Keep on Rocking Us: An Interview With Jehmu Green

By T. Eve Greenaway, WireTap. Posted December 8, 2004.

WT: What was the single biggest thing you learned from the election?

JG: This [election] cycle reinforced why it’s so important for groups to not just talk about collaboration but to pinpoint specific ways that efforts can be amplified – by sharing lists, by carving out different roles that organizations, individuals, and leaders can play and allowing those entities to play those roles. I think that happened from a collaboration standpoint at a much higher level than we’ve ever seen. Ideally that’s one of the main things that will continue. And that people don’t point too many fingers in trying to make assessments of what happened with the campaign but really build off of, in the sense of building blocks, collaboration.

WT: What can youth and youth advocates do to continue the momentum that built up around this election?

JG: Given the initial reports of turnout for young people not being as significant as had been expected … there was this immediate need that we set the record straight. I think that still has to happen. With the record-high turnout, with the impact – I don’t even know if it’s quantifiable – young people actually helped drive the buzz and excitement and energy that made this record turn-out across the board. I just feel like they really should be given the credit for that. So I think immediately there’s still a need for all the activists and first-time voters and individuals who got engaged in this process in a way that we could have only wished, to realize how impressive this year was.

But just as important is to make sure that the media and the political operatives and the parties and consultants realize it. So I think from an activist standpoint, we have to keep clarifying. Building off of that, because you can look at key states and see where young people increased their share of the electorate and what it meant in a number of different ways.

So you have those numbers from a community that we can count on to hold elected officials accountable on a set of issues that spurred the turnout. A case has to be made from a local, state and national standpoint for advocating an issue-based agenda. And if we wait too long as a community to really get into these battles and put our policy positions forward, it’s going to be harder to pick back up the momentum. We definitely need to ride the wave and jump back in the higher education fight, and even into the Social Security fight. The messages that are going be used from the administration around some of the changes that they're proposing for Social Security, for example, are going to be based on what people report young people want or need or would like to see. So we should make sure that the values of this generation are on the table as one of the most significant social programs this country has ever seen is being adjusted and re-worked.

WT: If you had to generalize about the values of this upcoming generation, what would you say they are?

JG: When you look at the values of young people you see that they are more tolerant of different cultures and lifestyles. The reality of their demographic is that they’re more diverse – and they’ve grown up with a different understanding about diversity. I think it’s very promising that this is the most tolerant and diverse generation this country has ever seen. And that, through the years – whether it’s the impact they had on this election, or in 2008 or 20 years from now – is going to have a very significant impact on public policy.

WT: Do you think the culture wars that everyone people are talking about – do you think those apply to this younger generation?

JG: I think that you’re not going to see the same level of intense division coming from this generation and that should be seen as a positive thing.

We are in a time where there are so many issues that are presented as if they are polarized to the extreme. But you’ll see a different political reality with this generation – where it’s not so polarized, from a partisan standpoint and not so polarized from a community, constituency standpoint. Even when you look at the new social conservatives, not a lot of these young people have a desire to go after gay people. That’s not a part of what it means to them to be socially conservative and that’s what’s so promising. Both sides need to really appreciate and understand what that means: How they’re going to engage this generation. For Democrats it's about how they should really find ways of nurturing, including and reaching out to young people as their base. The Republican Party needs to recognize how the numbers of this generation are going to have an impact again, from here on out.

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