We are the great generation… or at least we could be

Claire Holland looks at whether young people really are apathetic, or are simply an unexploited but willing force for change.

''As you have probably guessed by now I am not a 'hippy tree-hugger', in fact I am probably your typical student.''

What I am about to suggest will probably not be very popular considering the target readership of this website. I am writing about the image of Generation Why-ers and others like us, about how the rest of the world sees people who care, and what I think is the best method to encourage people to be more aware.

This is a response to an article I read by another writer on this website, Are we the great generation? by Kathy Yates. First off I should say that people like Kathy are very admirable; from what I can tell of her, she is very ethical, has a strong sense of morality and is doing all she can to help the causes she feels most strongly about.

But the article also struck me as judgemental, single-minded and more than a little alienating, and unfortunately the reason a lot of my friends do not participate more in ethical events is due to attitudes like this. I am lucky enough to have a couple of Oxjam events happening in my local area, but when I suggested that me and my housemates go along they refused saying that it would be full of “hippy tree-huggers”.

As you have probably guessed by now I am not a “hippy tree-hugger”, in fact I am probably your typical student; I would rather be at the bar than in a lecture, would rather be shopping than doing pretty much anything, and would rather have my student loan taken away than be mistaken for an eco warrior!

But that doesn’t mean I don’t care, or that I am unwilling to campaign for causes I feel strongly about. I think I am a good representative of the rest of the “apathetic, selfish, ignorant” young people of today.

I think that the reason young people aren’t up in arms is that they feel they have no voice and no one unifying issue to get behind. In the 60s they had Vietnam, in the 80s they had the anti-nuclear campaign, but today there are 101 things to campaign for or against.

Furthermore, if one issue could be decided upon, what could we really do? Protests don’t work; if they did then the Iraq invasion certainly wouldn’t have gone ahead, and like it or not, neither would the ban on fox hunting.

What I think really needs to happen is a make-over of the whole area. It needs to become a cool thing to do again. The Make Poverty History campaign exemplified this perfectly; they got celebrities involved, gave people something cool, simple and cheap to do by introducing the white bands, and gave people one issue to focus on.

If anything has shown the willingness of young people to do the right thing, and to campaign for what they believe in, it was what we saw last summer and that should not be dismissed as a one off. The people are willing - they just need good leadership.