[music]

Regina de Heer: How does your life experience shape your political priorities this election year?

Speaker 1: I feel like, particularly as Gen Zers, we've grown up in an age where it's been political gridlock. It's been hard to find biharvesting consensus to do anything or get things passed through Congress. Addressing gun violence is number one for me at a national level. I survived shooting myself, so for me, that's important.

Speaker 2: I'm a woman, but I'm a woman of color on top of that. There's multiple layers to that situation because women of color are disproportionately affected by reproductive healthcare laws.

Speaker 3: We joke about whether or not we'll ever be able to own a house, which is a sad thing. We should be able to build on and have better life.

[music]

Kai Wright: It's Notes from America. I'm Kai Wright. Welcome to the show. We are coming to you this week live from the stage of the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, New Jersey. Hello, Newark. [applause] This is a special edition of our show dedicated to a conversation about the politics of Gen Z, so really the politics of our future. Listen, we have talked about this a bit on our show previously. It can be very easy to over-generalize or slide into cliches when talking about young people in politics.

The, "They're going to fix everything," and "They're so very different from anyone who's come before." That gets tiresome to young people themselves. Anyway, we've all been through the wild ride of adolescence, the anxiety and excitement of starting out adult life, and charting your own course. It can be easy to overstate the generational differences thing, but the thing is, it is simply a fact that this cohort of Americans has moved through all those rites of passage.

They have faced some remarkable and unique conditions as they have done so. How has that shaped them? How has our tumultuous recent history shaped the people who will, in fact, chart our future? My first guest is a young journalist who has spent the past few years trying to answer these questions and others. Rachel Janfaza is founder of The Up and Up newsletter, which focuses on Gen Z's political zeitgeist and is generally covering the beat of her own generation. Rachel, welcome to Notes from America.

Rachel Janfaza: Thank you so much for having me.

Kai Wright: The voices we heard in the opening of the show come from a listening session that you co-hosted with us earlier this week. What were some of the top issues that you heard in that session in terms of political priorities this election year for the folks that were there talking to you?

Rachel Janfaza: Definitely. We hosted this joint listening session earlier this week, as you mentioned, and the top themes that came up in terms of issues, we separated out at the national level and at the local level. At the national level, the young people on the call were hyper-focused on reproductive healthcare access, healthcare more broadly, general economic issues and jobs and employment. Then at the local level, we specifically heard even more about the economy.

There are a range of issues that young people care about. I think, as you mentioned in your intro, there are things that make this generation stand out, but there's also some similarities with older generations, too, and the economy is one of those things.

Kai Wright: What about values? You've been holding focus groups of all sorts. We just butted in on this one, but it is a generation that is more racially and ethnically diverse than any previous generation, and it is on track to be the most well-educated generation yet. In terms of values for that kind of group, how would you characterize your generation's values? I'm asking you to speak for millions of people, but nonetheless, [laughs] as you covered it, what's bubbling up for, you.

Rachel Janfaza: Of course. I think the first thing that I'll point out is that when I ask young people, "What do you think is the biggest misconception about your generation?" they always say, "We're not a monolith." I think it's important to point out that they really do value individuality and the sense of self and being different from their peers. I think a lot of that has to do with diversity and the fact that this is the most diverse generation in American history.

They really appreciate their own sense of self-identification that comes with that. Recognizing, too, what that means for the way that they interact with their peers and form cohorts based on shared traits. I think it's both. Yes, there is this strong, strong sense of individuality, but also being in community with one another and being able to recognize shared experiences and lived experience is something that comes up a lot.

I think there's a perception of understanding that this generation has been through a lot of unique circumstances. You hear them often describe themselves as the lockdown generation. I think it's understanding that there are things that make them unique, but that they also similarly have a lot in common, which sounds a little bit in tangent with one another, but I think that it makes sense when you look at it from a 50-foot view.

Kai Wright: What about yourself? You were in school, you were in college during President Trump's first administration. Whatever your politics or ideology are, that was a tumultuous time in American history. How did that impact your choice to do this work? What was your journey through this?

Rachel Janfaza: Thank you for asking. When I was in college, I was noticing this resistance movement that was bubbling amongst my classmates, friends, and also around the country. In response to a lot of the action that former President Trump was taking in the very early days of his administration and throughout the course of his time in office, I started paying attention to that and realizing the way that it was really affecting the folks that I went to school with, but also everyone in our generation has this unique experience of being able to see everything happening in real-time and absorbing it on our devices that we hold in our hands at literally every second of every day.

Then a lot of people were taking what they saw and posting about it. I think this sense of understanding what was going on in the world, but also speaking out about it, that was made easier for our generation than maybe any other generation in history. I thought there just were these unique circumstances that would come to shape our generation's political consciousness, and it has. I started writing about it.

Kai Wright: You do feel like it has?

Rachel Janfaza: I do think so. I think every generation has their fair share of crises that they go through, and I don't think our generation is necessarily unique in that. What is special about the way that Gen Z has come of age is that we have had social media, which has allowed us to communicate with peers in real-time about what is happening as it's unfolding. We've seen this even this weekend with the hurricane, and the way that we're watching this happen, literally in the moment where it's happening.

You don't have to turn on the TV, you don't have to watch the news. You can just see it on social media. When you look at politics through that lens, I think the way that our generation has been able to have these conversations with our friends, but also being able to-- you can message a politician. You can interact with the people who are making decisions and who hold the seats of power in a way that is just a different type of communication than has existed for prior generations.

Kai Wright: Is it a good or a bad thing? Just this morning, I woke up and scrolled through images of the horror unfolding in the hurricane and worked myself into a bit of a fur over it. I had a lot of life before that to put those things in context. Part of it is, I wonder about the level of trauma that your generation has experienced in the course of those coming-of-age years. Does that come up in your reporting?

Rachel Janfaza: Definitely. I think if you look at the data and the way that young people self-report the harm that social media has had on them and their mental health, you can see it there, but then, in the conversations that I've had with young people across the country, there is this overwhelming sense of frustration that I think has resulted from the way that information is consumed.

Not only is it the constant inundation of news alerts and posts and frantic breaking news images, but it is also the way in which that leads to-- on social media, with the way that our algorithms work, you might be being fed a specific type of information from a specific perspective, and a lot of times, those are in conflict with one another. From what I've heard, really in recent months, from the young people that I've been speaking with, is that they oftentimes feel that they're at odds with one another, especially online, and that there is little room for nuance in the types of conversations that are being had on social media.

Instead, it is painted very much as no matter what the issue is, it appears to be very black and white. There is one side and there is another side. I think the most clear example of this is the current presidential election. Social media, the way that young people are experiencing it, do feel that it is pinning them against each other. I think there's actually a strong movement from the young people I've been speaking with in recent weeks to step offline and have these conversations in person, rather than just sending messages back and forth or sliding into people's DMs because they have recognized the anxiety that these online conversations can provoke.

Kai Wright: We're going to talk to some folks who are engaging in politics actively with this generation, including somebody who is finding ways to engage activism in digital spaces later so we can get more into it. What would you say based on all of your focus groups that you've been doing and all the reporting you've been doing if in this moment we were trying to say, "Okay, well, what do young people care the most about politically?" If there's one thing that keeps bubbling up, what would you say it is?

Rachel Janfaza: Personal rights, I think. You see this on both sides of the aisle. I think you also see both presidential campaigns leaning into this, but this idea of freedom, this idea of democracy and the sense that that's an umbrella and the issues can fall into that, and you can take that with what you mean or depending on what side of the aisle you're on, but that would be the theme that I would say I'm hearing.

Kai Wright: This is a special edition of Notes from America coming to you live from the stage of the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark. We're talking about the politics of Gen Z. I've been talking with Gen Z journalist Rachel Janfaza, founder of The Up and Up newsletter. Just ahead, we will meet two more Gen Zers whose personal experiences have informed their political priorities and who are putting those beliefs into action. We're going to get a live performance from the R&B duo Bathe. You're listening to their song Avalon right now, but do stick around for their exciting live performance. That's just ahead. Stay with us.

[MUSIC - Bathe: Avalon]

[applause]

Rachel Janfaza: Three words, how you're feeling to describe the election. Anyone want to start?

Speaker 4: I can go. I would say nervous, optimistic, represented.

Speaker 5: I would say confused, intrigued, and then represented.

Speaker 6: I think a combination of energized, hopeful and nervous.

Speaker 7: I'll go with stakes, hopeful and afraid all at the same time.

Speaker 8: I would say concerned, tired, and the risk of sounding repetitive but exhausted.

Speaker 9: Conflicted, anxious, exhausted.

Speaker 10: Echoing all of these, energized, anxious, hopefully optimistic, double word, hyphenated.

Speaker 11: Confused, hopeful, and anxious.

[music]

Kai Wright: This is Notes from America. I'm Kai Wright, coming to you this week live from the stage of the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, New Jersey. Hello, Newark.[applause]

A word to our listeners in the Southeast who are navigating that horrible hurricane. Our thoughts are with you tonight. We're talking about the politics of Gen Z, an obviously consequential group of voters this fall, but also a cohort of Americans who have come of age in a unique and turbulent time. We're thinking about how that may have shaped some of them. You just heard some of the voices that we collected at a listening session we held in collaboration with our first guest, Rachel Janfaza.

I'm joined now by two more Gen Zers who are busy putting their politics into action, each in a very different way. Askar Mirza is, at 19 years old, an elected official here in New Jersey. He's the youngest commissioner in the history of his community in Ridgefield Park. He's also a public policy student at Rutgers University. Askar, welcome to the show.

Askar Mirza: It's great to be here.

Kai Wright: I'm also joined by Alexis Williams, who is a recent graduate and a coder and social media content creator. She created the site pb-resources, which facilitates engagement and activism on a whole range of issues. Alexis, welcome to the show.

Alexis Williams: Thank you.

[applause]

Kai Wright: Askar, let's start with you and your story. The youngest commissioner in the history of your town. First off, for those who are not in New Jersey, what is a commissioner? What is it that you do?

Askar Mirza: It's a great question. Thank you for having me. A village commissioner. We essentially act as both the executive head of our departments, but also we make up the legislative body for the village of Ridgefield Park. I am the commissioner primarily of parks and public property, and what that means is, when there is an issue that comes to revamping our parks or managing our public property or making those decisions, I have the ultimate say.

I am the only authority in that field, but also when there are larger matters that concern the village as a whole, I will work with my fellow commissioners and we'll reach registration that works for all of us.

Kai Wright: Why? What made you want to do that? [chuckles] You're in school, you're a teenager, you want to be in charge of parks. Why?

Askar Mirza: Look, you're not the first person to ask me that, believe it or not. When it comes to it, I was raised with the belief that those who can must. That if you have an opportunity to make a positive change in your community, I feel as though you have an obligation to. It has been very rewarding. It has been very difficult, but I am happy to make a difference in whatever way I can.

Kai Wright: Introduce us to Ridgefield Park. How would you describe your community to the folks who [crosstalk]?

Askar Mirza: It's a village. It's one of the few villages left in the state of New Jersey. We're nestled right in Central Bergen County. We're a small suburban town. It's about 15,000 residents, mostly single-family homes, and we're very tight-knit. We're called Tree City USA. We've got wonderful trees in our parks, and we are self-proclaimed the only place to be on July 4th, I believe.

Kai Wright: Self-proclaimed?

Askar Mirza: I may be wrong on this. We have the oldest running July 4th parade in the state of New Jersey, perhaps in the country.

Kai Wright: I gather that affordability is a real issue in Ridgefield Park, including for yourself. Tell me about that. How is this showing up in your community?

Askar Mirza: Look, we are a community that is changing. A lot of older residents, they call themselves townies, they've been in town their whole life, and frankly, with property prices going up in New York City and surrounding neighborhoods, people are looking to Ridgefield Park as a real working-class community that was affordable. Recently, when people do come from your Manhattans and they would like to live in the suburbs and they'd like to work in the city, it drives property costs up, and that drives property taxes up. The problem is, when you're a senior citizen on a fixed income, or really when you're just a working individual trying to make a living, you can't pay these high property taxes. We're seeing an exodus of the working class community that makes Ridgefield Park the way it is towards more affordable areas.

Kai Wright: For yourself, why did that resonate? Why was that something that was such a provocation to you?.

Askar Mirza: Recently, actually, a few years ago, my family was forced to downsize. We sold the home I grew up in, and it was beautiful. Sometimes I'll wake up in the morning and think I'm still there. It's a wonderful place. We had to move into an apartment building because, frankly, we couldn't keep up with the property taxes. That and everything else is getting more expensive. It was completely unsustainable to pay both the mortgage and property taxes and the increased cost of living.

Kai Wright: We heard Rachel in our previous segment talk about affordability and economic issues. This is something that has resonated with other young people in Ridgefield Park. I gather?

Askar Mirza: We went from a few years ago saying, "I'm worried I'll never be able to buy a house," and now we're starting to see, "I'm worried my parents won't be able to stay in our house." It's a terrifying thing for someone who-- like you mentioned yourself, it's a very trying time being a young person these days. You're balancing school, you're balancing social changes in life. It is extremely difficult to put that kind of stress on a young individual to say, "Well, you might have to worry about whether your parents are going to be able to buy groceries and live in their home." It's really making an impact, and it's making a lot more people, who normally wouldn't be, more politically conscious.

Kai Wright: Alexis, that's how Askar got it. He decided to go into electoral politics, being provoked by what he saw was going on in his community. You have amassed quite a following in the digital space as you've tried to facilitate activism. What got you started?

Alexis Williams: I resonate with so many of those same feelings that you, Askar, were sharing within your story because activism and politics came into my life in a way that felt very natural in that same way. I went to school for engineering, I went to NYU, and when I was first starting my journey into engineering, I had so many different feelings of, "What is my place in this world?" Being a Latina, an African American young woman, you can imagine there are not too many people that look like me in those classrooms.

I was always looking for a space that I could find where I would feel seen and heard when I wasn't feeling seen and heard in my school. That's where I turned to the Internet. At that period of time, TikTok was starting to blow up as this place where Gen Z were gathering to share ideas and tell jokes and to spend a lot of our free time, maybe too much of it, but that's naturally where I turned to to talk about my experience in engineering.

When I started my platforms on social media, that was really my jumping-off point. I was always talking about identity and how so many of the aspects of my identity intersect with history and politics, but I was more so focusing in on myself, whereas nowadays, I get to talk about more historical things and more ways in which policy and politics and advocacy has to interact with each and every one of our daily lives. I think that started with one of the websites that I built in 2020 that really helped me start merging those ideas.

We all were home during COVID, during 2020, and that was also the period of time where there was the passing of George Floyd and the really high moment of Black Lives Matter and supporting the Black Lives Matter movement. I was basically able to use my skills that I was learning in school for engineering and computer science and merge that with my new budding interest in being really hands-on and active with politics. That's how I created my website, as you mentioned before, pb-resources.

Kai Wright: Which is interesting. The point is that you started off doing something for yourself. You were trying to find some space for yourself, and that blossomed into this larger thing. At what point did it shift? Was there a marker for you?

Alexis Williams: Absolutely. During that period of time when I was at home and when I got to not only work alongside so many organizers who were organizing around Black Lives Matter but also immigration and all sorts of issues that were really personally important to me, I saw the importance of being able to share my platform. I saw the importance of not only having this mic to use for myself to talk about my own experiences and my own identity, but a way that I can pass it off to my audience to not only highlight issues that they care about and I also deeply care about, but also give people a tool to say, "Here's what we can do about it."

We have this issue or we have this complaint or this thing that is a deep problem within our communities and the identity markers that I personally resonate with as well, but not only do we need to talk about these things and relate to one another and have these spaces where we can have that inner community, but there are also pieces of advocacy work that we all can do that don't take too much work or too much effort to continue to advocate for our communities and advocate for ourselves and not only make ourselves have our voices heard but also share that with other people.

Kai Wright: I wonder for both of you, this is a time there's so much cynicism. I certainly am guilty often [chuckles] of feeling cynical, but there's a real feeling that we often assign to people your age of a distrust in that anything can be fixed, a distrust in institutions, and a almost nihilism, I guess. You are two people who very clearly don't feel those, given the actions you've taken. I just wonder if you can speak to that emotion and how often you do or do not encounter it amongst your peers and how you react to it. Let's start with you, Askar.

Askar Mirza: Well, Kai, social media is lying to you, and it's lying to a lot of people. There is a lot of doom and gloom, but among the people in my community, it's a lack of engagement. Nobody in our community is working to turn us out. Personally, I want to say I registered at least 25 to 50 voters that graduated with me, and they just never really bothered to turn out and vote until there was someone in their face that said, "Hi, I gave you the answers to that test in 7th-grade math. You owe me for that." Getting them involved and engaging them in the community.

I think that's what makes the difference between optimism and cynicism. Do you feel like it's working for you, and do you feel like it's working with you?

Kai Wright: What about your Alexis?

Alexis Williams: I totally resonate with that. I think a lot of my advocacy and activism work is rooted in a great knowledge of history. When you look at history, it is really easy to be doom-scrolling on our phones and feel like right now is the worst moment possible that we've ever seen in our lifetimes, but truly, that isn't very true. When you think about just the history of our entire nation, there has been periods of time that have been much darker than this.

I feel really lucky to actually have a blueprint of people that have impacted history and that give me guidance in the way that they've navigated their spaces in the past, to navigate those spaces right now. I just look to those moments that were so deep and dark and the way that organizers and revolutionaries have persevered in those moments, even when it seemed to be too hard or too challenging.

Then also, just, as you said, looking in for community as being one of those things that really pushes us through these difficult times. It's so, again, easy to feel the doom and gloom from your phone, but once you look up at your friends and talk to the people around you, we start to realize that what we believe aren't too far apart. We all want to be safe. We all want to have good community with one another. We all want to support one another, and once you start having those real-life interactions and conversations with people, that's when you can start the building blocks of, "Okay, how do we get there?"

Kai Wright: We've spent a lot of time beating up on social media in this conversation. I think you heard in the first segment, Rachel and I were talking about it. As somebody who has chosen to use social media as your primary place to engage politically, how do you think about it at this stage, in terms of the folks who are saying this is not a helpful platform for political engagement?

Alexis Williams: That's a totally valid critique. I feel like anyone who is on, I don't know, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok these days can see how divisive and hard-drawn the lines are when we engage in these political conversations. What really drives me in my work of using social media as my main platform for advocacy and activism is I'm only ever really trying to change one person's mind.

If I can make one person think a little bit differently about an issue, or one person to ask more questions, or get one person to call up their legislator for the first time or learn one little thing about either history or the way that their politics works, that can act almost as a seed to inspire them to continue on this journey of really finding their space in where politics intersects with their own lives so that they can continue to advocate for their communities. That's all I'm hearing here to do.

I really try to ignore the divisiveness, ignore the misinformation and disinformation that is being spread, actually really using my platforms to actively combat it, but the reason why I'm able to sustain this content on social media for this long and am passionate about doing that is because I'm really looking at the audience as people and hoping that I am just reaching at least one person.

Kai Wright: We're going to take a break, and when we come back, more with Askar Mirza and Alexis Williams, and journalist Rachel Janfaza will rejoin us, but first, let's hear from Brooklyn-basedR&B duo Bathe, performing their live song Bad News. Take it away, guys.

[MUSIC - Bathe: Bad News]

[applause]

Regina: Hi, I'm Regina, a producer here at Notes from America with Kai Wright. I know, I know you're loving this episode. I promise I won't hold you long, but I have to ask, have you seen what we're up to on Instagram? That's where we post questions to you that help shape the conversations that we have on this podcast. Plus, it's a great way to keep up with the show. Follow noteswithkai on Instagram. That's @noteswithkai and we'll talk to you there. Thanks for listening.

[music]

Kai Wright: Welcome back. This is Notes from America. I'm Kai Wright coming to you live from the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, New Jersey. Hey, again, one more time, Newark.

[applause]

Before the break, we heard the R&B duo Bathe. They'll be back with us a little later in the show to perform again, but I just want to say their whole vibe is exactly what we need for this conversation in this moment. They just wash over us with a hit of peace. Thank you to Bathe. We're talking about the politics of Gen Z. I've been talking with Askar Mirza, who at 19 is the youngest commissioner ever elected in his community of Ridgefield, New Jersey, and Alexis Williams, who is the founder of pb-resources, which is a digital resource that facilitates activism across a whole range of issues. We are now rejoined by Gen Z journalist Rachel Janfaza. Rachel, welcome back.

Rachel Janfaza: Thank you for having me.

Kai Wright: You've been listening to the conversation, and I first of all just want to ask if you've heard anything from either Askar or Alexis's story that popped out to you that you want to respond to.

Rachel Janfaza: Definitely. I so enjoyed listening to that segment, and I think that both Askar and Alexis are so emblematic of the fact that despite all of the political frustration and disaffection that we're discussing, there are young people who are tuning in, who are deciding to put their foot in the pool and make a difference. I hear this all the time. While there is this immense disaffection, there is not disillusionment.

Despite the fact that young people are so fed up, they believe that they're going to be the ones who can change it, who can make a difference. We see so many young people running for office at all levels across the country. I think they are two prime examples of how this manifests, and that stood out to me from your conversation with them just a few minutes ago.

Kai Wright: Askar talked a great deal about affordability. We talked about that earlier as well. In your focus groups, in your reporting, how do you see the particular questions around the economy and affordability specifically manifesting for this generation of people?

Rachel Janfaza: I think it is really coming down to the cost of living, and that sounds pretty general, but on the specific, it's housing and rent and rent affordability. This affects both young people who are working their first jobs, who are trying to perhaps start a family, but also students. The cost of higher education is so expensive, and many students are having a hard time getting by as well or can't afford the housing that comes with-- that they need in order to take their classes.

I recently wrote a story for the Free Press that was all about home ownership and renting, and this idea that for many in this generation, the possibility of one day buying a home seems just totally out of the realm of possibility.

Kai Wright: Askar, can I ask you, the office you ran for is a nonpartisan office, but you chose to be a registered Republican, what drew you to that identity? Why the Republican Party?

Askar Mirza: I take my office as a nonpartisan office very seriously, but I'm a registered Republican. I'm on the Republican county committee. Frankly, it's because I've seen the results of democratic rule in New Jersey, and it hasn't worked. We are in a state where housing is more expensive than national average, gas is more expensive than national average. I have watched with eagerness, and trust me, if I thought it could work, I would love to be a Democrat in New Jersey, but I've seen the policies, and I'm not convinced that they've worked.

Kai Wright: It's a hyper-local question. It's not about national politics. So much of our politics is nationalized at this point, but what you're saying is, for you, you're looking at it from a particularly local lens.

Askar Mirza: Absolutely. New Jersey is one of the states that has elections every year. 2023, I served on a state Senate reelection campaign, and that was the top of the ticket. These small local-level issues, they get so often overshadowed by these big national questions, especially in a year like this. Everyone knows who's running for president. Does everyone know who's running for office in their town? Who's running for office at the county level? These are the people that are making the decisions that will impact you much more directly than whoever the president of the United States is.

Kai Wright: Rachel, there is some data that suggests-- We can make too much of this, but there is some data that suggests that Gen Z, relative to millennials, is more conservative, which is different than how we think about it. Is that accurate, and is that what you see as well?

Rachel Janfaza: I've written about this data, and when I wrote about it, I reached out to young people to get their take on it, to try to find that anecdotal evidence as well. I think that there is some truth to this, that this generation has more conservative views than the millennial generation or then perhaps their parents' generation. There are some young people who consider themselves to be more conservative than their parents are.

I think when you look at the Republican Party and the way that it has shifted over the past, let's say, 10-ish years, the first-time voters in 2024 were 10 years old when former President Trump was elected. I think that there's just a different Overton window in what conservatism looks like and the way that that plays out on social media is contributing to this shift in ideology, but there also is a huge gender gap.

I think that's important to point out as well, is that young women are moving further to the left at faster rates, while young men, it depends on what poll you're looking at, aren't necessarily moving further to the right, but just aren't moving to the left as quickly. There is a gender dynamic at play there as well. A large part, I think experts would say, is due to social media.

Kai Wright: Listeners, we are not taking your calls this week, but we are taking questions from folks here in Newark that are with us in the audience. I'm going to go to a few of those. Let's start with a question we got from Saul here, who asks, "How important is it for us to vote, and what would you say to those who think their voice is not heard?" Both Alexis and Askar, you have both chosen-- Askar, you explicitly have chosen to engage in electoral politics, [laughs] but Alexis, part of your work is also electoral politics. Why don't we start with you with an answer to Saul's question?

Alexis Williams: Absolutely. One of the things that I really want to say is, of course, it's so incredibly important to vote. So many people don't think that their vote matters or that their vote counts, but something that I want to talk about a little bit for a moment, especially for first-time voters, is the fact that so many people, when they look at their ballot and they see what's at the top of the ticket and make their way down after you're voting for real people, they'll, in a lot of states, see ballot measures.

A lot of these young voters don't even know what that is. They go into the ballot box and they're like, "I didn't know I was voting for something other than human beings," but those ballot measures are such an important way that you do get really active in your local politics. It's something that I realized so many young people don't even know about when they're going to go vote for the first time, which is why I made an automated resource to tell people, "Okay, you can put in your state and figure out what those ballot measures are going to be before you step into that poll so you know what you're voting for."

A lot of people feel like, "Oh, these elections are predetermined. These people that I have to vote for, I'm not a fan of either of them," but there's so much more on your ballots than just people. Abortion, minimum wage, prison reform. If these things are important to you, there is a reason for you to go out and vote.

Kai Wright: What about you, Askar?

Askar Mirza: Vote, please, and I'll tell you why. My story has become a proverb among my voting community. I won my local election by two votes. That's two people who, if they stayed home, the result would have been different. We think so much about how little we feel our vote matters at a national level. New Jersey is a blue state. Kentucky is a red state, but there are so many minute differences at the local level, at the county level, at the congressional, and the senatorial level.

You may feel as though your vote doesn't matter for who the president is, but I guarantee you, your vote will matter on who your mayor is, on who your congressperson is, who your county commissioner is. It can be disheartening to see every four years, your state turns the same color on that map, but I am living proof that these things happen when you come out and vote. I had people at the door, "Hi. Hey. Listen, I'm in my car. I'll take you to a polling station right now." "I'm doing something right now."

I remember on election night seeing that I was up by two votes, and there were still mail-in ballots coming, and I was terrified. Every vote counts. It really does. Like you were saying, not just for the federal elections, but for your local elections.

Kai Wright: Two votes. [chuckles] Someone here in our audience wants to know, do you see any drawbacks to approaching politics across generational lines? Maybe I'll put that to you, Rachel. What is the drawback to looking at it this way?

Rachel Janfaza: I have had lots of conversations with people who are older than me who say, "You always write about all of the problems that this generation is facing, but our generation had our fair share of problems, too." That is completely valid and accurate and I think it really is important, as Alexis was saying, to look at history and to see the role that young people have played throughout history in leading many of our countries and around the world, social movements.

I think it's really important to recognize also that there are similarities in issues young people and older people care about, and when you focus so much on the generation as an individual generation, that might get lost. That could be a potential drawback, but I also think it is really important to understand for many of the reasons we spoke about in the first segment, about the way that this generation has a different perception of politics and a different worldview as a result of social media. I think that distinction is really stark and should be highlighted.

Kai Wright: How stark do you think the distinction is, Alexis? As somebody working again in social media, I assume some old folks like myself-- How Stark do you actually think the difference is?

Alexis Williams: It's funny because once again, it's one of those things where you-- when you're able to actually interact with people, you realize that so many lines and barriers are much lower than you might think. A lot of the people that resonate with the content that I make and the way in which I specifically tie in our current politics and policies with history, it resonates a lot with older people who lived through the exact experiences that I'm talking about.

A lot of the historical anecdotes that I'll share on my platform resonate not only with an older crowd, but then again, with a younger crowd that maybe doesn't know about the things that I'm talking about or the historical situations that I'm referencing, but are learning something new and see how it resonates with their own progressive ideology. Then it just makes us realize that there are so many throughlines that make so much of our politics more similar than different. A lot of people think that Gen Z is so much further on the spectrum than other generations, but I often find that that's not as true as maybe traditional media makes it seem.

Kai Wright: We will apologize. We got several questions about the Electoral College. Askar, you mentioned this, watching your state turn blue or red and how that depresses you. Rachel, I wonder, do you see-- first off, how legible is the idea of the Electoral College and all of these things that go into our national politics to the people you're interviewing in the first place? Does it depress engagement?

Rachel Janfaza: I think definitely. I hear this come up when I'm having listening sessions across the country and this idea that Askar mentioned that a vote doesn't matter because their state will go a certain way no matter what.

I think beyond this idea of the Electoral College and the fact that most young people are aware of it and understand how it impacts their vote in their state, at the federal level at least, there's this idea that even if they vote and their state goes the way they wanted it to, things might not change anyway. I've spoken with a lot of left-leaning young people who voted for President Biden in 2020, but felt frustrated after the fact because they felt like the things that they thought they would see didn't come to fruition. We keep going back to social media, but I think that our generation has been conditioned to instant gratification and thinking that things happen immediately.

Politics works really slowly, and I think that sometimes the sense of frustration from our generation is a result of the fact that these things, these policies take time, but then you also look at DC and there is gridlock. I think it's both something that is perceived, but also there are some structural reasons that young people feel frustrated as well.

Kai Wright: All of us, frankly. We don't have time on some of these issues. We do not have time on the climate for politics to catch up. That can be quite maddening. I said that this is the most diverse generation in history. How much does identity matter to-- I hear that it matters certainly to your politics, Alexis. How much do you think it matters generationally to the people you're engaging with, both of you? I want to hear both Alexis and Askar talk about this. How much does identity matter to the politics of Gen Z?

Alexis Williams: I think that social media has really cultivated a space where we're all getting to see people live out their identities so much day-to-day. We, in so many ways, do get a more personified view of different identities that maybe we're not a part of that I think can propel a lot of people's politics, especially when it comes to issues like reproductive rights and abortion. You don't have to be a cis-gendered woman to feel like that is something that you should either agree with or disagree with.

A lot of my identity drives my politics because I'm a part of so many marginalized groups, but I don't necessarily think that just because you have an association or a belonging to an inner group, that your identity will always drive who you are.

Kai Wright: Askar, I have to ask you to do it quickly. 20 seconds. How big a deal is identity?

Askar Mirza: I think it's being made a bigger deal than it should be, frankly. I'm a Pakistani American. My parents immigrated from Pakistan in 2001, which, as you can imagine, was not a good time to immigrate from Pakistan, but they raised me to say, "Well, listen, you are Pakistani, but you're an American." I think that unity among Americans is a form of identity, but I think it transcends a lot of the smaller identity subgroups. I think, most importantly, when we do hyper focus on identity, we end up building walls, and we're saying, "Well, listen, you're not in the in-group. You don't know about this. Stop talking about it."

Kai Wright: We will have to leave it there. Askar Mirza, Alexis Williams, and Rachel Janfaza thank you all for joining our show. Notes from America is a production of WNYC Studios. A special thanks to our partners here at at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center. I'm Kai Wright. Thanks for spending this time with us, and once again, here is Bathe, performing their song Furloughed.

[applause]

[MUSIC - Bathe: Furloughed]

 

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