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Shocked Shoppers Find “School Shooting” Sympathy Card Section in Powerful Video

By Sara Barnes on July 26, 2022

There are all sorts of greeting cards on the market. You can find graduation congrats and birthday wishes, but there's a specific card that hasn't hit the market yet. But sadly, it’s one that the American public could actually see on shelves: sympathy cards for after a school shooting. A viral video by Change the Ref (CTR) is imagining what it looks like. The organization set up this card display and filmed shoppers' responses when they saw them.

Change the Ref is an organization that formed after the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida, on February 14, 2018. Manuel and Patricia Oliver founded CTR in memory of their son Joaquin, one of the 17 victims of that horrible event. It aims to empower future leaders, using art and “nonviolent creative confrontation” to expose the effects of mass shootings.

The school shooting sympathy cards, while shocking to see them on the shelves, is in keeping with CTR’s mission. The video features the astonished views of people as they go from casually browsing cards to being stunned and saddened these cards exist in the first place.

CTR’s sentiments don’t hold back. The striking black and white design have large, white words written across them including “ARMS,” “SYMPATHY,” “SHOOTING,” “GUNNED,” and I'M SORRY.” There is a smaller text written across that is equally as heartbreaking. “I'm sorry your kid got shot at school today,” reads one of the phrases. “Sympathy on the shooting of your classmates,” another card says.

Although the video has recently gone viral on Twitter and TikTok, it was first shared in 2018. Unfortunately, it’s as relevant today as it was back then. Watch it below.

In a video posted by the organization Change the Ref, shoppers are shocked to see school shooting sympathy cards on the shelf.

Though the video was originally released in 2018, it has gone viral once again, four years later.

Wow,
I didnt realise this was already 4 years old. Makes an already gut wrenching video even more so. Absolutely unbelievable really .😔

— DFahey🍀 (@villahagler69) July 25, 2022