For Gen Z, crisis is normal. Give us something to fight for, Democrats

In November 2016, I was 10 years old. My family had cake in the fridge on election night, ready to celebrate the election of the United States’ first woman president. Instead, my dad woke me at 2 a.m. with the news that Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton.

Growing up in deep-blue Massachusetts during the first Trump administration, I was surrounded by resistance. My fourth-grade teacher hung “We The People” posters on the classroom door and attended the Women’s March in Washington, D.C. My own family marched in the Boston Women’s March. We could barely fit into train cars packed with pussy-hat clad, sign-bearing activists. As Trump’s presidency went on, every egregious, norm-bending act — from separating children from their parents at the border, to pulling out of the Paris Climate Accord, to travel bans — was accompanied by a wave of outrage and rejection by Trump’s opponents.

I’m 18 now, and I have identified as an activist since middle school, mostly focusing on the climate crisis and reproductive rights. In November, I cast my first presidential ballot. This time, I was the one waking up my family in the middle of the night with the news that Trump had once again been elected president.

Since the election last November, I’ve been getting messages from friends and fellow activists, asking what we should do. The problem is, I don’t know what to say. In 2016, I was surrounded by outrage and activism. Now, in 2024, everyone seems to be struggling to simply stay afloat, as despair and overwhelm tempers our motivation to take collective action.

I think the non-legislative opposition to Trump is doing good work — including statehouse protests organized by the newly coined 50501 movement. But what’s missing for me and a lot of people I know is legislative cohesion — it doesn’t seem like progressives in Congress are clear on a vision for the future beyond fighting Trump. (And in the case of some Democrats, like Sen. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, even fighting Trump is a tall order.)

Young activists, like my friends and me, are angry. To us, older politicians and voters are clinging to a political reality where compromise was possible without compromising democracy, human rights or our ecological system. But that’s not our reality or our lived experience. We are staring down a perilous, uncertain future, as our democracy slides into authoritarianism. We want to fight. We are angry at the Democratic Party, which hasn’t been willing to take young people seriously. We want the Democrats to acknowledge the collective rage we feel about our futures being sold out, and harness that energy for good.

I believe the Democratic Party’s best move right now is to fight bad Trumpian radicalism … with good radicalism. Just hear me out.

We are living in a radical time full of compounding crises: ecological (the climate crisis), political (the rise of authoritarianism), economic (widening inequality and inflation), social (loneliness and mental health epidemics) and technological (misinformation and evolving AI). We are witnessing daily the consequences of runaway capitalism, political corruption and a society disconnected from the Earth, the truth and each other.

During the 2024 campaign, the Democrats’ closing argument was to “save democracy.” And of course saving democracy is important. But this message, combined with clinging to an 81-year old Joe Biden, made the whole campaign seem like an appeal for a return to normalcy.

The overall youth turnout in 2024 was down by about 10% (from the 2020 election). The “save democracy” messaging wasn’t compelling to me or my friends, because we are acutely aware of — and experiencing — how our normalcy is crisis. For years, the policy steps a major political party would need to take to address the climate crisis, for example, hasn’t been anywhere near mainstream. Despite record levels of clean energy expansion under Biden, his administration also oversaw record oil and gas production.

This is why, although it seems counterintuitive, you’ll find me protesting Democrats and Republicans. Why protest potential allies instead of solely opponents? Because potential allies only become real allies when Democrats live up to the values they claim to share with us. The party needs to recognize that requires more radical action than is currently part of its mainstream platform.

Last year, as a former member of Gov. Maura Healey’s Youth Climate Council, I confronted the governor with the group Climate Defiance as she gave a speech at the annual meeting of a business coalition, which includes fossil fuel companies. I was conflicted about calling out a politician who has taken major steps on climate, but I also believe she could be doing better for our state, by banning the construction of any new fossil fuel infrastructure, and listening to young activists instead of big business interests. By working outside the system to put pressure on Democrats, we encourage them to expand the scope of the party to include stronger action on climate.

There are leaders on the left who could take the Democrats in a different direction and turn my generation’s hopelessness into bold policies that will affect the structural change we need. I look to leaders like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-VT), who turned out tens of thousands of people on their recent "End the Oligarchy" tour. Members like Ocasio-Cortez are also fluent on social media and could counter the “manosphere” online space that Trump’s campaign embraced.

There is so much potential energy in young activists. We are an important voting block, but we are so much more than that. I want our country to pay attention to the voices of young people who want to pursue policies proportional to the scope of the interrelated crises we are facing. We’re already pursuing what work we can in our local communities. For example, a group of students from my high school are drafting a climate resilient schools resolution, which would aim not only to make the schools in my community more sustainably powered, but also put in place a curriculum that incorporates the human-environment story across all subjects.

Our energy and motivation could be the Democrats' ticket to garnering the kind of mobilizing force that the party — and the world — desperately needs. So, Democrats, on behalf of the young progressive activists of this country: We are ready to fight. All you have to do is give us something worth fighting for.

Follow Cog on Facebook and Instagram. And sign up for our newsletter, sent on Sundays. We share stories that remind you we're all part of something bigger.