The March for Our Lives generation can make gun control a reality The March for Our Lives movement can end this gun war we are waging against ourselves, just like another anti-war movement ended the Vietnam War.

EJ Montini | The Arizona Republic Opinion

Show Caption Hide Caption March for Our Lives crowd turnout could be record-breaking Here's a look at how the March for Our Lives protest stacks up against other huge events at the national mall in Washington, D.C.

At its core, the nationwide March for Our Lives campaign is an anti-war movement.

It’s trying to put an end to a war we’ve been waging — and continue to wage — against ourselves.

Whenever there are large public demonstrations, such as this weekend’s student-led March for Our Lives protests, we ask ourselves whether they represent the beginning of something big, or the end.

Are the protests simply a noisy expression of our exasperation over gun violence in the wake of the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., and all the others, or are they the first step in what could be a long, bipartisan legislative process over gun laws?

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The “mission statement” for March for Our Lives begins:

"Not one more. We cannot allow one more child to be shot at school. We cannot allow one more teacher to make a choice to jump in front of a firing assault rifle to save the lives of students. We cannot allow one more family to wait for a call or text that never comes. Our schools are unsafe. Our children and teachers are dying. We must make it our top priority to save these lives."

Two of the student leaders from the Florida high school, Emma Gonzalez and David Hogg, have been advocating for action, making appearances on TV and doing media interviews.

They call themselves part of the “mass-shooting generation.”

On CBS This Morning, Hogg said, “We’re what every American should be. We’re people that are standing up and becoming politically active.”

They say they want action, or, as Gonzalez said: “We’re going to vote out the people who aren’t acting.”

The March for Our Lives mission statement also says: "School safety is not a political issue. ... The mission and focus of March For Our Lives is to demand that a comprehensive and effective bill be immediately brought before Congress to address these gun issues."

What the group wants, essentially, are three commonsense regulations: a ban on assault weapons, a ban on high-capacity magazines and universal background checks on every gun sale.

It will not be an easy thing.

And opponents will say the enthusiasm of the students will fade.

It has happened before.

I was in college in the mid-1970s, after the military draft had ended and the Vietnam War was nearing an end.

While doing occasional work for the student newspaper, I found out we were approaching the fifth anniversary of a time when demonstrating students took over the university’s administration building in order to protest the war.

I thought it would be interesting to contact some of the organizers of that demonstration and see what they were up to and how they remembered those days of political unrest.

After combing through phone books from several big Eastern cities and checking alumni records, I made contact with one of the student leaders.

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He was disgusted.

With me.

Or, at least, with what I stood for.

I was 19 or 20, and I’d guess the former protest leader was only 25 or 26, but he railed against what he called “your generation.” He said those of us only five or so years younger than his class had turned our backs on student activism and went from protesting government policy to “streaking” — which, essentially, involved running naked through the streets.

This, sadly, was true.

The kids I came into college with didn’t have direct experience with the war and its politics, as the protest organizer and his classmates did. After those activists graduated and dispersed into the working world, the rest of us never developed the same sense of political advocacy.

The young people behind March for Our Lives say that won’t happen with them.

They’re organizing voter-registration drives and encouraging each new voter to participate in future elections.

Hogg said, “The one thing that the NRA is trying to push right now is that they’re trying to make sure that we forget about this. They expect our generation to have a short attention span, and we are not going to let that happen.”

I hope he’s right.

I believe he is.

The reason is simple. The Vietnam War ended.

While the mass shootings in our schools and other places, the bloodshed, the armed conflict we’ve been waging against ourselves, go on.

And on.

And on.

EJ Montini is a columnist for The Arizona Republic, where this first appeared. Follow him on Twitter: @ejmontini