The Unsafe Generation

 

The Unsafe Generation

Gen Z expectations dashed, future is uncertain, untrusting, mostly ignored without a real political voice

70% of Gen Z doesn’t have faith in either major political party. As they enter the job market, AI has profoundly and negatively impacted their employment opportunities (they are experiencing more than double the national unemployment rate), even as they are saddled with incomprehensibly expensive student loan repayment obligations. They are watching “adult” politicians acting like children – “because I can”… “radical” this, “radical” that name-calling … bigotry on steroids… playground bullies calling the shots… – and the entire nation backed into unwinnable, entrenched corners. Whatever else is said, Gen Z has been marginalized.

The economy, simply, does not work for them. Polls are now expressing a universal sentiment that college education is highly overrated. Only 35% of Americans still value that career preparation path. While providing better earnings paths, for-profit trade schools have turned out to be a rip-off, and while community college equivalents fare far better, budget cuts have made getting all the required credits for graduation unnecessarily longer. The bankruptcy and repayment provisions of student loans have been completely twisted to support big lenders at the expense of students and their families.

And these rising citizens know: very few Gen Z will live a better life than their parents, when it comes to big money or protecting them, they will always lose to $$, and the number of their cohort ever expecting to own a home has dropped through the floor. They are frustrated at our massive wealth and income gap (most are on the wrong end of that disparity) and that the trillionaire/billionaire class are the puppet masters of our government leaders.

The know climate change is getting much worse; they cannot look at wildfires, flooding, hurricanes, drought, longer periods of unforgiving heat and accept the description of “hoax” to the obvious underlying cause. They are acutely aware that they and following generations will bear the rising horrible brunt of their parents’/grandparents’ denial, marginalization and utter failure to embrace obvious solutions. They watch as even China is surpassing the United States in the development of alternative energy. If they were ever to afford a car, they were expecting to buy an EV, until the government ended building the necessary supportive infrastructure.

One of the reasons MAHA (make American healthy again) is resonating with younger Americans starts with just reading the labels on the foods they are expected to eat. Just as air and water pollution disturb them, “food pollution” is just one more symbol or older generations’ worshipping money over their children’s health. They struggle with healthcare, often addressing the cost issue only if they experience a medical emergency. They have not yet struggled with the health issues that develop later in life. If there ever were a generation that would be ready for universal healthcare, like the rest of the entire developed world has had for years, this is it.

Not having been raised during the “duck and cover” Cold War, the red scare and the “domino theory” on the spread of communism, to Gen Z words like “communism” and “socialism” only represent political systems; given the rapid penetration of AI and its accelerating impact on the job market, many see “socialism” as a potential attractive necessity in the foreseeable future. They see the rewards heaped on the greedy, at their expense instead. What they do not see are viable solutions offered by either Republicans or Democrats.

Having lived in a post-9/11/01 era, with the United States mired in long futile wars, particularly in Central Asia (Afghanistan) and the Middle East, with images of our devastation and the cruel responses it has evoked, Gen Z sees a perilous world that could extinguish their lives in an arrogant moment. Some see military forces invading their cities, while others revel as this effort because they are convinced of a serious threat from the “radical left.” Some are convinced that undocumented US residents are criminals or coming to take jobs from them, while others abhor the cruelty of ICE and its cohorts. Many of those undocumented kids are cherished classmates.

As the United States continues to support a “whatever Netanyahu wants” policy, continuing to supply weapons to Isreal and block UN Security Council votes on Palestinians human rights, even Gen Z Americans, furious with Hamas and its brutality, are turning against Israel’s decimation of Gaza and innocent Palestinians. The US policy using the excuse of “antisemitism” to bring down major research universities has resulted in major “not in our name” backlash among a growing number of Gen Z American Jews. It is all a confused, awful mess. Ignoring the Russian War in Ukraine is unfathomable to many, while others see that conflict as “far away and over there.”

Gun violence, a vast multiple of any other nation not at war, is puzzling to most Gen Z cohorts. Even the moderate middle of that segment is tired of active shooter drills they have experienced their whole lives and wonder why “the number one killer of American children and teens is the bullet” has not made one whit of a difference against the proliferation of guns, particularly of the AR-15 ilk, that continue to take their lives with unmitigated frequency.

But the major political partes have not learned how to talk to Gen Z or allow Gen Z to talk to them. Sorry AOC, Bernie Sanders and JD Vance, you don’t get it. Many have turned to faith for answers, but there has been a very parallel political movement, anchored in Christianity. An outspoke conservative former “never Trumper,” reached out to Gen Z, an articulate spokesman who met Gen Z Americans where they lived. He started with small groups and ultimately became the superstar of arguing face-to-face with liberals and hosting the most well-choreographed rallies, usually at college campuses. A college dropout, he connected with Gen Z, although technically he was at tail-end Millennial. In 2017, he gave up his embrace of a new Gen Z independent conservative movement and, for reasons that have oft been disputed, threw his sizeable political weight behind the MAGA movement and Donald Trump.

Instantly, he became a GOP superstar, the only individual powerful enough, from either party, massively to connect with this young electoral cohort. Even as most of Gen Z disagreed with his message, those who followed him were passionate. But on September 10, 2025, Charlie Kirk, that American right-wing political activist, was assassinated while addressing an audience on the campus of Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah. Killed with a long hunting rifle from what seems to be a lone shooter, Kirk was quickly elevated as a messiah to many his followers.

The aftermath, based on Donald Trump’s seizing this moment to justify a right-wing crackdown at every level of the American liberal/Democrat movement, now labeled as “antifa,” even bringing comedic performers and the media companies they worked for to their knees. Taking his cue from Trump, even the head of the FTC threatened to attack their broadcast licenses and to question their merger activities.

And while I disagree with most of Charlie Kirk’s message, I sincerely believe he would never have countenanced a right-wing effort to end free speech except for Trump supporters… because Charlie Kirk was the embodiment of First Amendment free speech, the anchor, I believe, of our Constitutional rights.

I’m Peter Dekom, and as Trump and his appointees use Kirk’s death as rallying cry to purge any thoughts, expressions or cultural reality that carry a liberal imprimatur, likewise, I do not want to morph our nation’s capital into a Budapest or Moscow clone and hope the vast majority of Americans, especially Gen Z, agree.