Parkland and Brown: What It’s Like to Survive Two School Shootings

MICHEL MARTIN: Thanks Bianna. Zoe Weissman, thank you so much for talking with us.

 

ZOE WEISSMAN: Thank you.

 

MARTIN: How are you doing today?

 

WEISSMAN: You know, I’m, I’m definitely doing better now that I’m home. It was a very long weekend. And I think that it’s kind of setting in for a lot of my classmates. Unfortunately, this is something I’ve been through before, so I do think it’s a little bit easier for me to cope with. So I’m mostly feeling the anger right now.

 

MARTIN: It’s so crazy that we’re even having this conversation where you can say, I’ve been through this before. And just to remind that you’re a sophomore at Brown, but you also lived through the shooting in Parkland, Florida and where 17 students and teachers were killed. And obviously the entire community is sort of traumatized. And then this weekend, you know, living through this again, do you remember where you were, like when you heard what was happening this weekend at Brown?  

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah. so thankfully I was in my dorm. I’m very fortunate that that’s where I was. I was in my room, I would say my dorm is probably like a five minute walk from Barus & Holley where the shooting occurred. I was thinking of possibly going to a library within like the next half hour. And then I got a call from my friend who was in a dorm that’s closer to Barus & Holley, and she asked me if I was in that building. And the way she said it, she sounded very distraught. And so that’s – my brain went to, there was a shooting, and so I said, I’m in my dorm, but what happened? Like, was there a shooter? And she didn’t respond to me and I could kind of tell, she was like hesitating to say the words and I was like, you need to tell me because like, I need to know what’s going on. And she said, well, people just ran in here and said there was someone shooting in Barus & Holley. 

And so at first I didn’t really know what to think because, you know, because I think my generation’s pretty paranoid about all of this, rightfully so. I was like, it could be a false alarm, it could be like some confusion. And then I would say a minute or two after I got off the phone with her, I got the text and call alerts from the school. And that’s when it really set in.

 

MARTIN: The fact that you, you said when your friend first called you, and that’s kind of where your mind went, was there a shooting? I mean, wow. That’s where your mind first went.

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah. And I, I can’t –

 

<crosstalk>

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah. I, you know, I’ve been, I think it’s a combination of the fact that I do have PTSD from Parkland. So like my brain will go there for things that rationally speaking, it’s not probable. But at the same time if your friend at school calls you upset asking where you are. I do think that unfortunately it’s not entirely irrational to assume that there’s an active shooter. And I think that’s indicative of the type of country we’re living in right now.

 

MARTIN: Do you remember what, like, what steps did you take once you realized what was going on?

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah, so once the school sent out the alert, we were all automatically on lockdown. And so that just basically meant that I couldn’t leave my room or the building that I was in. And so for me, thankfully, that just looked like me staying in my dorm. But unfortunately for a lot of my friends who were in academic buildings, that meant having to all gather into one common area and wait for the police to evacuate them, which is a much more frightening experience. And so I was in my dorm from, the shooting happened a little after 4:00 PM, until 6:00 AM the next morning is when the shelter in place lifted. And so I was – thankfully I had food, I had water. There was a bathroom right across the hall from me that I just, I ran to once or twice, but, you know, not everyone was as fortunate as me. And so I just stayed in there. I watched the news. I was constantly in communication with my parents and my family and my friends. And then they also did recommend for us to barricade our doors. And I knew rationally speaking, based on the fact that the shooting was isolated in one building, that I didn’t feel imminently in danger, but I didn’t wanna regret, you know, not barricading. So I did barricade my door, but that wasn’t out of fear. That was more so out of a precaution.

 

MARTIN: Did you feel that university handled this okay? Like how do you feel about the way they communicated with you and all of that?

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah, I’m actually pretty proud of how the university responded to this. I think, you know, there’s only so much a university can do to prepare for something like this when we live in a country where gun violence is so prevalent. So I do think security wise, I’ve always felt pretty safe at the school. Obviously that was something I thought about when I was looking at colleges because of my history. And so I do think that the school has a really good balance of having security features without making us feel like we’re in a prison. The one thing that I do think that they’re going to improve on now is adding more cameras to Barus & Holley. It is one of the older buildings on campus, and the engineering research center, which was built onto the building is newer. And so that area of the building has cameras, but Barus & Holley apparently doesn’t, which I wasn’t aware of. And so I know that they’re going to fix that immediately. But besides that, I’ve always felt very safe at the school. 

And I also think that the response emotionally and mentally was really good from the school providing us resources. I do think there was some confusion in regards to the police response on campus. But that’s more so because there’s a lot of different factors having to communicate with one another being the administration, the Brown Police Department, the Providence Police Department, the FBI. And so I think that’s where a lot of the confusion overnight came from.

 

MARTIN: But again, I’m listening to you and you’re saying, when you were doing your college tour, deciding where to go to school. Security was one of the things that you looked at. And I have to tell you, I just don’t think that a lot of people in other parts of the world do that.

 

WEISSMAN: No. Nor should they.

 

MARTIN: How do you think living through Parkland, you were 12, how do you think that that affected, you know, who you are now and how you see things?

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah. So I was in a unique position at the middle school where I got stuck outside. And so I was exposed to the gunshots and things like that. And so I was one of the few middle schoolers that had one of those more direct experiences ’cause thankfully most people were able to get inside. And so after that experience, I did develop PTSD from it as I think a lot of people in Parkland did. Even people who were inside my middle school during the shooting. And so I’ve kind of had to learn how to adapt to my new normal. I’m definitely very hypervigilant, kind of almost paranoid in my surroundings, always subconsciously preparing for things. But I’ve gotten to a place over the past seven, almost eight years, where I’m able to still, you know, live my life and enjoy myself and kind of put that in the background of my head so that it’s not something that’s always, you know, consuming my everyday life.

 

MARTIN: When you went to college, did you think to yourself, that’s, I mean, you did, as you’ve just told us, you thought of what’s the security plan? Like, does this place feel safe? Like how would I, where would I go? So you went through that mental process in your mind, but did you honestly think you’d lived through this again?

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah, I think that for the most part, I did not think that this would be something I’d ever experienced again. I thought, you know, naively, that statistically speaking, I, I had already been through before and that almost gave me a sense of protection from it occurring again. But at the same time, I knew that that was more so like something I was telling myself to keep myself, you know, calm. Because I have friends already that have been through two mass shootings. I know people through my activism that were at the Oxford High School in Michigan and then went on to Michigan State University where there was a mass shooting there. I have friends from Parkland who go to Florida State University, which is one of the biggest schools in the state where a lot of people from my town go. And there was a mass shooting there as well. And so I knew that was a possibility. But again, even someone like myself who’s been through it before, you still believe that, oh, it can’t happen to me until it does.

 

MARTIN: So you got involved with gun safety activism after Parkland, and a lot of young people did, in fact, like there were, you know, enormous demonstrations. Do you think it’s making a difference?

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah, I think that, so I was, and still am a part of March for Our Lives, which is the movement that came out of the shooting in Parkland. And I think that practically speaking, there were a lot of red flag laws that got passed after we started really speaking up about things. So policy-wise. And then we were also really big part of the bipartisan Gun Violence prevention bill that got passed in 2022. But I think on a cultural level, we had more of an impact in the sense that we were one of the first student-led movements to really advocate for an issue that was impacting our generation in a unique way. 

But also we kind of brought the issue back to the forefront. I think for the past few decades, ever since Columbine, it had kind of become an accepted facet of everyday life. And I think the movement after Parkland kind of brought back this idea that we don’t have to accept that as our normal. And so that’s something that I kind of want to reinvigorate after this. You know, the timing’s a little unique because we were about to go on winter break, and so now winter break just started prematurely. But it’s my goal to make sure that I am able to use this moment to advocate for my community so that no one has to go through this again, and that I don’t have to share this experience with more people.

 

MARTIN: Do you think that people, broadly defined, understand the degree to which exposure to gun violence is a feature of your youth? Do you think that people get how much of a generational issue this is?

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah, I mean, I do understand that to an extent. If you’re not in my generation, it could be really hard to understand the impact this has had on us. You know, I’m the same age as a lot of the kids who were killed in the Sandy Hook shooting. I was in first grade when that happened. And I remember my school practicing lockdown drills in the aftermath of that. And so it’s something that’s been so deeply ingrained into our youth and our childhood that is kind of hard for people who are older than us to understand because it is a relatively new phenomenon in the sense that it’s kind of been a predominant issue for the past few decades in regards to school shootings. But at the same time, I feel like I have the responsibility to really demonstrate just how much gun violence can have a ripple effect in communities. Because obviously people understand when people are killed, people are injured. But for example, my community of Parkland, a majority of people were not shot or killed. And yet this is still something that affects my community. Every single day I go into restaurants and I see signs about the shooting. I, you know, it’s something that’s kind of always on the forefront of our minds. And that’s something that’s hard to understand if you haven’t been through it.

 

MARTIN: I don’t know whether you’re following, you know, any of the details around the investigation and so forth. They, authorities or the FBI first said that there was someone in custody there, there was briefly, but – a person of interest. But this person has been released because they are convinced that this person is not the responsible party. And I just wonder if you have any thoughts about how this investigation is proceeding.

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah, I think that, you know, I’m not a, like a, I’m not a law enforcement officer, so I can’t speak to the investigation itself specifically. But I will say that I do think there was a communication breakdown between authorities and the Brown community and students themselves. And I think that the confusion surrounding the person of interest and the fact that the FBI prematurely released that information was definitely something that caused a lot of chaos and confusion on campus. I was still in the Rhode Island area when they announced that the person of interest was released, albeit I was off campus, but a lot of my friends were on campus. That caused so much paranoia that during the press conference there were false reports of shots fired at one of the libraries. So, you know, there’s definitely been a communication breakdown between local, state, and federal officials and students in the broader Providence community.

But at the same time, it’s very obvious that whoever the suspect is, prepared well ahead of time they clearly knew the area. They knew the fact that Barus & Holley is right on the edge of campus and exits right out into a very residential area with not much public buildings or cameras or anything like that, because it’s almost entirely houses. And they were even casing the area hours beforehand. So it’s very obvious that this person knew the area well and prepared very well. So I understand that the investigation might take longer than we want, and we might not be able to know all of the information. But at the same time, I do think that our community did deserve more information and more accurate information than we were given.

 

MARTIN: And now, here’s the big question, why do you think this keeps happening?

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah, I think the only common denominator that we’re seeing across all of these acts of gun violence is access to guns. We’re the only country in the world where guns outnumber people. There’s more guns in circulation in America than there are Americans. So that means over 300 million guns are in this country. And because of how lax federal regulations are, even in states like Rhode Island that have amazing gun laws on the books, there’s only so much that states can do in order to protect against how relaxed the federal regulations are around guns. Not only can people cross state lines and go buy firearms in states with more relaxed laws, but there’s also things like the universal background check system that are run federally. And so those are systems that states don’t really have a say over. And also private sales are not regulated.

You know, there’s an issue of ghost guns as well. And so we don’t know the specifics about the specific shooting, but I will say that I think the only common denominator that we’re seeing across all these acts, motivations may be different – whether that be suicide, domestic violence, gang violence, everyday gun violence, or mass shootings – those ideologies are different, those motivations are different. The people are wildly different, but the one thing they have in common is people having access to guns when they shouldn’t. And so I think that the issue ultimately comes down to needing to pass comprehensive federal gun violence prevention laws.

 

MARTIN: But I’m curious, given all the work that you did over the years with around your activism, do you have a theory about why it is that we are willing to tolerate this level of gun violence?

 

WEISSMAN: I think that first and foremost, the fact that we have gun rights enshrined in our country’s constitution is something we don’t see in any other developed country, and is something that the interpretation of has kind of led to the free flow of guns in this country. I think that the Second Amendment should be interpreted as a means of defending against a tyrannical government in the form of militias, not necessarily the ability for any everyday American to have a weapon of mass destruction that didn’t exist 300 years ago. But at the same time, regardless of how you interpret the Second Amendment, it’s a fact that we are one of the only countries in the world that has that right enshrined within our Constitution. And I think that’s led to this culture where guns are kind of almost worshiped in a sense where guns are seen as more valuable than human lives. 

And then I also think on a political level, at the end of the day, it does come down to corporate greed and money. We see gun lobby groups like the NSSF, and the National Rifle Association have lined the pockets of politicians with their blood money. They’ve spent tens of millions of dollars every single legislative year to ensure that their bottom line, the bottom line of gun manufacturers stays the same. And so I think you see this combination of politicians prioritizing money over people, and also people kind of having this really warped understanding of the importance of guns in our country, something that we don’t really see in other nations because they don’t have that right enshrined in their constitution.

 

MARTIN: Do you ever see this changing to the point where when you take, I don’t know if you plan to have kids, but if you take your daughter on her college tour, the first thing you think about won’t have to be a security plan. Do you ever see this changing?

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah. I do wanna have kids. And so it’s something I think about a lot and especially for, I have a younger sister who’s going to be going to college next year. And so that is something I think about. And, you know, it’s really easy to get very hopeless, and especially with the fact that I’ve been doing this for seven years and I have seen little to no progress. The fact that when I speak out in times like this, instead of – I get a lot of support, but I also get a lot of hate and oftentimes for things I can’t control, like the fact that I’m a queer person, the fact that I’m Jewish. And so those things can really make it seem like I have no hope in humanity. But then I think about the amount of people who have sent me so many supportive messages, and I think that the real change is going to come when people in my generation are able to actually secure positions of power. We see people like Representative Max Frost, who I’ve been in touch with and was actually the previous director of March for Our Lives. He’s an amazing example of how my generation is going to be able to really shape the political landscape in this country. And I think until this country realizes that we’re going to be the group that’s really having a say soon I think that that is going to be the point at which we really are able to turn the tide in regards to gun violence.

 

MARTIN: Do you mind if I ask, are you planning to go back to school?

 

WEISSMAN: Yeah, I am. And I, you know, I still do feel safe at Brown, and I do think part of that is because my definition of safety has been fundamentally different than other people for the past seven years. I’m kind of at a baseline of hypervigilance, but I will say that I think a majority of my classmates are really excited to get back. Brown is a very uniquely happy and warm and supportive environment, especially in the world of Ivy League institutions that are kind of considered cutthroat and competitive. I’ve never once felt that at Brown. And I think I can say that for almost everyone at the school. I’m already excited to go back after break and take my classes and be with my community, not only to grieve together, but also to make sure that we have real impacts. Another great thing about Brown is we’re very politically active when it comes to international, national, and local issues. And so I think that that’s going to be something that’ll really bring us together and motivate us to create change.

 

MARTIN: Zoe Weissman, thank you so much for talking with us.

WEISSMAN: Thank you for having me.