For several years, health experts have been warning about increased mental health strain on America’s young people. Social media took its toll. Global warming continues to cause fear and anger. And most recently, the global pandemic has led to unprecedented levels of isolation and hopelessness.
Social media has largely been a silent problem, tricking young people and adults alike into thinking that it is a benign medium to socialize and share news. Only after films like The Social Dilemma (2020) have most people come to realize that there is a vast army of manipulators behind our social media experiences.
Global warming has been a somewhat different story. For at least two decades now, environmentally conscious young people have expressed growing concern about our treatment of the environment. In 2006, Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth brought several decades of science and concerns into a powerful (to me at least) 2-hour package. It inspired a generation to take up activism.
However, the activism has yet to translate into the major global changes. The planet is still warming. Carbon dioxide and methane from human use are still flooding into the atmosphere. Then, 3 and a half years ago, Greta Thunberg began her “School Strike for Climate” initiative, also known as Fridays for Future, Youth for Climate, or Youth Strike for Climate. The movement has grown around the world, inspiring students to take up direct action in an effort to influence policy makers.
The Cost of Action
A recent study published in PLoS One by the political scientist Kevin B. Smith, showed that increased engagement in politics in the last five years by Americans has been making us increasingly stressed-out and unhappy. Young people have felt acute pain.
In particular, the hyper-polarization of contemporary politics seems to have filtered down to teens and other young people in ways that are hard to manage. As older adults, most of us have developed a number of coping strategies, from elements of Non-violent Communication (NVC) to finding and using that “mute” button and going for a walk.
But we can all remember our younger days, when every boost made us feel on top of the world and every set-back felt soul-destroying. When we’re younger, we don’t have the same sense of perspective that we gain over the years. So we are more at the whim and will of life’s ups and downs.
The Eight Worldly Winds
In Buddhist thought there are said to be “Eight Worldly Winds.” These are praise and blame, success and failure, pleasure and pain, and fame and disrepute. According to Buddhism, spiritual progress makes us less and less susceptible to these winds, which are generated by the world around us and often completely out of our control.
For many of us, spiritual progress tracks somewhat with simply getting older. Even without a religious identity or philosophy, we can simply settle in to who we are and grow less concerned with these things. It is understandably difficult, however, for young people to avoid the lures and pitfalls of these eight winds.
Social Media and Global News
One of the factors making political participation most difficult for many young people is the growing sense that American democracy itself is in jeopardy. With so many people praising authoritarians at home and abroad, the existential dread can be all the more palpable.
Add to this the often toxic mix of social media and news channels bent toward a constant cycle of hype and crisis, and we find ourselves in a difficult place indeed. The further away an atrocity is, the more obviously helpless we are going to feel in the face of it. And when all we see on news is atrocities, it can feel like we are under constant threat.
Think Global, Act Local
This is where the old motto, “Think Global, Act Local” can be of great help. There is little I can meaningfully do today to help the people of Ukraine, Yemen, Myanmar, or Haiti. However, I can make meaningful changes in my own town.
When I was a youth in Helena, Montana, I was not particularly politically active. However, I was a fan of frisbee golf (we called it “folf”). And when the city proposed an ordinance outlawing its play within city limits, a few of us banded together to fight the powers. We went to city council meetings, pled our case, and promised to be careful and respectful (a few windows had been broken along our downtown course).
If memory serves, we lost our battle. But it instilled in me a sense of efficacy—telling me that it was and is within my power to make a difference. Twenty years later, I was back in my hometown when city officials were pressured to clamp down on trans people’s rights. Again, a group of us took up the cause. We went to city commission meetings and pled our case. This time we won.
These small victories can give young people (and older people too) a sense of agency that is so needed in today’s world. Even when my friends and I lost the right to play folf, we gained comradery as we worked together for a common cause. So we deepened our sense of community and belonging. This practice of building networks and helping one-another can help teens ride through the inevitable ups and downs that politics will bring. And, as politics is a matter of people-power, no matter how many losses happen, when the network is large enough and committed enough, it cannot help but win.
Justin Whitaker, Ph.D., holds a doctorate in Buddhist ethics from the University of London. He has given lectures, and taught Buddhist studies and Philosophy at Oxford University, the University of Hong Kong, the University of Montana, and at Antioch University’s intensive study-abroad program in India. A certified meditation teacher, he is a regular contributor to Patheos.com, and Senior Correspondent for Buddhistdoor Global. He lives in Missoula with his family.