In New York City, marchers bundled in bright orange charged towards Central Park, and in Parkland, Fl. less than a mile away from where the shooting took place on Feb. 14, 2018. at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, the protesters’ eyes brimmed with tears, surrounded by echoing chant, “Enough is enough!”

According to TIME, hundreds of thousands of people converged on Washington, D.C. on Saturday to participate in the March For Our Lives. Organizers estimated that the March For Our Lives attendance in Washington, D.C. reached about 800,000 people, NBC News reported.

Hazel Martinez, a sophomore at Cypress Ridge high school said, “It makes me so happy knowing that a lot of people decided to stand up for those who were killed in those shootings, and not only for them but for themselves too.”

The March for Our Lives was a student-led demonstration in support of tighter gun control that took place on March 24, 2018, in Washington, D.C., with over 800 similar events throughout the United States and around the world.

March for Our Lives was created and led by students of all ethnicities, religions, and sexualities across the country.

“The mission for ‘The of March for Our Lives’ was assured that no special interest group or political agenda is more critical than timely passage of legislation to effectively address the gun violence issues that are unpleasant in our country”, the March For Our Lives mission statement said.  

The goal of the march was to push for universal comprehensive background checks to bring the the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) into the 21st century with a digitized, searchable database, funds for the Center for Disease Control (CDC) to research the gun violence epidemic in America, high-capacity magazine ban, and to implement an assault weapons ban.

According to the NY Times, at the main event in Washington, survivors of mass shootings, including the one in Florida, rallied a whooping crowd. “Welcome to the revolution,” said Cameron Kasky, a survivor. 

Oscar Umana, sophomore in Cypress Ridge High School, said, “I feel extremely bad for them and their families. I cannot imagine how their parents must be feeling knowing someone took their children lives away just because people do not want gun control.”

Small groups of counter-protesters supporting gun rights also marched in different cities. In Salt Lake City, demonstrators carried pistols and flags. One of their signs read: “What can we do to stop mass shootings? SHOOT BACK.”

The NY Times said Brandon McKee was one of the many people with pistols on their hips. His daughter Kendall, 11, held a sign: “Criminals love gun control.”

McKee said of the Washington marchers, “I believe it’s their goal to unarm America, and that’s why we’re here today. We’re not going to stand idly by and let them tell us what we can and cannot do.”

But Martinez disagrees with this sentiment. “Going against gun control is like saying you want more killings and deaths to occur, and that is so wrong on so many levels,” Martinez, said.