Yeah, we took them down. It was easy. It’s not that we’re tough. We’re not. It’s that they were weak. They were always weak. They were counting on nobody noticing. That worked for a surprisingly long time. But not against us.
We were a new generation and we didn’t know they were supposed to be strong. They always looked old and weak to us.
You probably first noticed us when the Parkland kids refused to keep quiet. They called bullshit. They knew bullshit when they heard it. All of us do. Instinctively.
First of all, these guys rule by fear. But we don’t know about fear yet. It’s not that we are brave. It’s that we are young and feel immortal. You were once like that, too. You just forgot.
There’s another thing. All those rationalizations for stupidity and cruelty—they don’t work on us. We know the adults are destroying the planet and are planning to be conveniently dead, leaving us a giant cinder of denuded crap to try to survive on. We know about ALL of your failures. And we’re not happy about it.
We know you glorify guns and greed and “free enterprise” and we know you make up imaginary enemies. We know that you allegedly “powerful” adults have enthralled the other less powerful adults and crushed them body and soul.
But you haven’t crushed us. You haven’t even reached us. We laugh at you. We take nothing you say seriously. You don’t even realize how stupid you sound.
In any case, here’s how we did it. You remember but you were so stunned you probably didn’t understand what happened. It’s a blur. You didn’t understand what was going on before and you are even more confused now.
But it’s pretty simple. This generation took control early. We simply refused to listen (ha, kids never listen!) and didn’t do as we were told and mucked up everything so business as usual became impossible.
We handed flowers to riot police. We handed construction paper hearts to your provocateurs and hired thugs. You couldn’t get a good picture portraying us as a threat. You couldn’t identify a leader to arrest. You couldn’t do anything—especially when your enablers abandoned you and began siding with us. Because, like other adults, parents have a weakness. They love their children. And a whole lot of adults have children. So, they joined us, and abandoned those who wanted to crush us.
Our message was simple. The adults have failed. They are unable or unwilling to lead on saving the planet, on fighting the virus, on social or economic justice, on anything at all. You are losers and you don’t even have a stake in the game. You are old and simply abusing the rest of us on your way to the grave.
We won’t stand for it. We didn’t stand for it. In every state, we held up signs that demanded resignation of the current generation of failed leaders and installation of young people committed to a humane and safe planet for the incoming generations. There was lots of yelling at us, but no actual answer to the charge that you failed and you deserved to be removed.
No answer whatever.
So, we took control. Adults should be seen and not heard. Or perhaps neither. Game over.