Rap Record Hoarder posted:

Is there a way to put an end to this response? The whole "wait til the baby boomers die off" thing? Because I feel like it's ultimately self-defeating on so many levels; if nothing else it encourages voter apathy and civic disinterest or disengagement. I mean, I'm not attacking you, personally, but I hear this repeated so, so often. Liberals, progressives, et. al shoot themselves in the foot with this stuff. Yes, changing demographics will shift the political landscape slightly, but that won't do much if people aren't engaged (for example: http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/03/31/us/hopes-frustrated-many-latinos-reject-the-ballot-box-altogether.html?hp&_r=0&referrer=).

It seems like the Left side of the aisle in this country loves to pat themselves on the back in regards to how great our policy ideas are, ignoring that rarely do those policies ever get implemented in a form which will actually affect real, lasting change, and when they get pushback it's always the response of "well, eventually they'll come around to our side and realize that we've got logic/science/whatever on our side". No, they won't. Conservatives are constantly rallying the wagons and doing everything they can to enact their agenda or at least stymie the opposition and I hate to break it to you, but not every person under the age of 50 is a Liberal. Yes, Millennials trend left, but I know a poo poo ton of "fiscal conservative, social liberal" people my age who are one bad experience or one misinformed discussion away from voting for a Republican candidate and feeling like they did the right thing.

Where hope lies is that if half the people who are "waiting for the baby boomers to die" got involved in a local political organization or campaign, things would begin to change very quickly. Hell, if they even went to community meetings once a month that'd be a drastic shift. Not saying I'm any better than your average citizen because I read the news and volunteer a few hours here or there, but really, waiting around is part of the reason we're as hosed as we are right now. It seems like everyone is waiting for some inspired leadership from on high to start organizing some kind of movement or at least give people a direction, but if you haven't noticed already, that ain't happening. We all have to start doing more than just waiting for demographics to be in our favor.