In the wake of the tragedy in Paris, you would think we would all be showing our support and sending our hearts out to the lives lost in the violent terrorist attacks that occurred on November 13th. But in shocking yet terribly unsurprising news, there are people who are speaking out against the massive amount of support Paris has received in the last 24 hours. Protestors in support of #Mizzou are claiming that the terror attacks in Paris have somehow 'stolen their spotlight.' There are terrible things happening all over the world that everyone should be aware of, but tearing down a terrorist attack because your story is no longer the most prominent headline? Does that not go against everything you're fighting for? You're against the terror attacks at Missouri, but believe other terrorist attacks are a distraction? Don't make tragedy a competition. They didn't steal anything. They were victims of a brutal attack just like the race issues at University of Missouri.

Students at the University of Missouri have been protesting racism that is all too prominent on their campus for years, but a stronger spark was ignited during the events of Ferguson in 2014. Since then, more proactive measures have been taken with each new threat posed to the minorities at Mizzou. Student Government President Payton Head first took to Facebook to express his frustrations with the racism and lack of control by university officials but has since moved off of social media and on to taking action in real life. Many student organizations have joined in the fight, organizing on campus protests and issuing a list of demands that included removing University President Tim Wolfe from his post due to his ineffective attempts to stop racism on campus. In the most recent incident of racial discrimination, someone drew a swastika in feces on the wall of a residence hall. This fueled the fire even further, leading Head and his followers to declare a hunger strike until Wolfe was removed. Many players from the Mizzou football team went on strike as well saying they would not practice or play until he was removed. Wolfe resigned from his post on November 9th. There is no denying that the racism that is still alive on the University of Missouri campus is disgusting and deserves the attention it is getting. Students should never feel unsafe on their own campus because of the inability of authority to control acts of racial discrimination. With that being said, people who are speaking out against these matters should not be tearing down a different tragedy just to get their point across, yet many people have taken to Twitter to do just that.

I highly doubt a terrorist attack in a different country that killed over 100 innocent people was planned just to distract from race issues in America. There are issues going on all over the world and one tragedy is not meant to take away from another. Is Paris in the headlines right now? Yes. Of course it is. It happened less than 24 hours ago and there are still details being collected. But, I've yet to read an article on the attacks in Paris that exclusively mentions how it's more important than anything else going on the world. Furthermore, the issues at Missouri have made headlines and there are tons of people standing behind the actions of the protesters. This is not a 15 seconds of fame scenario, the #BlackLivesMatter movement is not being brushed under the rug in favor of other catastrophes. The racial issues alive in America are not going to be dropped in favor of this terrorist attack, but that does not mean it doesn't deserve attention as well. There are so many things going on in the world. There are Syrian refugees who've risked their lives and everything they knew just to escape for a better life but are still struggling to survive. There are people who have nothing, who are hungry, dying, diseased. People are suffering all over the world. Now isn't the time to pit one tragedy against the other. All of these things are terrible, all of them deserve attention and instead of tearing one group down to shed more light on another, we should all come together to realize how much needs to change. Not just in Paris or Missouri, but everywhere. Tragedy is not a competition. Instead of fighting over who has it worse, we should be focusing on working towards preventing these disasters.