Gen Z Won’t Save Us
Gen Z Won’t Save Us
Young voters were supposed to “lead the evolution of our nation.” Yeah, about that …
Its the working class vs the 1%, not generation vs generation.
Sorry to break it to ya Slate (libs), Trump barely got more 18-24 votes this time than he did last time, whereas a lot of young people just didn't show up for Harris. Everybody knew young people were upset by the genocide, they said they couldn't vote for Harris because of her policies and surprisingly no matter how much Dem party dorks tried to shame them they didn't show up, just like they said they wouldn't. And now everyone is like "gen z is maga" get a grip
The sad part is I don't think most gen z voters who withheld their vote for Kamala fully appreciated what a 2nd Trump term meant, but here we are.
No, Gen Z just isn’t conservative enough to settle for Dems. Put up a progressive, and they’ll show up.
doubt it will work as well as you think
Whatever the Dems do, even if it move their platform to the furthest left in the known universe most moral puritans on the left will just lable them mainstream, or corpo shills and find a reason to stay home. Regardless of policy position or idea, the far left has always moved the goalposts between each election cycle just out of reach of the main stream.
When they refused to vote for Gore because of climate change the party moved to the left to meet those voters, and the left said fuck off. When they moved to left to get voters that refused Hillary because of corporate speaking gigs the party moved further left on corporate accountability, and the left said fuck off. When Biden moved left during his term to protect the environment, hold predatory schools and lending servicers accountable, attempted loan forgiveness, expanded overtime guarantees, etc etc etc. the left said fuck off to his predecessor. The people who claim the left will just show up if you give them x are big fat liars. Their perceived moral purity will always be more valuable to them than progress and action.
And I say this as someone that is further to the left than the party. I am also profoundly disappointed in the parties lack of moral courage. I just believe in practical progress and action, something most self righteous moral puritans absolutely don't believe in.
The zoomers are more like boomers than any other generation. The thought that they would save anyone but themselves is ridiculous.
The lads depicted are Gen Alpha 18 year olds. Gen z is mid to late twenties now. Some of them are about to hit 30...
The birth year range for different generations is fuzzy, but I can't find a single source saying that 2006 or 2007 would be considered gen Alpha. The youngest population that voted in this election is gen. Z, and not all members of Gen. Z are eligible to vote yet.
Liberals solve the problems that cause voters to die. Conservatives push for the status quo, even if the status quo kills the voters. The more deaths, the more people move towards the liberals. What, right now, is killing Gen Z?
Gen Z males have been raised in this "men need to be the alpha dog - don't let anyone talk down to you - don't respect anyone" mindset throughout high school. Then, when they get out into the real world, that mindset lead them to flunk out of college, not hold down a job, and not be able to get/keep a girlfriend. With no education/money/girlfriend's house and housing prices through the roof, they have to move back in with there parents who:
A) Are liberal and thus blame it on there attitude, which makes them even more conservative
B) Are conservative and blame it on trans-mexican-CRT-cowfarts, which makes them bond more with their parents.
How do we fix this?
For many, it would be making them more community-minded and responsible as younger kids. The combo of rarely being held accountable for mistakes or failure to meet expectations (basically, gentle parenting) and a social education from algorithmically curated content feels like it's been a major factor in developing their social/political attitudes.
Just replying to thank you for that glorious combo of terms. As the dirty migrant I am, I simply had to steal it for my username.
Good luck!
If we were able to age out of authoritarian conservatism, it would have happened a long time ago. Possibly as far back as "cooking food over fire is making kids these days weak". That should never have been a strategy. Doubly so when there's a time limit to solve global warming.
Fuck Gen Z. Gen Y fo life!
I have been saying for the past 6 - 8 years that Gen Z is the future, they are different, they are compassionate, etc. My opinion changed on that Tuesday in a bad way.
Turns out that growing up with a phone in their hand made a lot of them particularly susceptible to right-wing propaganda.
They've been raised to believe their thoughts are valid and they should speak up, instead of shutting the fuck up and listening until they have enough experience.
Sorry, but that was a "kids these days" moment.
“Crazy how Millennials were the only ones to learn how to use computers and we apparently are also the only ones who learned to see through disinformation,”
Whoever this Dylan jackass is can piss right off. Gen-X built your fucking computers.
Well, TBF, the boomers helped bootstrap what Gen X was working with, and then there are the Elder Gods like Turing, Hopper, John McCarthy, Neumann, etc...
In any case, if someone thinks that learning computers means they can see through disinformation....LOLOLOL. This is exactly why I keep beating the drum for critical thinking and media literacy, steeped within a rich liberal (in every meaning of that term) educational program.
This is exactly why I keep beating the drum for critical thinking and media literacy, steeped within a rich liberal (in every meaning of that term) educational program.
I've actually begun work on an essay about that exact thing. One that I've put off for a very long time because the last time I dared to imply a causal relationship between the rise of Trade-Schools, where you learn to do one thing and one thing well, but have no real education otherwise, and the dumbing down of the electorate, I got shouted down for being "elitist". But with recent events, I've decided to expand on my idea and throw some more research behind it because fuck it, I'm feeling vindicated.
I'm not saying that everyone who attends a trade-school is intellectually incurious; just that a broader understanding of the world is not a part of the curriculum and it's left up to the students themselves if they want to be a well rounded individual on their own time.
It's like every generation loses the ability to do something in computer technology that was just abstracted away somehow. I as a millennial have never soldered a PC mainboard (modding an Xbox doesn't count), but I'd say that otherwise, my understanding is pretty good. And I think all of my friends understand the concepts of files.
I recently asked someone about 10 years older if he knew what partitioning and formatting means in the context, and he knew, despite initially saying he has no clue about computers, to show someone 10 years younger (who didn't know) that such knowledge was just basically required back in the day. And it's not like these terms are obsolete, the concepts are still the same, even though we went from MBR to GPT and from FAT32 or whatever to better filesystems. It's no different for phones, but not required and even hidden.
I'd say generally, the technology userbase broadened while average knowledge in the group declined, however I'm not sure whether the absolute numbers of people with a certain knowledge level actually went down.
I recently asked someone about 10 years older if he knew what partitioning and formatting means in the context, and he knew, despite initially saying he has no clue about computers, to show someone 10 years younger (who didn’t know) that such knowledge was just basically required back in the day
I call them Intellectual Oligarchies. The knowledge (of any subject, not just tech) being limited to a circle of elites while the products are made simple enough to operate that the average person doesn't really need to know how it's done, just how to purchase it.
The good thing about Intellectual Oligarchies, however, is that they are open to be joined by anyone who wants to learn, or is curious about things. No formal education is required; just intellectual curiosity and the ability to read. They're entirely self-propogated; not purposefully created by some evil cabal trying to withhold knowledge from the average person. Knowledge itself is open-source, in other words. Anyone can use it if they want.
In the Greek and Roman democratic condition, people who don't exercise that "right to knowledge" lacked the context necessary to properly partake in the citizen's primary job...democratic rule.
Ars Liberalis doesn't translate to "Liberal Arts". It literally translates to "The skills of Freedom". A citizenry of a democracy needs the skills (knowledge) to properly function in said democracy; and that included studies of history, philosophy, politics, civics, etc...
It’s like every generation loses the ability to do something in computer technology that was just abstracted away somehow
Yes, I've been hearing computer engineers (or those with that mindset) complaining that programmers don't really understand much about how computers actually work since before I even entered the workforce, but I kind of get what they are/were saying. I'd look around at my peers nearly the entire time I've been doing this, and I'd see some that really wanted to know a lot about, well, everything, in some cases, being interested in hardware, and then there were a lot, maybe more than half, that just focus on learning whatever the herd is telling them is the newest shiny object - and this is nearly always vendor-led and a lot of it is less about sound reasoning, and more about being fashionable. These days it might be a frontend JS framework, but exchange the set of terms/frameworks and it's the same old story.
These days it is increasingly difficult to know much about the actual target hardware, if you work in hosted services like Azure, etc...
I mean, Boomer grandparents did the real lifting if we're going back...
And some of the prior generation. There were some truly great minds working on this stuff that were the parents of boomers.
If you want salvation, seek Jesus. The one from Revelations, the one that crushes people and had his clothes dyed red with the blood of his enemies. He is the only one who will save you now. Riding a white horse, and sword in hand, truly the fifth horseman of apocalypse. Only he can bring justice to this doomed world.
If Jesus came back he would burn down mega churches and banks. Jesus with a gun.
I find the sword a weapon for gentlemen, but yeah, that's the Jesus I'm taking about, impaling conmen and their mega churches, pedophiles and manipulators.
Why hasn't there been a push to counter the propaganda on social media with social media?
Use short form, humorous posts that integrate facts and ideas that give a different more positive take on others. I would guess there are great writers and actors that have a progressive-ish mindset that could put something like this together.
But honestly what is the reason this hasn't been done? Or if it is being done why isn't there more of a push to get it seen?
Why hasn’t there been a push to counter the propaganda on social media with social media?
Because the dems are also right-wing and have no credibility.
The actual left-wing is constantly pushing counter-narratives but without the massive funding of capital (eg. koch bros). No billionaire is going to fund a left-wing Prager U that talks about how billionaires are trash.
Because a lie will circle the earth a dozen times before the truth gets a foot (or whatever tf the saying is).
It is so much easier, and takes so much less time and energy to make up disinformation, than to fight it. And people on the left tend to actually care about the truth, and we also want others to understand the truth (and to gain the means for them to independently arrive at the truth), and spouting disinformation goes directly against that.
It's amazing what people are willing to do to win when you not only make it acceptable, but encourage complete disregard for ethics.
Algorithms ensure that the only content that ends up getting to your eyes is content that you already agree with for the most part. Or content that you hate so much that you have an incurable urge to respond to it with swearing and vitriol. (or at least that's why I think TikTok keeps giving me Maple Maga bullshit)
In other words, you can put up whatever you want but thanks to modern social media, the only people who will ever see it are the people who already agree with you.
why I think TikTok keeps giving me Maple Maga bullshit
I mean... it shows the garbage to you, and you keep coming back..... maybe it's time to ditch tictack
That would require ongoing funding outside of election years. These are paid for by Mercers and Kochs or the Kremlin on the right, and i don't think Gates or Cuban is too eager to fund left-wing propaganda.
If you don't control the platform, it might just be wasted efforts, although I guess they could try. But it might be that those pulling the strings can be sure that virtually no one is reached.
It's a frustratingly true response... sigh
The establishment wants to stay established, so they only use their established channels, not realizing how disconnected they became.
Trump Youth.
Millenials appear to have been peak liberal.
If this is true, it might explain so much of why they were so angry.
Watching TNG reruns nightly as an 8 year old really gave me some hope for humanity’s potential.
Just remember that according to the cannon timeline, the United States was rounding up people and putting them in “sanctuary districts” and in 2027 it’s the start of World War 3. Who knows, we may be right on track for that brighter future!
Same. Le sigh 😕
We were teenagers under dubya and the iraq war. Depending on how much the country swings into actual fascism this time, gen alpha might wind up standing for general anarchism
Sure...
"Liberal."
Its never been up to a single generation anyway
When the link snaps open the entire chain is broken.
It is up to every generation.
No analysis of how the older generations that turned out for Obama and Kerry went even harder for Trump than Gen Z ? Gen X went Trump by 22 percent.
Gen Z is doing their best and if you put this all on them then you're going to lose the next election too.
Depressing as it is, it's fairly typical for people to skew rightward as they get older. The problem is if Gen Z is already starting at a certain position, right now...where will they be at when they reach the age of today's boomers or Gen X/Y?
Remember: the boomers brought us the 60s. Over the years, the narrative has morphed from the boomers' parents (and reactionaries among the boomers) clucking their tongues about the 60s to: OMG, the boomers are all in for donvict, and "okay boomer" and so on. Boomer is now shorthand for Faux News and hate radio addict. Not so long ago, that target demo was the boomers' parents.
So, if it can happen to them, it is likely to happen for Gen Z, but maybe even worse.
The boomers were actually better than Gen X. The only reason we think people get more conservative is because we had a generation with reliable news. Then as they got older they kept Fox News on whenever they weren't watching something else, just all the time. They didn't realize Fox was propaganda and Gen X hasn't realized CNN was bought out years ago with the specific idea of turning it into Fox News 2.
What we need in this country is some media literacy.
"But that is far from a sturdy monolith. It can, and should, be easily conquered. All it takes is a platform that authentically offers something—anything—to youth voters. As they’ve proved, time and time again, they’ll listen."
Democrats: Sorry, we'll talk a big game and then just have 2 fuckwit Senators ruin everything. Don't worry though I promise next time will be the same!
In before Newsom or Shapiro nominee in 2028. (that is, in the far-fetched scenario we still have real elections).
They about to be thrown off mom and dads insurance and learn the hard way about the "team" they voted for.
Not to mention the fact that inflation is about to go through the roof and there will be food shortages when they start deporting migrants.