Burn, Baby Burn – 60s Radicals or Angry Zs?

 

Burning draft cards in 1965, an anti-Vietnam War protest

For me, as a Boomer, I am looking into bridges to understand rising voters. As the father of a Millennial, I am beginning to see his transition into a very settled career path, that “busyness” that captures my own work experience, a solid marriage to another professional (he’s in finance; she’s a physician)… His conflicts are with a contractor. Oh my. But Mr and Dr Dekom still have staggering unpaid university loans (almost all from their professional degrees); they are watching with extreme discomfort as the nation does not seem to be able to diminish it’s unbending polarization and wondering if there is a healthy future left here.

But my son is a Millennial. The world is changing fast that his experience has little in common with Gen Z and beyond. I think we really to start looking at 10 year demographic cohorts instead of that vastly generational demarcations. I remember asking my son, then 27, to explain what life was like for young graduates entering the work force. I was stunned at his answer: “How would I know, Dad, I’ve been in the workforce for years. I don’t even understand most of their acronyms and newest vocabulary.” Wow.

If he was having trouble within his own Millennial contingent understanding social changes, what must it be like for Gen Z. They are different. Very different. And in some ways, not so different, like where college Zers want to work: “Interestingly, [a recent Axios poll] says the federal government snagged the second-most-desired employer spot among both young Democrats and young Republicans. As for Google, the company swept the No. 1 spot for both women and men, and Asian, Black, and Hispanic students.” FastCompany.com, April 5th.

Issue-wise? While the extreme edges of Gen Z are as polarized as the rest of the nation, most Zers are in the middle, willing to listen and compromise and alter their direction when necessary. Affordability (tuition and housing mostly) is high on their fear list, but that is dwarfed by climate change and gun-violence anxiety. They are tolerant, and most live in a world where diversity is the norm. But they also feel betrayed by Boomers and X Gens, who have them a shamble of a future. And that makes them angry, very angry.

Writing for the April 3rd Los Angeles Times, Jean Guerreo takes a look at this rising frustration. In my time, opposing the Vietnam War, protesters burned draft cards, risking prosecution. “Gen Z has reason for anger. Will they burn it all down?... Donald Trump’s election in 2016 was a turning point for these young adults, who learned early in their lives that American exceptionalism was a lie…

“Will young people extinguish the flames of political polarization or fan them? As their values clash with those of the oldest generations hoarding power, the fires of extremism crackle louder and expand… It’s impossible to predict what 69 million Gen Zers will do. But it doesn’t take a crystal ball to see that as the arsonist GOP elders double down, young people will be more inclined to burn things too.

“Still, there’s hope. Gen Zers can negotiate differences better than perhaps any prior generation; some call them Plurals because of their pluralist nature. They’re the most racially and ethnically diverse voters. They’re more likely to identify as LGBTQ: 20% of them, compared with 11% of millennials and only 3% among older people. They’re averse to binaries, be it man vs. woman or citizen vs. illegal. A quarter are Latinx. They’re less likely than millennials to be immigrants, but more likely to be children of immigrants — cross-border in culture and identity.

“They’re digital natives, born between 1997 and 2012, when surfing the web was already mainstream. They prefer TikTok to TV. Liberal-vs.-conservative cable news pundits are a bore next to social media’s multiverse of raw commentary. Social media’s negative impact has been greater on this group than any other. Depression, anxiety and feelings of loneliness — made worse by the pandemic — are big challenges. Yet many Gen Zers are demonstrating a remarkable resilience, channeling their sense of unease into advocacy for the most vulnerable.

“They share millennials ’ progressive ideas on social issues, but are more likely to support radical policies, such as reparations for descendants of enslaved people. They’re more likely to believe the government should do more to help people. They believe in advocating for the Other, except when the Other is a bully… ‘You either have sensitivity to people or you don’t,’ Mariah Allen, an 18-year-old Black student at Loyola Marymount University, told me ahead of her class on Bad Bunny’s activism. ‘If you don’t, you’re kind of being excluded.’

“Like other Gen Zers, Allen grew up on stories about teenagers rebelling against oppressive governments, from ‘The Hunger Games’ to the ‘Divergent’ series. Perhaps that’s why they’re more politically engaged than millennials were at their age. While millennials came of age on Harry Potter’s lessons of a community’s importance, Gen Zers immersed themselves in worlds of uprisings. ‘We’ve been reading political commentary since like middle school,’ Allen said.

“In last year’s midterm elections, Gen Zers helped Democrats win in nearly every battleground statewide race and grew the Democrats’ majority in the U.S. Senate. They were key to President Biden’s 2020 victory despite their qualms about him. Even though they’re more likely than older generations to be disillusioned with both political parties, they vote… ‘If we don’t vote, nothing’s going to change,’ Ethan “E” Carter, an 18-year-old Latino classmate of Allen’s, told me. ‘Incremental change over radical change must be prioritized ’cause it’s better than no change.’

“They’re pragmatic progressives who see too much at stake for an all-or-nothing approach. ‘They won’t compromise their values, but they’re not afraid to compromise on the perfect solution in order to make progress,’ John Della Volpe, polling director at the Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics, told me… Yet, they’ve been vilified as anti-American. They’re less likely than older people to say that the U.S. is better than all other countries, but the unpatriotic label is unfair given their civic engagement. They care about the country. They value the diverse reality of who Americans are; they’re not interested in preserving an America that’s monolithic in culture or politics.

“The election of Donald Trump was a turning point for these young adults, akin to the 9/11 terrorist attacks for millennials… Getting past polarization affects their electoral choices. Many Republicans, particularly older ones, see Gen Zers as impinging on their political power. Young people’s fluidity with identity may be foreign to them, but they will have to contend with it. Although most white Americans older than 30 voted Republican in the midterm elections, 58% of whites under age 30 voted for Democratic House candidates.

“At the same time, younger Republicans are becoming more socially liberal than their parents. A full 54% of those under age 45 believe America’s openness to immigrants is essential, while only a third of those older than 45 think so, according to an analysis of October 2022 Pew Research data by Michael Hais, who co-authored three books with Winograd… Gen Z Republicans are more likely than their older counterparts to acknowledge that Black people are treated less fairly than whites today: 43% say this, compared with 30% of Republican millennials and 20% of Republican Gen Xers.

“By contrast, among Democrats of all ages, views on social issues are aligning. “It’s really the Republicans who are more divided at this point,” Hais told me. There is a widening generational rupture on the right as youths of all backgrounds learn to coexist and care about one another. ‘Younger people are more willing to work together across a variety of lines: age, generation, party, race,’ he said… Gen Zers and millennials will represent nearly 40% of votes in the 2024 election. Millennials are the first generation that hasn’t become more conservative with age, and Gen Zers are following in their progressive footsteps.”

Yet many Gen Zers are frustrated with both political parties. Many are not content with incremental change, especially on issues they believe have severe time limitations, like climate change and the need to stop the flood of uncontrolled firearms all over our country. Will there be a breaking point? Will those obvious time restraints move them to more physical reactions? Time will tell, but if they stop voting, there will be hell to pay. Look at Florida today. Oh my.

I’m Peter Dekom, and the very survival of the United States, as a continuing democracy, rides most significantly on the shoulders Gen Z and other rising voters.