为了制止枪支暴力，美国各处的学生正在变成老师

艾玛·冈萨雷斯发现，沉默一样有巨大的力量。3月24日在华盛顿特区一场游行活动中，面对美国首都有史以来规模最大的集会人群，这位18岁的佛罗里达女孩激愤地讲述了玛乔里斯通曼道格拉斯高中17名师生遇难的经过，她的朋友们再也不能在放学后开玩笑、挥别或者一起玩了。再见，卡拉·洛克伦，再见，克里斯·希克森，再见，卢克·霍耶，冈萨雷斯缓慢而庄重地念出他们的名字。

随后，这位年轻姑娘短短几周内就成了全国性运动代言人，她代逝者采取了唯一可能的反应，那就是沉默。人群呼喊着她的名字，经久不息地鼓掌，略显笨拙地喊着口号打破现场的沉寂，但冈萨雷斯什么也没说，只是沉默。警报声在她登台6分20秒后响起，正是疯狂的年轻人手持AR-15自动步枪射杀17人花的时间。这位勇敢的高中生用一句话结束了富有冲击力的演说：“为自己的生命战斗吧，别让别人夺走。”

2018年美国之所以终于开始对付枪支暴力，这种每天夺走近百条美国人命的“疾病”，原因并非赢得选举的官员关注，而是因为艾玛·冈萨雷斯之类充满勇气、坚韧，口才又出众的优秀学生。因为玛乔里斯通曼道格拉斯高中11年级（相当于国内高二）学生卡梅隆·卡斯基和他的同班同学贾克琳·科林和阿莱克斯·温德发起了#NeverAgain运动，并参与筹划了3月份在华盛顿的“Our Lives”历史性游行，还得到全球其他地区的响应。因为游行同一天，11岁的娜奥米·韦德勒提醒数百万人，大量丧生于枪支暴力的非洲裔美国年轻人“绝不仅是统计数据”，而是生机勃勃“充满潜力”的生命。也因为21岁的哥伦比亚学生恩扎-阿里·科荷普拉和别人一起发起了两项运动——Project Orange Tree和Wear Orange，她希望这能促使年轻人多讨论社会顽疾（穿橘色服装的想法是因为猎人在林中狩猎时往往穿橘色衣服，以免其他猎人误伤）。

反枪支暴力组织Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence联合总裁克里斯汀·布朗说：“孩子们表达诉求的声音是充满力量和激情，引发的关注早已远超玛乔里斯通曼道格拉斯高中的范畴。现在全国各地的年轻人都想参与。我想他们真的就这个问题发出了自己的声音，几乎是一代人在集体呼吁。这已成为他们的事业，我觉得非常棒。”

布朗指出，学生们已推动立法方面实质性变化。新泽西州、佛蒙特州，没错，还有佛罗里达州均通过各种改革方案限制枪支暴力。1990年以来，布朗一直在推动改革，比如全国性背景核查以及限制攻击性武器。她认为现在或许终于接近拐点：“越来越多州开始讨论提案，数量也空前之多，蔓延之势远超之前观察。现在开始动真格的了。”（财富中文网）

《财富》杂志编辑最近敲定了2018年全球50位领导力榜样名单。本文是该特别报道的一部分。

译者：Charlie

审校：夏林

Somehow, Emma González found the strength to be silent. At a March 24 rally in Washington, D.C.—in front of a crowd larger than any other that had assembled in the nation’s capital—the 18-year-old Floridian spoke passionately about the loss of 17 students and teachers at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, friends who would never joke or wave or hang out after school again. Cara Loughran would never. Chris Hixon would never. Luke Hoyer would never, she intoned, releasing each name into the air, one by one.

Then the young woman, who in just weeks had become the face of a national movement, offered the only response the dead could make: silence. As the crowd called out her name, as they broke into restless applause, as they chanted awkwardly to fill the void, she said nothing. When an alarm rang, six minutes and 20 seconds after she’d walked onstage—the same amount of time it took a broken young man to murder 17 people with an AR-15—the intrepid high school senior finished the powerful sermon she’d begun. “Fight for your lives before it’s someone else’s job,” she said.

If 2018 becomes the year that the United States finally begins to tackle its disease of gun violence—an epidemic that steals nearly 100 American lives every day—it will be due not to the good sense of elected officials, but rather to the courage, tenacity, and sheer eloquence of students like Emma González. It will be due to 11th-graders like Cameron Kasky, who along with Stoneman Douglas classmates Jaclyn Corin and Alex Wind launched the #NeverAgain crusade and helped plan the historic March for Our Lives rally in Washington, which was mirrored by gatherings around the world. It will be due to 11-year-olds like Naomi Wadler, who reminded millions of people on that same day of something that should never have needed a reminder: that young African-Americans who die in such overwhelming numbers from gun violence aren’t “simply statistics” but instead vibrant lives “full of potential.” It will be due to 21-year-olds like Columbia student Nza-Ari Khepra, who cofounded two efforts to bring attention to gun violence—Project Orange Tree and the Wear Orange campaign—which she hopes will inspire other young people to engage in a conversation about this scourge. (The idea of wearing orange came about because it’s the color hunters wear in the woods to protect them from becoming targets themselves.)

“These kids are articulating so forcefully and passionately the need for change, and it has sparked something well beyond just Marjory Stoneman Douglas,” says Kristin Brown, copresident of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. “You see it across the country with kids now wanting to get involved. And I think they’ve really claimed their voice—almost as a generation—around this issue. This has become their cause, and I think it’s a wonderful thing.”

On the legislative front, she says, the students have already driven substantive change. New Jersey, Vermont, and, yes, Florida, have passed various reforms to curb gun violence, says Brown, who has been fighting for reforms such as national background checks and limits on assault weapons since 1990. She thinks we may now be near a tipping point: “It has really caused an unprecedented number of bills to be introduced in many more states than we would have even had on our radar screen,” she says. “There’s something real here.”

The staff of Fortune recently assembled our 2018 list of the World’s 50 Greatest Leaders. This story is part of that coverage.