“The election is over — get over it.”
“Trump won — deal with it.”
“These spoiled millennials now know they’ll have to get a job.”
‘They should grow up!’
We’ve all seen these easy, knee-jerk reactions to young people protesting the election results. The condemnation of younger generations for perceived inferiority always makes us feel better about ourselves.
But when we lose our optimism and gripe about younger generations it’s a sign of old age — but not wisdom.
Before we judge the protesters, try standing in their shoes and understand they believe their reaction is justified. We’ve preached to them the gospel that every vote counts and one person one vote is how we choose our government.
Yet they saw results showing that more people voted for Clinton; and 52.8 percent of voters overall voted against Trump’s vision for this country. Despite long established rules of the Electoral College, results that contradict the popular vote may leave some feeling empty and wanting to see change.
Millennials seamlessly absorb change in this world at a pace that has left many of us – those mostly older — struggling to keep up. The world has always been at their front door.
Global digital interconnectedness erased borders. Build a border wall, but even internet censorship will not stop the flow of ideas and information, including hateful ideology spreading and inspiring violence.
Our younger generations also have never known a time when we were not at war. This war’s frontline is not just in some faraway land. Violent death could come in mundane places like a movie theater or a school.
In our universities this generation competed in classrooms with students from across the globe. As a result this generation faces more pressure to compete in the economy of the future.
We hear the calls for unity but this country has never been about blind loyalty freely pledged to anyone. Given the President-elect’s sometimes divisive election rhetoric, it will take action to earn that unity.
For all the fears some have about the future president, remember we have a Constitution providing a separation of powers. One check on power is the right to peacefully assemble to voice our opinions.
Respecting the office of president yet defending your values are not mutually exclusive.
These protesters have looked at the previous generations and they are frustrated. The way they may see it, archaic laws allowed a minority to elect someone espousing a return to a less-inclusive and darker time.
They may feel disenfranchised and as such we should recall the words of Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel: “There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.”
So they speak out.
Before we point and gripe we should look inward as well. This is a generation of our children. Our parenting created this. Maybe we should be proud that they’re willing to stand up for themselves.
Generational disconnects are not new. In the early 1970s a long-time faculty member at a major university wrote about college kids protesting a foreign war and Nixonian worldview.
“I think we have to understand, when you talk about youth today and the way they feel, what they’re saying to us. They’re asking our generation ‘What have you done for America and for your fellow man and for what other reason besides making money?’ I think that is why there is so much distrust of us by young people today.
“All it has really done is make them feel we think material things will satisfy them. That money can buy everything. Well, it can’t and the kids have proven that by their actions lately.
“They’ve forgotten that one of the great joys of life is achieving. That is part of youth’s problem today. They’re bored to death when they get to college. They’ve had all the joys. They’ve had sex, cars and privileges when they’re young. There’s got to be something else for them to do.’
Neither condemnation from the right nor coddling from the left is the answer to their protests. Maybe if we grow up and listen we might understand what they want to tell us and open the door for them to learn from us.
If the younger generation feels their future interests and current values are not being heard, let them walk out, let them march. But to adults in contact with them, forget safe spaces and protecting them from unpleasantness.
They should learn this reality: When you speak out the world will strike back. Successful opposition will neither be unopposed nor completed in a day or a month. It requires organized sustained effort over time. It requires participation in all elections.
In the end we all will grow up when we accept the results of the election but also fight to define the outcomes by sustained engagement at all levels. We’ll all grow up when we can respect all voices and weave them into the fabric that makes us a stronger society and nation.
