This election more than ever, young people have been getting involved in politics. Whether it be the millennials taking advantage of what might be their first chance to vote, or the outburst of debate on social media platforms by teens, there has been a significant increase in the amount of young people interested in the upcoming election.
It’s no secret that a large percentage of young people identify as either Democrats or independent leaning left. Young people seem to be especially liberal when it comes to social issues, probably due to the fact that they’ve grown up in a generation and a world that is more accepting of individuality and change than ever. So if you look at the statistics for the Democratic caucuses, it should be no surprise that Bernie Sanders has the near unanimous vote of the youth. In the Iowa caucus, Bernie received the vote of 84% of Democratic voters aged 17-29. More so than gender or race, it seems that age is the most significant division in Sanders’ and Clinton’s voters.
And if you’ve spent five minutes on Twitter during the past few months, it’s no shock that teenagers love Bernie Sanders.
Bernie is radical in a way that the youth has never seen before. His progressiveness is exciting and his anger towards injustices makes it easy for feminist and egalitarian teenagers to identify with him. Before the primaries began it was predicted that Hillary would win the majority of the millennial vote, but—though she continues to win the primaries—this prediction has not proven true. If young people’s general dislike towards Hillary is not because of her lying, flip-flopping and slut-shaming, then it is because of the fact that she is just like every other politician. Bernie, on the other hand, gives off a revolutionary vibe that appears to be touching the youth’s souls.
With his self-proclaimed socialism, history as a civil rights activist, acknowledgment of climate change, insistence that the government should be for the people and relentless desire to take down Wall Street, Bernie sets himself apart from Hillary nearly as dramatically as he does from his Republican counterparts. But apart from his individuality in terms of his policies and beliefs, Bernie isn’t in it for the power. He’s in it for the people. He understands that not everyone is a neurotypical able-bodied heterosexual cisgender upper-middle class white man, and he fights for the minorities.
But on top of their undying admiration for Sanders, another key factor in the increase of political involvement and interest in young people is that young people in the past did not have access to the resources and information that we currently do. Candidates frequently discussed on social media, creating hype and introducing people to a world they never thought they had a place in: American politics. In addition to the this, you are now able to google anything about X candidate and be met with millions of responses in seconds. This makes it easier to find out who you want to support and why you support them.
Clearly, teenagers and millennials have taken advantage of the platforms and resources they have access to and are educating themselves and each other on the upcoming selection. And if the hashtags, textposts and record amount of millennial voters haven’t been enough to convince you, I don’t know what will: young people are ready for a political revolution. Young people are ready for Bernie.
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