Emma González on new Parkland security measures: We’re being treated like livestock

Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting survivor and gun control activist Emma González is criticizing moves to implement new security measures at the south Florida high school, saying the efforts make students feel like “prisoners” and “livestock.”

González argued in tweets Tuesday that the new measures at the school are the wrong response to the shooting that left 17 students and faculty dead in mid-February.

{mosads}

“The people with the power to make changes keep making the wrong changes,” tweeted González, a senior at the school, mentioning steps by officials to install security barriers and require students to wear see-through backpacks.

“When people pay money for these modifications on our school (the only one in the county being altered btw) that means Someone Is Getting Paid and I am Sick and Tired of us being treated like prize pigs,” she added.

…When people pay money for these modifications on our school (the only one in the county being altered btw) that means Someone Is Getting Paid and I am Sick and Tired of us being treated like prize pigs.

— Emma González (@Emma4Change) April 3, 2018

Upon returning from spring break this week, students at the school in Parkland, Fla., faced new security barriers and bag-check lines.

Students there are now required to carry see-through backpacks and wear identification badges at all times, measures that some students have said make them feel like they are in prison.

While some students have said the clear backpacks and other measures may deter would-be attackers, others have argued the efforts don’t address the issues that allowed a suspect to carry a rifle into the school during the Feb. 14 mass shooting.

González said the security barriers only “create the illusion of safety” and “make all the students feel like a combination of prisoners and livestock.”

…or a Barricade Renter saying “Hey do you need any extra fences that will create the illusion of safety but are easily jumpable and make all the students feel like a combination of prisoners and livestock?”…

— Emma González (@Emma4Change) April 3, 2018 

González has become a public face in the movement calling for action on gun violence in the weeks since the shooting, amassing more than 1.5 million followers on Twitter and playing an active role in the “March for Our Lives” demonstration in Washington, D.C., last month.