Students Want You To Know What'll Happen If They Die In A School Shooting
ADVERTISEMENT
For students across the country, dying in a school shooting is not theoretical. This year alone there have been 22 school shootings where a person was hurt or killed, according to CNN.
Following the attack at Santa Fe High School in Texas last week, student Paige Curry told ABC13: "It's been happening everywhere. I've always kind of felt like that eventually it was going to happen here too." The shooting — which happened just after the three-month mark of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, FL — left 10 people dead.
This weekend, teenagers began using the hashtag #IfIDieInASchoolShooting to send a message. They listed milestones they will miss if they're killed in an attack, the desire for their deaths to be politicized, and words of comfort for their loved ones.
Andrew Schneidawind, an 18-year-old college sophomore, created the hashtag.
"I'm gonna try and get a hashtag trending called #IfIdieInASchoolShooting. If you wanna join, feel free," he wrote. "#IfIdieInASchoolShooting, I will never be able to finish my animated TV series, I'll never be able to see my sister again, and I will have to become a martyr."
For Lane Murdock, the 16-year-old student behind last month's National School Walkout, #IfIDieInASchoolShooting speaks to how teenagers are thinking of their own mortality in the wake of Parkland, Santa Fe, and so many other school shootings.
"The hashtag for me is a really important way to visualize the mental state of America's youth," she told Refinery29. "We constantly wonder if we will be next. We live in fear, we plan our escape routes. We question our legacies. It's not healthy. The hashtags represents that."
Ahead, 15 of the most powerful tweets written by students.
ADVERTISEMENT