Whether people can enact change in a society is a tough question to answer, but my answer is both yes and no. In the present day, change can be initiated ,but only at the cost of something valuable or someone’s life.

Throughout history and to this day, men and women are unnaturally sacrificed for the greater good. Until the 1960s, Jim Crow laws ran rampant throughout the U.S., institutionalizing segregation and discrimination, and only a few people stood up and risked their precious lives for the greater good. These men and women saw the injustices that lurk in the shadows of our world. Through hardship and sorrow, they stood against hate with nobility, integrity, and uniqueness. Sadly, all these visionaries and inspirational spokespeople have died, almost poetically, at the hands of those who were the by-product of that malicious anger they tried to exterminate. Their deaths came with no warning, no time to grieve, and wiped out some of the love that had begun to flourish.

Still, their deaths never went unnoticed, as they helped others wake up and take a stand. When people saw innocent men and women murdered, it brought them together not in unity and joy, but in agony and mourning. Through this process, change occurred in the form of pity and empathy. But everything is different now.

In today’s world, 28 toddlers were killed, and yet our nation did nothing. Seventeen innocent high-school students were murdered in front of fellow classmates, and our nation did nothing but say a four-word phrase that pollutes our media, “Our Thoughts and Prayers.” Our nation, even through death and agony, will do nothing but send condolences and distract us with unimportant news topics that contaminate our TV screens.

I believe we can do nothing to change our world today without being ridiculed by our leaders and the adults around us. We are getting tired of screaming and feeling like we’ve wasted our time and tears to be humiliated for our “trivial” actions. In today’s world, change cannot be enacted even with death and an undying love within yourself and for others.