Take protests to voting booth

Kudos and plaudits to the thousands of marchers who protested ongoing gun violence. Their speeches were passionate, and some were even erudite, using their rhetoric purposefully and effectively to express their opinions, their frustration, and their rage.

But their passion will remain hollow, their rhetoric empty if all they do is beg and plead for lawmakers to make changes. People have been begging and pleading the lawmakers ever since the Brady Project was initiated.

Where these earnest protesters need to direct their efforts is to the voting public, and especially to themselves, those who are old enough to vote, and those who will soon be old enough. Though the U.S. is the greatest democracy in the world, it has one of the lowest voter turnouts of most of the world's democratic nations.

This is especially the case with our youngest citizens. Some will argue, "My vote won't make a difference." But not voting makes a huge difference. We are in the shape we are in now because so few voted in the last election.

So if these passionate and in many cases well-spoken youngsters want to make change happen, they'll need to organize. They'll need to organize themselves, and they will need to organize those who agree with them. And they will have to vote.

They will have to vote and vote in large numbers. Because the members of the NRA most certainly do vote, and they vote consistently and in large numbers, and they vote one way. For guns.

So, register to vote. Vote. Vote for someone who will represent what you want. It will make a difference if you don't.

Johnston Getty

Elgin