Dissent, dialogue drive change

Editor’s note: About 450 Clark County high school students participated in the annual Sun Youth Forum on Nov. 8 at Liberty High School. The students were divided into groups to discuss several topics. A spokesperson was chosen from each discussion group to write a column about the students’ findings. Today, Samantha Reagan, a senior at Coronado High School, tells of the students’ opinions in the session entitled “America.”

“Unity sounds nice, but, sometimes, unity isn’t what we need. When what’s happening isn’t right, what we need is dissent. Disunity means someone’s driving things.”

My response to the Sun Youth Forum discussion prompt “How can the U.S. overcome political divisions to become a united nation?” led some of my peers to be taken aback. There was a stunned digesting of what I’d just said before raised eyebrows of consideration and, bit by bit, nods of acceptance.

Of course, I wasn’t implying we shouldn’t respect one another. My answer was, instead, borne from a desire to get the most out of my time at the forum — a payoff that would be guaranteed only by open and earnest dialogue.

Two topics in particular stoked this earnest dialogue: abortion and gun control. This was unsurprising; both issues are the sort that one can’t disengage from. They are subjects tied deeply and intrinsically to one’s moral framework, with debates that are often highly controversial and incredibly, even painfully, personal.

We breached the first hair-trigger issue with the question, “Should women be penalized for traveling from one state to another to get around abortion laws?” We began by discussing the legal plausibility of this premise; several students pointed out that, in the U.S., citizens are tried in the state in which they committed any given crime. Since an abortion obtained in a state in which it was legal would not be a crime, there would be no grounds.

Quickly, though, the discussion veered toward the ethics of abortion, with one person taking the stance that, “If murder is legal in one state and illegal in another, you should be charged as a murderer once you return?” He was met with vehement disagreement from pro-choice advocates in the room, who stated their belief that abortion is not an issue of murder but of bodily autonomy. Several students also expressed that needing to travel out of state for an abortion is already inaccessible for low-income women; a criminal conviction on top of that would be doubly unjust.

Anti-abortion advocates, however, doubled down on the belief that abortion is unacceptable, based on the belief that human life begins at conception. The split in the room was palpable. There was, however, some consensus; even the most ardent anti-abortion advocates did not believe women seeking abortions should be prosecuted. They instead endorsed the prosecution of those who administer abortions. The pro-choice advocates, naturally, wanted no criminal penalty whatsoever.

With the second issue, gun control, one could sense just how close to home the discussion hit. The conversation began with one student’s testimony that she knows what it is like to be afraid at school. She expressed her dismay that constant fear for one’s safety has become such an embedded part of American life. This topic is a sensitive one for Las Vegas teens, specifically; I knew my peers were likely thinking of the Oct. 1 shooting, the deadliest in U.S. history, which occurred but 15 minutes from our homes.

Pro-gun advocates noted that, often, the kinds of people who go commit these sorts of shootings don’t yet have any criminal history and claimed that the gun-purchasing process is already as rigorous as is feasible. They also expressed concern about government overreach in the potential disarmament of our citizenry. Those in favor of gun control voiced that the risk we take in allowing military-grade weapons to circulate is far too great already, and outweighs any potential risk increased governmental power would pose. At no point did we appear to be heading for agreement. Eventually, our moderator insisted we move to the next topic, much to the group’s dismay; it was clear we’d found an issue we could have spent the entire forum discussing.

Ultimately, the forum stirred deep convictions in all of us. Our debate was impassioned and lively, just as I’d hoped; and, at the end, I was delighted to shake hands with my most ardent opponents. It was their voices that led to the productive form of disunity and dialogue found that day. Our final (and next to only) consensus was this: It was important that we were there.