Setting Ourselves Up For Disappointment
2018 is off to quite the start. In January, a Democratic Alabama Senator was sworn in for the first time in decades, and the Republican governor of New Jersey was replaced by a Democrat. In the past two weeks, people from both sides of the aisle have come out en masse in support of tighter gun regulations, and the NRA seems to be facing its reckoning. For the first time in recent memory, the Dems seem unstoppable. If only it were truly so.
It is the mind’s natural setting to search for coherence and common causes. Democrats have won 3 major victories, and many small ones soon, so surely liberal sentiment is increasing in this country. Only it may not be. Doug Jones’ victory in Alabama was amazing, yes, but it is almost definitely not repeatable. Yes, there was record turnout from certain demographics, which certainly propelled Jones to victory, but let’s not kid ourselves: this is Alabama. Doug Jones didn’t win the election so much as Roy Moore lost it. Jones’s margin of victory was 1.5 percent, and he won by fewer votes than the total number of write ins, which was astronomically large. He could get the same turnout next election, but unless he’s running against another pederast like Roy Moore, he will be completely crushed.
Now for Phil Murphy. I’m incredibly glad this man is governor, but his victory isn’t really impressive or a sign of surging liberal sentiment. The governorship of New Jersey has very consistently switched parties for the last few decades. It’s a blue state.
What worries me especially is how quick we, specifically my generation, are to use the phrase “our revolution.” At this point, we have nothing approaching any Democratic revolution. Did Beto O’Rourke out-raise Ted Cruz? Yes. Does the Women’s March draw way larger crowds than its conservative counterparts? Yes. But anyone who sees this as evidence of a “revolution” is fatally mistaken. Hillary far out-raised Trump by a huge margin. Jon Osoff out-raised Karen Handel by an even more tremendous margin. Bernie drew enormous crowds in the Democratic primaries. None of these things translated to an electoral victory.
This nation’s youth, who vote overwhelmingly blue, has absolutely no right to call itself revolutionary. Our political participation is best described as performative and empty. There hasn’t been one national election cycle in the past 3 decades where our turnout has not been the lowest by a large margin. Our participation in presidential elections in the past 30 years has never surpassed 50%. Our midterm election participation is not only markedly worse, but in a state of outright decline: in 2014, our turnout didn’t even reach 20%.
If you think that the shootings in Las Vegas and Florida will send youth turnout into overdrive, think again. The 2014 mid-term elections were preceded by the Isla Vista and Marysville shootings; youth turnout hit its lowest level in 3 decades. The 2016 election was preceded by the San Bernadino shooting, and the Orlando shooting, which was, at the time, the worst shooting in American history, and happened 3 months closer to Election Day than Florida’s Parkland shooting; youth turnout in that election was lower than in all but one of the three presidential elections preceding it. The Florida shooting is a terrible, deeply saddening tragedy. But it’s a tragedy that’s occurred 9 months before Election Day. As history shows, that is far more than enough time for the nation’s young voters to forget their outrage and flake on Election Day.
Things could certainly change, and I hope they do. If every single one of my pessimistic predictions is proven wrong this November, I will be ecstatic. And I will be doing what I can to make sure they are. But the way to solve this problem is not to convince ourselves that its solution is already a fait accompli. In fact, as we saw in the 2016 election, a premature victory lap can come with terrible consequences. What we need more than rallies are voter registration efforts. I don’t doubt that America’s youth has a vision for this country. But as long as we remain the lowest-performing age bracket, it will never be anything more than a vision. The most important political demonstration will happen on November 6th. Will we show up?
