My point is that the "kids" (arguably not kids and I would have to agree) are speaking out in favor of gun control

Schools are already gun free zones, and that hasn't prevented shootings. Again, someone determined to produce random killings isn't going to be stopped by laws which compared to murder are minor. Including regulations that make schools gun free zones.

And yet, the kids are also mysteriously silent about many other things that happen in schools with also many deleterious effects on themselves and society at large as they integrate into it: bullying, sexual repression, homogenization, lowering academic standards, drugging kids numb, how sex integration doesn't help either of boys or girls, how sports programs divert and waste resources from all other areas (not to mention how sports programs produce physical injuries).

That sounds like someone is misinforming and ill informing kids about what they must protest about.

but both the politicians and the media don't take them seriously (maybe because their opinions are not 'equal' {as Haj says}?).

That is a problem; but it is a problem with many other things than gun control too. Which don't get nearly enough coverage either. Though again, for the most part schools are already gun free zones.

Being "realistic", we can't tell them not to go to school or not to get in a car.

No, but being realistic, we can inform them properly of real, proven facts to improve their knowledge and perception of the subject. That is what we demand on sexual issues, and that is what should be the standard with everything.

Why is it that young people don't protest how underage drinking laws force them to drink underground and assume greater risks upon driving home? Why is it they don't protest for greater car safety (a topic which many "soccer moms" types do, for instance)?

But we owe them better answers than 'shit happens'.

We can tell them that the majority of gun deaths in the US are the product of gang on gang shootings (including innocent passers by and police vs suspects), which themselves are disproportionately concentrated in males, 16-25, racial minorities, urban. And a significant number of the rest are suicides (yes, suicides are "made easier" by guns, but truly committed suicidal people will find a way nonetheless).

The more you truly know about risks, the more you truly can be prepared. The more you think you know but is incorrect, the more that things will catch you by surprise.



And, once again, even short of conspiracy interpretations of specific events, it is clear that many of them could have been avoided by proper, measured intervention to help a kid in distress before they snapped. No matter how many guns you remove from that kid's hands, if they're already willing to lose their lives to kill others (either literally against police, by execution or by suicide; or figuratively by life without parole), the method is unimportant: they can always find one.