As young people, we are often told by older generations that we are a lethargic, apathetic, cynical generation of screen-addicted zombies. Just take a recent guest essay published in the New York Times by Thomas B. Edsall titled “Why Aren’t the Kids Out Protesting Against Trump?” where he inveighs against the numbing power of social media and laments that kids aren’t protesting like they used to.
He’s not entirely wrong. Social media and phones have led us to conceptualize justice as a product to consume, rather than a relational movement to participate in. But the truth is, Gen Z is fired up and ready to make a change. The student movement against genocide in Gaza in 2023 was a great example of the power our generation has when we come together, and how rebuked we are when we really do stand up for change. Oftentimes, we’re just unsure of where to start, and how to translate passion into action.
A great example of eager youth participation is through the energy surrounding an annual change maker event on campus: Be the Change. On February 21, Eastern University students, professors and staff gathered together with members of the community, clergy, activists and organizers in a day of education and mobilization. The vision of Be the Change is to give the necessary tools for making transformational change towards a more humane and just society in a number of key areas. In a consumerist society where even concern for the marginalized is a product to consume, Be the Change reclaims justice as a community act of solidarity and an active process rather than a passive product.
This year we pulled around 100 people, doubling last year’s turnout. We also substantially increased our student turnout, providing evidence to the fact that the youth are hungry to get involved. Oftentimes, people are not apathetic to the injustices of the world. It’s that they care, but are overwhelmed and unsure where to get started. The best remedy? Inviting folks into opportunities for action. That’s exactly what we did this year following Be the Change.
Be the Change is about more than one day of learning about justice from a disembodied, abstract perspective. It’s about receiving necessary tools to actively build a society that works for the many, not the few. Like any tool, they only work when used, not when admired from a distance on the wall. We put these tools into practice this year by organizing a nonviolent direct action on Palm Sunday that got its inception at Be the Change.
Eastern students and recent alumni, led by organizers and activists at BTC, took to the King of Prussia Target to demand the corporation stop cooperating with ICE/CBP and enforce more robust policies to protect their employees and customers. While individual Targets in various jurisdictions have different responses to ICE, as of yet there has not been a procedure passed down from the larger Target Corp. Target has also been targeted (excuse the pun) due to their lack of response when CBP entered a store in Minneapolis during Operation Metro Surge and arrested two employees – employees who were legal citizens.
We demand Target Corp. inform all their employees of actions to take should immigration enforcement arrive on scene and request to see signed judicial warrants if they seek entry. We demand a more explicit rebuke of ICE’s practices in Minneapolis during Operation Metro Surge and everywhere else they are now utilizing the same practices.
Raising our voices in chants, songs and messages reflecting on Holy Week and its intersection with justice, 100 demonstrators disrupted business as usual, awakened the public consciousness, and held a picket line outside the store. We occupied the building for nearly two hours with contagious joy and energy before police intervention.
At that point, 11 demonstrators, including myself, linked arms and held a sit-in blocking self-checkout until demands were met. We were each arrested, but thanks to the prayers of many supporting us along the way, we were booked and released without spending an overnight in a holding cell. Thanks to Up Against the Law, a team of lawyers who work to represent activists facing charges, we were able to plead not guilty to our summary-level charges of disorderly conduct. This action would not have been possible without several teams supporting us along the way, including a jail support, mutual aid, safety, media and outside team cheering us on and filming the arrests to ensure we were handled appropriately.
Many of the folks who came out to begin to challenge corporations’ compliance with ICE were young people like myself for whom it was our first nonviolent direct action. As I spread the word about the action throughout campus in one on one conversations, I saw the hunger for involvement in students’ eyes. Not everyone helped out in the same way. Some of us got arrested. Some of us helped notify the media. Some of us joined the jail support team, who welcomed us with cheers when we were released from police custody. Others of us who were intimidated by showing up in person prayed for our safety. The truth is, there are infinitely numerous ways to get involved in the work of justice, all of which are necessary to societal change.
But what I encountered in the hearts and minds of countless young people was not what Mr. Edsall describes the situation as, where Gen Z is hopelessly compliant in the face of rising authoritarianism. No, I saw the youth fired up and ready for more, and excited to finally have a chance to participate in the work against the cruel and inhumane immigration enforcement system we see right now in our nation.
Don’t buy into the narratives that our generation is a lost generation, coddled by screens and unwilling to stand up for what we believe in. As the active involvement of Eastern students for justice shows, we’re just getting started.
