In a recent interview with experienced pollster John Della Volpe and youth activist David Hogg, the founder of the youth-led gun control advocacy group March For Our Lives, National Public Radio journalist Juana Summers discussed the high political engagement of Generation Z, the generation that largely came of age in the Trump era, and how their engagement differs from the political party-based organizing of other generations.
The ideas that were brought up connected with several other grassroots, youth-led, nonpartisan activism started by individual youth wanting to see action. David Hogg said in the interview “change has to be created inside and outside of politics”. He could not be more right.
A lot of my own engagement has been through the Democratic Party and the High School Democrats of America. I decided that for me to better bring the message of grassroots, nonpartisan organizing to a platform like this, I should talk to the youth that are involved on the ground.
Tyler Johnson, a seventeen-year-old student from Tully, New York, saw firsthand what youth could do when they organized. As a senior in his high school, his school invited him to be part of a “Senior Spotlight” in the January newsletter. Among the questions asked of him was what his biggest challenge was. Johnson answered candidly and said that growing up gay, overcoming bullying, and coming out was the biggest challenge he had faced in his life. Soon after, the principal of his school told Johnson that his answer must be rewritten or removed based on a so-called district policy preventing discussion of religion, sexual orientation, or illegal drugs in the school newsletter. Johnson said that if he needed to hide that part of his life from the newsletter, he didn’t want to be part of it. Soon after, Johnson took to social media and shared his story. After gaining national attention and the support of several community members, the Tully superintendent changed his mind and agreed to publish the original answers.
Johnson told me that “what inspired [him] to stand up and share [his] story in the end was the simple fact that [he] knew [he] wasn’t the only person this was happening to”. It wasn’t just that, his brave actions, which inspired around 40 supporters to stand outside an emergency closed-door session of the school board and call for the resignation of the principal and superintendent, were spurred by the feeling that “if [he] didn’t speak up [he] was essentially just portraying that these acts were okay” and that he had to act to ensure that “this hate stops”.
Generation Z “definitely influenced” Johnson’s activism. Crediting Generation Z’s access to technology and social media, Johnson says that from an early age the world has “given us a platform to use our voices and speak out about the things we believe in and that we feel are important”. Johnson was among several youths who attended the American Civil Liberties Union Advocacy Institute to learn about activism and rights. Because of this, he says, he was able to help organize rallies, co-host a youth activism summit, and become a student ambassador for the New York Civil Liberties Union.
Tyler Johnson’s organizing for LGBTQ+ rights at his school was entirely nonpartisan. When asked why Generation Z’s activism has begun to shift away from political parties and more towards grassroots organizing, Johnson said that it was the “toxicity of political parties” that have driven away young people from the partisan aspects of organizing. He says that “anything can be politicized and shifted to fit a certain agenda”, a realization with which Gen Z has become all too familiar.
“Gen Z has decided and realized that approaching the issues at more of a head on angle and with a specific goal of just solving the problem at hand instead of coming at the issues from a party standpoint gives it more of a focus of not only what needs to happen, but ways that we can do it,” he says. In fact, he adds, “standing up for your beliefs even if it goes against your political party is important”.
Generation Z is a generation that has seen crisis after crisis, tragedy after tragedy, emergency and emergency, one after the other. We are coming of age in an era of political and social upheaval, climate change-caused disasters, and a worldwide pandemic. It is no surprise that we are as politically and civically active as we are. In his interview with NPR’s Juana Summer, David Hogg said that it cannot be an issue of passing the baton from older generations to Gen Z on important social issues. Hogg says that “it has to be an inter-generational coalition of people that work hand in hand”. Johnson commented that his organizing saw a scattered generational makeup. Unfortunately, he says, most of those who organized with hime were not actually Generation Z. Why did Generation Z not show up? Rather than being a lack of care or attention on the issue, Johnson tells me, it is possible that “a lot of people honestly seem scared to speak up”.
What do people who are afraid to speak up because of their age need to hear? “It is never to early to change the world,” Johnson states. Going on to list climate activist Greta Thunberg, women’s rights activist Malala Yousafzai, and anti-bullying activist Jaylen Arnold, as people to look to for inspiration and courage, Johnson says that “this work is not easy, it’s tiring, and activism burnout is real, but it is the most rewarding work you will ever do”.
As youth, we are obligated to be the change we wish to see in the world, to paraphrase a popular saying. Being young does not hinder our ability to make the world a better place but provides us with the experience and tools necessary to ensure that our future is one we want to live in. To repeat, Tyler Johnson puts it best:
“It is never too early to change the world.”
Full interview with Tyler Johnson can be found here.