This year’s presidential election has been the most nerve-racking, most competitive, and most apprehensive of all time. As a millennial, many of us are actually not or at least “pretend” to be up to date with what’s going on with the latest news, most especially politics. However, social media has been the tool keeping us up to date with everything in the world. Sadly though, the majority of our decisions and choices are greatly influenced and affected by social media.
For example, we -- millennials -- loathe the Republican front-runner, Donald Trump because of what we see and hear through social media. Some just go along with the flow without actually knowing why the majority despise him and his plans. A term I would gladly use for this occurrence would be "band-wagoners,” commonly used as basketball jargon. Needless to say, we all go along or “cheer” for the popular belief that Trump is to be hated and that Sanders is our ideal president.
It is easy to provide judgement. Nevertheless, are we even aware of each presidential candidate’s platform? Even Trump supporters don't even know their candidate's plans! Watch this hilarious video of a social experiment "Would Donald Trump Fans Support Hitler?"
Multiple studies have shown that millennials are completely shunning politics. We lack engagement and involvement with all things political. But don't get me wrong, there are plenty out there who are actually doing everything they can to get involved. But ultimately, many of us no longer even bother reading the news. Instead we continuously scroll through our Facebook news feed. Not to mention, for instance, I have learned last week on Twitter that Bernie Sanders agreed on debating Donald Trump -- which, to me, was very interesting!
Let me inform you a little bit about it, just in case you missed an episode.
On May 25th, Donald Trump announced on "Jimmy Kimmel Live" that he would be happy to debate Bernie Sanders before the California primary on June 7th to receive high ratings. In response, Sanders agreed through the use of social media.
Although meanwhile, Trump evidently backed out which cancels out the said debate. Pretty sad! Though, I bet many of you weren’t even aware of the debate and Trump chickening out. Many of us could care less about political issues because we think it is not important. It’s because we are confused and focused on other things such as thinking about what picture to post on Instagram or what outfit to wear for the day.
Millennials are very liberal. Yet, unless we took part in any economics courses, we have little to no idea on what’s going on with our economy as well. We fail to realize the importance of voting for the betterment of our economy. I am guessing that most of us are unaware of how poorly our economy is doing. Income inequality is booming.
My question is what will happen to our generation a few years from now? Will any of us be fit for a presidential position? Majority of us aren’t even registered to vote, which would have been a huge step to making a difference to our country. With the continuous rise of social media, we can either let media and society influence our decisions or actually put in effort using social media to educate ourselves with what’s going on with the world.
And about Donald Trump or Bernie Sanders? You can like the dude. You can not like the dude. At least, know why.
