Once, anti-establishment youth disillusioned with mainstream politics headed left. Now increasing numbers are tilting right. Why?
Josh is 24 years old and works as a carer. It’s not easy work, but he prefers it to his old job in a supermarket: most of his clients are elderly and “just want someone there with them, because they’re lonely”. In his spare time Josh used to be into boxing. But lately he’s got into politics instead.
Like many of his gen Z contemporaries, he’s thoroughly disillusioned with the mainstream kind. “The two parties that have been in power for 100-plus years have done nothing. The economy’s a mess,” he scoffs. But if he sounds like the kind of anti-establishment young person who once rallied to the radical left, Josh’s frustration has taken him in another direction. An ardent leaver in his teens, who backed Boris Johnson in 2019, he now belongs to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.
Where’s the left-leaning equivalent?
The status quo is bad so of course people are going to gravitate towards things that go contrary to the establishment. It’s not exactly rocket science.
I feel like a lot of people look at a bad system and go “We should change!” and then accept any change. But that’s stupid. If you have a machine that often breaks down, yeah you should change that. But you shouldn’t replace it with a machine that shoots rusty nails out every couple minutes while filling the room with toxic gas. Yeah, that’s a change, but a change for the worse.
Or like if you realize you got on the wrong train. You should change because you don’t want to go where this one is going. But don’t go on an express train going to the same wrong place!
There was Corbyn, who, after his antisemitism judgment, has been deplatfotmed by the mainstream media, not to mention repellent, self-serving tankies like Galloway. There was a media-savvy “dirtbag left” (think Russell Brand, in his sex-god-Che-Guevara era), though for some reason they keep turning fash as soon as it gets expedient, and are the opposite of a solution here.
Arrested for protesting, keeping their head down, or trying to live their life outside of mainstream capitalist society is my guess.
The left have been the targets of successive governments and vested interests, in most countries, for over 100 years. No wonder it’s dead. Not to mention the infighting. Some of which I’m sure is natural but some of which will be instigated by those same governments and vested interests.
We’re just passing on our ideals through upbringing, storytelling and kindness, like we always have. These are powerful tools.
Edit to add: we’re also a lot sexier.
And humble too!