Collective Pain: Youth of Color Facing the Aftermath of Mass School Shootings

Abstract

Mass school shootings are infrequent and involve predominantly White perpetrators and victims; yet, they elicit intense social reactions without acknowledging race. In contrast, shootings in cities are frequent, affecting the lives of people of color. Connecting both, this chapter explores how youth of color experience mass school shootings and whether the gun-control movement incorporates their needs. Specifically, 114 youth of color participated in an interview (2013/2015), involving a socio-spatial exploration of their segregated metropolitan area near Newtown, Connecticut, where a young White man killed 26 students and staff members (2012). Furthermore, this exploration involved unobtrusive observation of Connecticut's March for Our Lives (2018). Youth of color were concerned with gun violence in relation to police brutality, crime, and mass school shootings. Those in predominantly White cities experienced the collective pain mass school shootings produce. In contrast, the predominantly White gun-control movement hardly acknowledged youth of color.