Dear Gen Z: Not All that is Spoken with Volume is Spoken with Truth

Community building and amplifying. Those are the goals I typically express when I open the weekly podcast that I co-host, The Round Table: A Next Generation Politics Podcast. Community building and amplifying--on the surface level, these don’t seem like strenuous goals. With the recent increase of young people being involved in politics, Millennials and Gen Zers alike are assuming the role of community organizers and activists. But my type of community building and amplifying really has nothing to do with politics, despite my strong passions for current events, government inner workings, and American history. 

My type of community building and amplifying are deeply interconnected to identity politics and freedom of expression, which are two continuous challenges that I have found myself struggling with in my sixteen seemingly long years of living. My desire for community building is a response to the struggles of being a Jewish, biracial, Hispanic, public high school attending girl who has a strong sense of self but who has yet to have “found herself.” And by that, I mean that I refuse to identify on the political spectrum. I do not identify as Democrat or Republican. I have found that my own personal views on individual issues tend to be wide ranging, often moderately liberal and sometimes even conservative.

I didn’t even know that the word “conservative” existed as a political term until I took a workshop called “The Right Side of the Aisle: What’s Up with Conservatism?” through Next Generation Politics’ YVote initiative during my freshman year. In middle school, I had no need to worry about how my political beliefs aligned, or didn’t align, with my peers because there weren't any political discussions. And when I entered my high school--a very large public school of just under 5,000 students located in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn--political discussion remained just as hush-hush. It wasn’t until the pandemic hit in March that my high school peers seemed to become as civically engaged as I had been all this time. 

Practically every single high schooler I knew who had social media was suddenly hopping onto the trendiest political movements and shunning those who were not in favor of these trends. Whether it be the Black Lives Matter movement or posting Anti-Israel and anti-semitic sentiments, my peers (who, throughout almost a year and a half of remote learning, all had their cameras off so they could scroll on social media during class) barely discussed anything that wasn’t politics online. Perhaps they had a sudden change of heart to be considerate for the battles that our nation has been fighting for centuries? Or maybe they all suddenly became thoroughly interested in civic engagement, but why via social media only? 

A survey that I co-conducted on behalf of Next Generation Politics last spring found that about 59% of the 250 New York City high school students that we surveyed said they were uncomfortable with sharing their political views on social media. This underscores a set of concerns we should all have: Why are high schoolers posting strongly opinionated content online if they are uncomfortable doing so? The teen voice online is disproportionately liberal, but is it a facade? Are all of these teens really so left wing, or has liberalism become just another new trend? Where are conservative teens, and why are they seemingly hiding?

And this is the moment where my call to action became tangible. I suddenly began to empathize with all of my peers who fear to express their voices, whether they be conservative or liberal, republican or democrat--because nothing good comes from voices being silenced. Community building and amplifying is about putting labels aside, as I have done for myself, and seeing each other as humans who are born with the right to speak and have all our voices heard.  It’s about human decency and respect. 59% of teens in our survey reported that they are scared to share the emotions that they have and are forced between one of two options: either comply or be silenced or shunned. And while Millennials, Gen Xers, and Boomers seemingly have pride in how Gen Z is the most vocal generation, they should be concerned about its implications: not everything that is spoken with volume is spoken with truth. But more than concerned, they should lead by example, because otherwise a generation of silenced thoughts and shaking voices will be taking the steering wheel. 

Madeline Mayes is a junior at Fort Hamilton High School, where she is both an honors and leadership student who sits on the Student Government Executive Board. Beyond school, she is an active participant in YVote and Next Generation Politics, and believes that freedom of expression is the most valuable right guaranteed to Americans. Madeline is also a student reporter for PBS NewsHour Student Reporting Labs. In her free time, she is a tennis player, an avid reader, a calligraphist, and an aspiring musician and linguist.