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Argumentative Essay: A Race To Prevent Teen Violence

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A Race to Prevent Teen Violence
“Since 2013, there have been at least 173 school shootings in America — an average of nearly one a week.” (Everytown for Gun Safety, paragraph 1). Everytown for Gun Safety has been tracking this information since the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting that occurred in 2012. This information is an alarming wake up call for parents of teenagers, who fear the possibility of their children being victims of school shootings caused by teen violence. The leading causes of teen violence are controversial topics, however, it is greatly believed by some that the main causes are bullying, begin misunderstood, and having parents that have given up on them.
It is imperative that we understand the causes that lead up to teen …show more content…

(AOA paragraph 1) which in turn can never be taken back. It is sad, when I hear about teens, which have bullied others online and later repented of the things that they posted, but are unable to take those comments back because they have been put for others to see. In addition to verbal, and physical bullying the AOA says “there is cyber-bullying in the form of harassing text messages and derogatory posts.” More and more, teens and children have cell phones, tablets and iPads giving them access to social media which is getting harder to track and monitor, so we need to take preventive measures that we are not giving our children the tools to bully others as well as opening the door to being …show more content…

Several cases have been seen in which parents have been aware that their children were having issues but failed to act or help improve the situation. In April 20, 1999, the world was rocked by the news of the Columbine High School Shooting, where two 18 year olds, Dylan Kiebold and Eric Harris killed 23 and injured 20 (New York Times article dated April 21, 1999). In a follow up article, published by USA Today on April 14, 2009 it was uncovered that the teens were not victims of bullying but they were the bullies. They wrote about their bullying in their journals as they planned their suicidal attack. The article described them as, “It’s a portrait of Harris and Klebold as a sort of “In Cold Blood” criminal duo – a deeply disturbed, suicidal pair who over more than a year psyched each other up for an Oklahoma City-style theorist bombing,over-the-top revenge fantasy against years of snubs, slights and cruel, real and imagined.” It makes you wonder how their parents did not see the changes in their teen’s signs of anger or bullying behavior. Susan Kiebold’s mother told DailyMail on February 13, 2016 that when she realized her son was one of the shooters, she prayed that he would kill himself. She also made a very impacting statement, she said, “I think we like to believe that our love and our understanding is protective,

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