Now is the best time to be alive in the history of the world. That is what many say to the youth of America and the youth of the world. If one asks why, they will say that technology has never been this advances, the overall quality of life is better, and people are, overall, more prosperous than ever. While all of these are true, they are leaving out key facts. These facts include facts such as the fact that the environment is rapidly deteriorating, the world is dependent on a fossil fuel that is going to run out in the next 40 to 50 tears, the United States alone is in 16 trillion dollars of debt, extremism is on the rise, the list goes on and on. With such grievances as this people are going to protest.
For the youth of America, protesting is something of an exotic thing. The Occupy Wall Street movement is probably the closest thing that can compare to the massive protests that occurred during the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement. Protests during this time were massive, attracting crowds of over one million people. These were things that the majority of America could get behind and support. People back in those days were very passionate about what they stood for and rebellious. In America today, you will find rebellious youths and passionate youths, but I must agree with an article that I read this summer called "The Organization Kid", in which the author talks about that, on the whole, many American youths, especially those attending prestigious colleges, are more respectful and less likely to challenge authority than the youth of the 60s and 70s. I also must agree that this is not necessarily a bad thing, but it is something that will affect protesting. Someone who has also known that being quite and non-combative and agreeable will continue to be that way because they know that is the behavior that will lead to their success.
As for myself, I'd like to believe that I am somewhere between the extremely passionate protesters of the 60s and 70s and the docile youth that are in America's colleges today. I know what i believe in and I know what I do not believe in. When it comes to protesting, I am not one to immediately see something that I do not like and go start a protest. I know some people that are like this and they honestly come off as over-the-top and tend to be the ones that shove their beliefs down your throat so to speak. However, people that are not willing to protest at all because they are afraid of the consequences come off as people who do not have a spine and will roll over the second someone challenges them. I do not wish to be either of those people. If I am going to go and protest, it would have to be about something that either I strongly believe is happening and should not happen, or is not happening and believe should happen. I would join any protest if I truly believed in their cause and I believed that they way that they were protesting would work. For example, if the price of milk went up $5.00 and their was a protest group that began looting stores, I would most likely not join that protest.
Protesting is necessary in a society like ours because it offers a route for people to voice their opinions about issues and for the government to hear them. It is this disagreement with the government that keeps the government accountable to all of its citizens, not just the most rich and powerful or the ones who can complain the loudest. Protesting and disagreement is the most American and democratic attribute a society can have.
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