Let me tell you something about political theater. It's like watching a Broadway musical where the actors forget the lyrics but keep belting out noise anyway. This weekend at Brown University, while students were burying themselves in textbooks and caffeine, someone decided finals weren't stressful enough. Two students dead. Nine wounded. Exams canceled. Lives shattered.

And cue the predictable chorus. The same politicians who've spent years blocking any meaningful gun legislation immediately grabbed microphones to offer thoughts and prayers. Thoughts and prayers are great, but when's the last time either of those stopped a bullet? I'm 26, and I can tell you exactly where I was when 20 six and seven year olds got murdered at Sandy Hook Elementary in 2012. Sitting in my high school cafeteria, watching grown adults promise never again. Now? I'm watching my peers get shot during organic chemistry reviews. The script hasn't changed.

Here's what happens every time. The shooting occurs. Leaders pretend to care. News cycles churn. Lobbyists write checks. Nothing happens. Repeat. It's the most dystopian subscription service imaginable, and we're all forced members. Brown students barricading themselves in libraries while hearing gunfire isn't some outlier horror. It's Tuesday in America. Or in this case, Saturday.

I remember during my freshman year at state college, we had an active shooter drill where campus police lectured us about hiding under desks. Desks. Against AR 15s. That's like using a napkin as an umbrella in a hurricane. The administrator straight faced told us to throw textbooks at an attacker if necessary. Ma'am, I paid $400 for that biology book, and you want me to frisbee it at a psychopath? This is the brilliant safety planning our tuition dollars fund.

The hypocrisy stinks worse than a dorm bathroom during flu season. Politicians who refuse to pass universal background checks or assault weapons bans will post solemn tweets about broken hearts. Meanwhile, their voting records show hearts hardened against actual change. It's like a chef serving raw chicken with a side of Pepto Bismol. Don't fix the problem, just mute the symptoms.

And let's talk about media double standards. A shooting in Providence gets wall to wall coverage for 72 hours until the next Kardashian tweet distracts everyone. But daily gun violence in Chicago neighborhoods barely warrants a crawl at the bottom of CNN. Black and brown kids gets constant shootings labeled urban crime, while white college students get labeled tragic anomalies. Both are tragedies. Both demand outrage. Both get swept under different rugs.

Human impact? Let me paint you a picture. Imagine working four years to get into an Ivy League school. Crushing yourself with AP classes, SAT prep, extracurriculars until 2 AM. You finally make it. Then during finals week, when stress should peak about grades, you're instead texting mom I love you from under a library desk while gunshots echo downstairs. Education interrupted by trauma. Futures derailed not by bad grades, but by bad policy.

Here's the frustrating part. The solutions aren't complicated. Australia had one massive shooting in 1996, passed serious reform, and hasn't had a mass shooting since. We average more mass shootings than calendar days. Yet politicians, especially certain ones fond of red ties, keep insisting the problem is mental health despite slashing mental healthcare budgets every chance they get.

So where's the hope? Funny you should ask. Because while career politicians fiddle, students are burning with fury. The Parkland kids showed us teenage voices can move mountains. Brown students organizing right now will channel grief into action. Young voters consistently rank gun reform as a top priority. And unlike Congress, our generation actually knows how to use social media for more than sharing minion memes.

Change is coming not from marble palaces in DC, but from dorm rooms and trauma wards and protest marches. It's coming from kids who shouldn't have to become activists before they've legally rented a car. But here we are. We vote. We march. We shame the shameless. We'll outlive the obstructionists.

Until then? Stay safe out there. Throw that $400 textbook if you must. And register to vote like your life depends on it. Because at this rate, it just might.