is so pathological that even with a trillion dollar military budget, they cannot secure the lives of their children but rather continue eternal wars for the arms industry.
---Marvin X
2/20/18