Power of Z Short Film Urges Young People to Vote So That Our Priorities Are Addressed by Government
Andy Sacks
Editor's note: The author of this piece served as a consultant on The Power of Z.
"Here's a simple fact," former Dance Moms star Nia Sioux says to the camera: "If voters under 30 voted at the same percentage as people over 60, the policies of our government would soon come to reflect our priorities and our concerns. Unfortunately, most of Gen Z remains unaware that our growing demographic might is our newest superpower."
Sioux, 23, is the narrator of a new short-form video highlighting Generation Z's origin story and aimed at encouraging youth voter participation ahead of the 2024 presidential election . The youth share of the electorate is growing: nearly 41 million members of Gen Z — those born between 1997 and 2011 — are eligible to vote this year, according to data from the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at Tufts (CIRCLE), and 8 million of those eligible Gen Z voters turned 18 since the last presidential election. This voting bloc is also incredibly diverse; about half (45%) of eligible young voters are people of color.
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With a montage of images and video clips from the early years of Gen Zers' lives, the Power of Z contextualizes life growing up for today's youngest eligible voters. Born just before or after 9/11 , members of Gen Z only know a period of intense chaos and deep partisan division: decades of war, climate disasters like Hurricane Katrina and wildfires across the country, the 2008 recession, the tragic Sandy Hook school shooting and a myriad of others that have followed, the Covid-19 pandemic, the Black Lives Matter movement, and the overturning of Roe v. Wade .
The film centers the perspectives of young people with footage from focus groups in Charlotte, North Carolina and Minneapolis, Minnesota led by Harvard Kennedy School pollster John Della Volpe, who authored FIGHT: How Gen Z is Channeling Their Fear and Passion to Save America. Asked what has shaped their perspectives, one focus group member said "climate change," adding, "it's honestly affected my reasoning of not wanting to have children anymore because I don't want to raise them in a world that probably won't exist."
But amid the doom and gloom and palpable sense of isolation and loneliness that has been felt by so many members of Gen Z throughout their adolescence, members of Della Volpe's focus groups honed in on the potential of community organizing. For example, as another focus group member shared, this is a generation that came together after the murder of George Floyd to rally for change. "We were all on the same page," he said. "We're all in this together."
While young leaders have taken action in their neighborhoods, that's not reflected in federal leadership aside from the singular Gen Z member of Congress, Florida Rep. Maxwell Frost . As Sioux makes clear, the average age in the Senate is 65, which is "retirement age for most Americans," she says. Making the argument that the problems faced by Gen Z could be solved by new and fresh leadership, rather than an aging gerontocracy, the film has a simple message: Vote.
Sioux doesn't diminish real disaffection from some young people who question the efficacy of voting, saying it's "entirely understandable." But to those who cast doubt, she says, "when it comes to controlling our future, having real political power, the math is now on our side."
"We need to find our collective voice now. Use our growing demographic clout and vote at the same rate as people over 60. And that means voting not just this November, but every November afterward," Sioux declares.
Power of Z is a nonpartisan film produced by Della Volpe, Mac Heller, and Tim Smith of the American Issues Initiative. It's part of a voter engagement initiative this election cycle that used a social-first digital strategy (in collaboration with influencers and athletes) and teamed up with nonpartisan issue-focused organizations to reach young people where they are: online.
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Originally Appeared on Teen Vogue
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