Stop Telling High Schoolers Their Opinions Don't Matter

Boulder High School students stage walk out

     Over the past week since Election Day there are unprecedented amounts of protests and walk outs happening across the country. Many of these are being perpetrated by high school students. I have to preface this by saying I am incredibly proud of these kids. I am on their side of this. I always have been. These kids are taking action in their world in some of the only ways they have the power to. My biggest issue with all of this is how people react to these walk outs. Time and again people say "Well, they can't vote." like that negates their worries and opinions.

     Let me be clear, I understand that before the age of 18 you are not a full legal adult in the United States and are not allowed to vote. That's obvious. Here's my issue with dismissing young people's opinions and actions in these types of situations. When you hit high school, you start to see the outside world around you and how it can effect your life and the lives of those you care about. You start to form your own real opinions about politics, religion, and life, in general at that time. You take what you learn in school, what you see in the news, and what your family and friends think and build your own world view. What can hurt this process is when people repeatedly tell you your opinion doesn't matter or "You'll know better when you're older." Saying these things and shutting down a teenager's opinions will disillusion them. This is where we get newly minted voters saying their vote does not count from. It is damaging, not only to the teenager, but to society as a whole.

     I am going to tell you a story of a teenager who built her own world view. I grew up in a largely apolitical family. My parents did not discuss politics a lot and my grandparents were much the same until later in my life. I first became interested in politics in 2001. Like many of my generation, I was rudely dragged from a feeling of perpetual safety into the glaring light of reality by the events of September 11th. I was two days for my 11th birthday and just starting in a brand new school in a place called Salem, VA. I thought I was a Republican because everyone I knew was and I thought that I held those same beliefs. By the time I turned 13 things had changed. We entered into a war we were lied to about the cause. I had friends who were of so many walks of life. People who came from all sorts of different races, genders, sexual orientation, gender identities, and religions. By 14, I was a democrat. When the United States of American re-elected George W. Bush I felt betrayed by my own country because I was not old enough to vote and it was our parents' generation's job to be our voice and they ignored us. So I stopped saying the Pledge of Allegiance at school. I tried to sit through it and was told I had to stand even if I said nothing. I received a number of stares and a fair few comments. I stood up to our Assistant Principal when he specifically targeted emo and goth kids as lacking potential or being outsiders. I joined my school's Young Democrats club with some nudging from a friend. We campaigned for Tim Kaine to become governor and won. I spent the next 4 years standing up to bullies (of others and my own) and my school's administration. My junior year we had a suicide occur and because he was a 'troubled kid' the school refused to bring in the resources they brought in for any other death at the school. His friends staged a sit in in our cafeteria. That same Assistant Principal got one of the best teachers in the school fired for having a second job bartending. We wore ribbons that read 'SHS.' They thought it represented our school's initials, but they symbolized his initials plus the word 'sucks.' We boycotted our cafeteria for a whole week when the school took away our right to bring off campus food to school. They shut the gate and broke the law. 

Bay Area High Schools staging a walk out

      What I am saying is that my WHOLE high school experience was one of action and protest. I built my own world view with the pieces given to me by my history and civics classes, being a part of Young Democrats, going to a Catholic church, having friends of all types, seeing injustices up close and personal, and going to programs like Model Congress and Model United Nations. I was told time and again "Oh honey, bless your heart, you're too young to understand." The funny thing is a decade or more later, I am more liberal than I was then and a political organizer. So as you see, the reason I support these kids is because I am one of them. If I were in high school right now with the implications of a Donald Trump presidency staring back at me, I would be out in the streets raising hell too. We FAILED THEM. No, they can't vote, but they do have to live with what happens. This election will shape their futures much more than ours. 

Montgomery Blair High School students walk out of their Silver Spring school

     Is it not bad enough that these kids are witnessing increased bullying of minority and female students? Is it not bad enough that many of them just saw someone who disrespects anyone who is an 'other' elected president? Is it not bad enough they just saw their hopes for the environment and their planet go up in smoke? So they get our attention. By walking out of classes. By rising up and telling us this is not okay. I don't blame them. I lived this life, but in my case we didn't elect someone who strikes fear in people like is their case. They are taking their stand and we should respect that. 

      So think before you say kids have no stake in these elections because you are wrong. They have the largest stake in elections. It's their future we're shaping and this time we screwed up royally.

The Reaction of a Young Woman Who Still Believes in Hope

     Over the past day I have been trying to decipher so many things. How we got here? How I feel about it? What happens next? What does this mean for my country? If you know me at all then you know that this election cycle was deeply personal for me. It is still hard for me to find the right words honestly. The cycle from beginning to end shed light on just how far we still need to go on sexism, racism, and homophobia. This post will be a bit scattered and it won't have pictures. This is me processing my feelings and what happened and what to do in the future. 

   

       As a woman, these results have shaken me. I mourned my country yesterday. I keep trying to make sense of it all. Every time I come back to a very specific moment in my college career. Six years ago, I was a junior in college and take a class called Social and Cultural Change. It was a sociology class that I took with one of my favorite professors outside the Political Science department, Dr. Harold Dorton. This class was highly discussion based and as many of you know I am incredibly opinionated. One day that fall we discussed women in politics and the way they are treated by the media and the voters in comparison to their male counterparts, specifically about how Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi were often referred to as 'mannish' and 'shrill.' During this discussion, one woman in my class said the following: "If they know that's how they are going to be treated, why do they keep running? It's not like it's going to change." I was immediately in shock. I see Dr. Dorton swivel around and begin to call on me, before I even raised a hand. I stopped him and told him I needed a second to collect myself. If I spoke at that moment I might have thrown a desk at her. Within two seconds though, my brain had rebooted I went into probably the most impressive and maybe the most terrifying (for others) response I can remember. Women keep running because if we do not there never will be any change. We have to fight for every bit of power and progress we gain and then continue to fight so we can keep it. 

      This election cycle was hard because I was seeing this argument on a national stage. I watched as people nitpicked Hillary on things that if she were a man no one would have cared about. I watched this while Donald Trump said some of the most racist, sexist, homophobic, and violence inducing things to ever hit our national stage. He said things that have disqualified other candidates and got away with it. Hillary Clinton is the picture of grace and composure. Playing to role forced on her as a woman. Don't show too much emotion, but be relatable. Don't be weak, but don't be intimidating. Be perfect in every way, but don't. Hillary Clinton lived the American woman's experience in front of the world for everyone to see. 

     The reason it seems like so many woman, and marginalized communities, seem traumatized is because we are. We watched and fought through this election cycle as Hillary Clinton ran against a man who had no political resume whatsoever and did and said things that are hard to believe. Hillary Clinton was the epitome of the over-qualified woman in the office dealing with her under qualified and loud male coworker. During the debates she dealt with being interrupted over and over and being followed around a stage. We heard our now President-elect trivialize consent, rape, women's health, call Hillary a Nasty Woman, and lie and lie and lie again about a woman's right to choose. I watched my country turn it's back on women.

     I will be honest. I spent the past day and a half in a whirlwind of emotions. When I woke up to the news yesterday after going to sleep and hoping it was all a nightmare, I cried and then I could not move for 3 hours. It was like the floor disappeared below me. The only reason I left my house yesterday was to return the iPad I used to canvass for six straight days. Afterwards, I went and bought myself greasy junk food and comic books, went home, and practiced as much self care as I possibly could. I grieved. I mourned. I couldn't get through listening to 'Sister Suffragette' without crying form despair at how disappointed they would be. I spoke with friends that were terrified for their families and their futures. I spoke with friends that were angry and devastated. I spoke with friends who are better at bouncing back than I am. 

     Today, I feel militant. I want to tear down the patriarchy. I want to show Donald Trump and his supporters that I will never back down. I will never stop being the strong, independent, intelligent, liberal woman I am. Don't tell me to give him a chance, he told us exactly who he was. Don't tell me that I'm overreacting or being irrational, I'm not. 46% of eligible voters didn't show up. 50% of those who voted elected a racist, misogynistic, homophobic, narcissistic blow hard to be our next President. President Obama, our first black President, will pass the presidency to a man supported by white nationalists and the KKK. I will not let this stand. I will go back into the trenches, no matter how tired I am, and I will fight for our future, for the soul of our country.

    The last thing I will say is to Hillary Rodham Clinton.

    Thank you. Thank you for fighting for us. Thank you for forging a path for women and girls across this nation. Thank you for fighting for minorities of all types. Thank you for taking this beating and this scrutiny. Thank you for setting such an amazing example for all of us. You are my hero. I am a better and stronger woman because of your example. I will fight harder than ever because of your sacrifices. We may have lost this battle, but we will win the war.