Amongst the movements that emerged in the decades of the 1960s and 70s, youth participation had a fundamental role. Young people demonstrated against a capitalist society, its model of consumerism, its internal policy of discrimination and their attacks against other countries.
This youth’s passion was successful in their attainment of civil rights through their struggle for these rights, where there were also multiple clashes with police.
Unfortunately, the following generations become lethargic in individualism and political disbelief, causing a retreat on the participation of young people.
Since then the youth have been marginalized. The possibility of a higher education becomes more inaccessible every day. There are no jobs. There are a large number of risks of increased violence on the streets.
Fortunately, the outrage against abuses and corruption in politics and the social system awoke the youth from their general sense of political apathy. Young people became aware that they are not alone, and they going back to collective action as a tool to make their presence felt, marching through the streets against social inequality and injustices.
We hear their voices demanding to keep their families together, as in the campaign for no more deportations. We hear them demanding justice for the absurd deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner at the hands of the local police of Ferguson and New York. And in places where earlier their voices were covered by silence, now their cry can be heard in the five continents for the 43 students disappeared in Ayotzinapa, Mexico.
There is no doubt that a country with a numbed youth has no future. It is important for youth to express themselves, collaborate with analysis, participate in protests and above all, make proposals for initiatives that can solve the problems. Yet let us not forget, educating for full participation as a citizen is a task for all of us without division by genders, races, classes. Division should come from between “two sectors, those who are committed and those who are not.” Join us in the struggle for a better world!
