11-Year-Old Activist Honors Black Girls Whose Stories Never Make The News

People were in awe of fifth grader Naomi Wadler’s speech at Saturday’s March For Our Lives.

 

By Jenna Amatulli                                      Mar 25,2018

 

While there were many incredible, poised speakers at Saturday’s March For Our Lives across the country, an 11-year-old from Alexandria, Virginia, named Naomi Wadler was arguably the most inspiring.

 

“I represent the African-American women who are victims of gun violence, who are simply statistics instead of vibrant, beautiful girls full of potential,” the preteen said in her speech to a massive crowd in Washington, D.C.

 

 

Naomi Wadler.

 

The fifth grader was chosen to speak at the march after she organized a walkout at her elementary school on March 14 to protest gun violence and honor the lives of those lost in the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting in Parkland, Florida. She also honored Courtlin Arrington a 17-year-old high school senior from Alabama who was shot and killed in school, just weeks after the Florida shooting.

 

Naomi told a local Virginia news station that she thinks “it’s completely unacceptable that we are not exercising our rights to be safe at school.”