Toms River Students Rally For Stricter Gun Laws

TOMS RIVER, NJ — A month ago, Zach Dougherty and thousands of students around the country sat in shock, watch video after video on Snapchat. Videos of students crying. Students hiding. Students bleeding.

Students dying.

"We were watching it in real time," Dougherty said in a recent interview with Patch. The Toms River North junior was more than a thousand miles away from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, where a gunman armed with an AR-15 was shooting up the freshman building at the school. But the videos put them right there. "You could see the blood on the floor. You could hear them."

"I realized it could be my school," he said. Though some of the videos were broadcast by news outlets in the first few days after the mass shooting that killed 17 students and staff at the Florida high school and injured 16 more, Dougherty says there are many, many more that were circulated among teenagers, and they drove home the reality of the situation.

That's why Dougherty — and thousands of students across the country — pushed for and held events Wednesday as part of a nationwide school walkout by students demanding action for stricter gun laws.

"Being a high school kid, our first reaction was what can we do," Dougherty said. But after seeing David Hogg, a survivor of the Parkland shooting, and some of Hogg's classmates speaking out, he reached out to Hogg to ask what they could do. Hogg's reply: Speak out. Take action.

That's why Dougherty and some of his friends organized a rally at the Ocean County Library on Feb. 19. And it's why he continues to push for opportunities for students to speak out on the issues, which he acknowledges aren't only about guns, but about mental health and bullying and much more.

That's why he pushed and worked for what turned into an assembly at the RWJ Barnabas Health Arena on Wednesday, which allowed students to speak out while assuaging administrators' concerns about safety of the students and staff.

The assembly was optional, and though there was a big crowd in the arena, there were students who remained in class.

Dougherty, who met Hogg face to face in late February at an event in Livingston where Hogg and his sister spoke, said seeing the videos of peers dying has galvanized students to take action.

"This is the first time the younger generation has something to fight for," Dougherty said. "We want to at least have people have a conversation about what can be done to prevent this from happening again. It doesn’t have to be an argument it just has to be a conversation."

He has heard the comments from adults who try to dismiss what the students are saying with comments about Tide pods and statements that they aren't mature enough to understand the issues.

"They’re focusing on the Tide pod as if that represents all of us. It’s probably five people total," Dougherty said. "Adults see it and think it’s everyone. It’s not." And many of the students leading the rallies are honor students who have jobs and do volunteer and are active in clubs and all the other requirements of college applications in the current era.

He's heard the statements about how students should be addressing the bullying that goes on in their schools among classmates, and says the adults lecturing students about bullying are sending him vicious messages and attacking him on social media.

"Most kids hate the election process," Dougherty said, but the desire to force change has prompted many to get involved. "It's not about Democrat or Republican. Enough is enough."

"It’s going to be very interesting to see my generation act," he said. "There will be consequences from what we do now and don't do now."

"I hope this conversation last more than 5 minutes," Dougherty said.

Photo provided by Zachary Dougherty