Hope for the Hopeless

In the 60s, The Baby Boomers helped to shape the future of politics in the United States. When you consider the changes for good that happened in those years, we advanced freedoms for a large portion of Americans that had never had freedom before. The Civil Rights movement, Freedom of Speech, Women’s Rights, and Roe v. Wade gave women body autonomy.

However, things started to slide backward once the Boomers became the majority. In the last 40 years, we have reversed Roe, causing women to be forced to carry babies when they might die, or the baby would knowingly die, or even children being forced to carry their rapist’s baby. Trans people are being forced to keep their birth gender even at the cost of forcing many into depression or suicide. Gerrymandering congressional districts keep people of color from voting in majority blocks. Christian Nationalism is causing people to fear another fascist regime in the making. One where Christians mandate everyone in the country live by the Christian point of view.

If there ever was a time when we needed someone to save the U.S. from itself, it is now. There is no civil discourse anymore. It is the land of whoever yells the loudest, and the angriest is the winner. The minority block is the majority in many states because of gerrymandering. Where else but in America can the fewest people rule the most? The Electoral College is outdated and gives an unfair advantage to the least populated areas by allowing the number of states which are least populated to have more say than the states with the most populated. Land does not vote. Just because a state has more land should not allow that state to have the same electoral sway as a state with more population. The electoral college was a compromise to allow the smaller states equal footing as the larger states with more population. It gives an unfair advantage and ignores the will of the people. There have been five times where the winner of the popular vote lost the electoral vote, two in the last 23 years.

The electoral college allows the swing states more attention than the non-swing states. Candidates totally ignore the states that they have the majority and solely concentrate on the few states that are a toss-up. Fifteen states and the District of Columbia have adopted the National Popular Vote Compact. This compact says those states have agreed to award all their electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote.

Under the current system, the winner of the electoral votes is the one who won in the state, even if they won by only one vote. This method, even though Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by 3 million votes, she lost the Electoral College. In 2000, Al Gore won by just over half a million votes, but Bush narrowly won Florida by 537 votes, and that tipped the electoral vote in his favor due to the sheer number of electoral votes in that state.

Gen Z may be the key to setting the system right. It is obvious that there are way more Gen Z voters than Boomers now. This generation is more engaged and are vocal about things they believe in. By their numbers alone, they could tip the scales to elect people who will move us toward the National Popular Vote. Recent changes in Supreme Court Decisions that have set national policies back fifty or more years may be the catalyst to get them to vote in record numbers as they did in 2020.

Gen Z voters are largely for more gun reform. They are for equal rights for people of color and other marginalized groups like the LGBTQIA+ community. Religion is not a factor that determines their beliefs regarding these issues. In other words, while they may be people of faith, they do not demand that everyone else live by their faith creeds. Gen Z believes more in the social constructs that want an equal playing field for others, not just what is good for them.

With the continued attack on democracy we see in many current politicians, they may be the greatest hope of stemming the backward-thinking laws, and what’s in it for me mentality we are now experiencing.

As much as the current political climate is disheartening, I have great hope for the future if the current Gen Z voters will come out en masse and help create a future that is brighter for everyone, not just the few in the ruling class.

Let me know what you think in the comments below.