How Do We Stop Future Violence? We Can Start With Our Children

If we are honest, everyone knows it is impossible to go back and change the violence that has occurred. We can not time travel.

But I wholly believe the best thing we can do to prevent future horrific violence and terror is to reform our school system, especially in regards to learning, motivating, and guiding our young men.

Boys learn differently. We all do. But the way it is, boys are told to live up to standards despite their brains developing differently. They put in seven-ish hours mostly spent controlled, quiet, and creatively limited. This is not our teachers fault. The blame falls on us all.

If our children are gifted, they are formally evaluated twice and quickly placed into a hands-on program to grow. However, if they have learning or behavioral issues in need of addressing, it can take years to get the help they need in the school system.

We need to give them all the words to explain their feelings. We need programs to teach boundaries and healthy conflict as well as education about abuse, violence in society and violence at home. We need introduce and open the lines of communication about mental health and teach them self defense.

Understandably, some of these things feel too mature for our children, and that is overwhelming. But we are doing them no favors staying silent and allowing them to learn by exposure to traumatic events and the internet.

Our children need a voice. They need to have safety plan instead of a safety net. And in giving them this language, it will truly raise morale.

The majority of our children are good, caring and compassionate. They want to be a good friend, stand up for what is right, give and seek forgiveness. And when they love, oh they do, ever so fiercely.

This is our responsibility to them, and to the future.