Wednesday morning in my U.S. government and politics class, a seemingly simple question from my teacher stirred an unexpectedly heavy silence: “Who watched the presidential debate on Tuesday, Sept. 10?”
“As young people, we’re poised to inherit a world that needs thoughtful, informed leadership more than ever. But if we’re not even willing to watch a debate, how can we expect to take on that responsibility? We owe it to ourselves — and to one another — to do better, to look beyond influencers and viral videos, and to engage deeply with the issues that truly matter. Even Taylor Swift, in her endorsement, urged us to “do your research.” If we don’t, we risk becoming not just uninformed voters, but a generation that’s lost sight of what it truly means to be part of a democracy.”
“As young people, we’re poised to inherit a world that needs thoughtful, informed leadership more than ever. But if we’re not even willing to watch a debate
I think it’s fair to say that Gen Z has seen enough of both major parties to know definitively that neither of the two leaders up for the job are going to do anything meaningful to change their lives in a positive way. Their entire lives they’ve watched presidents of both parties promise to raise wages, improve health care and education, and spend less on war. Instead, they’ve watched both of their parents working full-time jobs while still finding themselves unable to provide for the family’s needs and education.
And it isn’t lost on them that when money for a war or corporate bailout needs to happen, it happens overnight, every single time. During COVID the government even made a few trillion we didn’t have appear out of thin air overnight.
It’s unreasonable at this point to expect Gen Z to care. Why waste a badly-needed day’s work to vote when you have observed for your entire life that things stay consistent regardless of who’s elected?
What seems to be lost on most, is that money has been coming “out of thin air” for close to a century already. The problem is that every time less money gets destroyed than created, it dilutes the worth of the total… and people who still think in terms of gold nuggets, are completely unprepared to propose anything that would make sense.
That assumes we educate gen beta, with no time, money, resources, or fucking example to go off. So yeah, don’t hold your breath that a magic future generation will both A understand the economic climate that professional economists struggle to explain, and B have a willingness to help poor people once you are in the “I’m so smart and handsome and God even loves me more than anyone poor” pipeline they shove you down.
First of all, maybe to young cis straight white kids both sides are the same but to everybody else one side has and will continue to, if given the change, make their lives actively worse
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I think it’s fair to say that Gen Z has seen enough of both major parties to know definitively that neither of the two leaders up for the job are going to do anything meaningful to change their lives in a positive way. Their entire lives they’ve watched presidents of both parties promise to raise wages, improve health care and education, and spend less on war. Instead, they’ve watched both of their parents working full-time jobs while still finding themselves unable to provide for the family’s needs and education.
And it isn’t lost on them that when money for a war or corporate bailout needs to happen, it happens overnight, every single time. During COVID the government even made a few trillion we didn’t have appear out of thin air overnight.
It’s unreasonable at this point to expect Gen Z to care. Why waste a badly-needed day’s work to vote when you have observed for your entire life that things stay consistent regardless of who’s elected?
What seems to be lost on most, is that money has been coming “out of thin air” for close to a century already. The problem is that every time less money gets destroyed than created, it dilutes the worth of the total… and people who still think in terms of gold nuggets, are completely unprepared to propose anything that would make sense.
Gen Beta might have more of a grasp on things.
That assumes we educate gen beta, with no time, money, resources, or fucking example to go off. So yeah, don’t hold your breath that a magic future generation will both A understand the economic climate that professional economists struggle to explain, and B have a willingness to help poor people once you are in the “I’m so smart and handsome and God even loves me more than anyone poor” pipeline they shove you down.
BoTh SiDeS ArE The SaMe
First of all, maybe to young cis straight white kids both sides are the same but to everybody else one side has and will continue to, if given the change, make their lives actively worse