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Sometimes tragedy can have unexpected positive outcomes - and the Parkland school massacre has revealed today’s supposedly feckless teenagers to be eloquent, motivated and powerful

Protesters in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, calling for the US government to restrict gun ownership Pic: Getty

We hear a lot in the US about teenagers and what a shiftless, socially challenged bunch of narcissists they are. With their selfie trout pouts and their iPhones and their obsession with how many ‘likes’ their banal little musings can garner on whichever form of social media controls their lives and thoughts.

There’s a widely espoused belief here that the current crop of teens – Generation Z.02, the iGeneration or whatever they’re called ...