How the Young Marchers Can Strike Fear in the Hearts of the Politicians

Intergenerational advice from a LGBT movement founder and elections expert

Courtesy of USA Today

To Our Young Marchers and Activists:

I am thrilled and excited by your demonstrations in response to the Parkland shooting and looking forward to the March For Our Lives this Saturday, March 24th. It has triggered memories of my marches at the start of the LGBT movement in 1970 and a desire to give my perspective based in five decades of covering elections for the major media (abc, ap, cbs,cnn,fox,nbc).

Marching in those first demonstrations was like being given access to the command center of our culture where I could see and experience how we as a society create ourselves. I didn’t have the words for it then because the experience was so strong. Perhaps these words will be of help to you now.

The Power in Marching

We affirm our shared concern for a cause when we come together; we are no longer separated and passive. We connect with the collective power to define who we are rather than who we were taught to be. This power amplifies when we march. When I marched for gay liberation, I dropped my guilt and passivity and felt the truth and power of my love. I could see if enough of us came together we would not only empower ourselves but also change the attitudes in the larger society.

Courtesy of Mark Wallheiser/AP

You are touching that power. I can see it in your faces. You are creating a new role for youth in politics. You realize that being not “old enough to know better,” is a good thing. While the lack of gun control is a direct threat to your own lives, many of you also see that there is a pattern of neglect that is giving your generation the shaft in many ways, the most lethal being the irreversible changes in climate change. I shudder to think what life will be like for you and your children.

You can use that collective awareness and power to improve life for us all. Here are some suggestions that I hope you will find helpful.

The Passivity in Voting

Your arguments for gun control are sound and your saying so makes it real to many adults, especially those with children. You are moving minds, but politicians are another story. Yes, you will make some of them more sympathetic but there are additional forces at play other than reason and compassion in our politics. If those were the dominant forces we would have a very different government and country.

I can hear in your speeches that many of you know the power that the NRA has over lawmakers in terms of one-issue voters and millions of dollars to drive turnout and feed negative ads to keep opposing votes home. To counteract that you need to speak the language of votes to the politicians. You can threaten them with your future votes and those of your parents, and I can see ways you can expand that threat.

Four years ago at the last midterm only 34% of those eligible voted. The highest turnout for a midterm in your lifetime was 42%. It is even less for primaries where candidates are chosen. The lack of voting is a clear sign that most people don’t see and feel the connection between their vote and their lives.

By talking to them you can help them begin this connection, if not with their life, but by relating their votes directly to your life.

What To Do Next

You have great potential in bringing out the vote. Think of your extended family and their friends. You need not change their minds about gun control; you need to identify the people that are sympathetic to your cause. They might not know where the candidates stand or be motivated to vote. You can tell them about the candidates, tell them that their vote matters to you a lot and ask them to promise to vote for you if not for themselves.

Our surveys show that many people intend to vote, but things often come up. You can remind them around Election Day how important their vote is and even contact them to make sure they voted. You could also offer childcare, transportation and physical assistance.

Don’t forget your older brother, sisters and cousins. Only one out of six of 18 to 29-year-olds voted in 2014. You can be a role model for them; encourage them to vote and be more active rather than just accept the given political reality.

With your skills at social media and contacts with peers throughout the country, you have the potential of a powerful vote turnout machine, one to strike fear in every politician.

You can spark this fear now with speakers that show that you have grasped the full potential of your power to bring out the vote. The media, so concerned with the election, will amplify your message. You can stoke this fear and keep your cause in the news by making efforts in the weeks to come in the Arizona special election and in the Democratic and Republican primaries throughout the country.

You are the faces of our future. As you grow in strength and connect your lives with our laws and votes, it will be hard for people to ignore the power they do have. And at some point, enough of us will realize that voting is a way that we can step together into the command center of our lives.

Your march this Saturday can be for commonsense gun laws, and it can also sow the seeds for a movement of Voting for ALL of Our Lives.

This Article Originally Published on Medium.com March 21 2018