Barack Obama is Our Homeboy

What follows is an article I had to write for my advocacy journalism class. Usually, I'm not political and I don't really care about anything but myself, but for some reason, I really got into writing this. Call it the Obama effect. Yes, you CAN finish this article. Anyway, here it is:


Barack Obama is my homeboy.

This is a statement emblazoned on t-shirts by a grassroots campaign organization to help get Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama into the White House. This sudden invigoration of young voters is by and large unprecedented in recent history. A generation plagued by political apathy and indifference has found their golden candidate, their homeboy. A guy they’d not only vote for, but a guy whose name and likeness they’d wear on their chests. How did he do it?

Generation Y has long been politically apathetic because they have never really had to care. The youth of today hasn’t faced hardships as previous generations have. Nothing has ever really been a matter of life or death for Generation Y.

They have never known a struggle for basic civil rights, the fear of a draft, or for the most part, any real kind of economic hardship. Simply put, when gas prices go up, they keep pumping, when previous generations would walk to the store.

The cushy lifestyle the abundance of Generation Y has lived has set the stage for rampant political apathy. After all, it’s human nature to be self-involved, and when young people perceive that they are not directly affected by political decisions and policymaking, why should they care?

Generation Y has largely grown up in an era where consumerism takes precedent over activism. Generation Y represents more than 70 million consumers in the United States alone and spends approximately $172 billion per year.

Oftentimes referred to as “The Net Generation,” Generation Y is remarkably wired and computer literate; they are consuming some form of media nearly every hour they are awake, and because of this, a greater emphasis on image and “the cool factor” has swept into politics.

It is believed by some that in order to get the youth vote, you have to be cool, hip, and espouse a message not about health care and tax reform, but something more abstract and catchy. Newsweek contributor Sarah Kliff reflected on the star quality of Barack Obama.

“Barack Obama's mobilization of the youth vote doesn't surprise me. I am eight months out of college and completely get his appeal: his hopeful ideals, moving speeches, and that air of change surrounding him are thrilling,” she said. “What shocks me is how thoroughly uncool it is to back Hillary and how her twenty-something supporters are regularly put on the defensive for having the audacity to vote against hope, change, and revolution."

All things considered, it’s not very likely we’ll be seeing any “Hillary is my Homegirl” t-shirts. Even less likely is the idea of “John McCain is my homeboy” shirts popping up. Perhaps a “John McCain is my grandfather” shirt will come to fruition, but definitely not “homeboy.”

The very idea that a political candidate could mobilize a generation so plagued with indifference toward political issues is amazing in itself. Not only indifferent, Generation Y is widely regarded as highly skeptical and realistic.

The mantra of hoping and dreaming sounds more like something out of the Peter O’Toole version of Don Quixote: The Man of La Mancha that Generation Y was forced to watch in Spanish class rather than a viable political platform. In the end, the idea of dreaming and hoping sounds more like a punch line to Generation Y than anything else.

Lynne C. Lancaster, co-founder of BridgeWorks, a company dedicated to addressing generational issues that arise in the workplace and marketplace at large stated that while Generation Y is extremely confident in themselves, they are also very skeptical, as often their first question when confronted with a problem is “why?”

“Boomers have given [Generation Y] the confidence to be optimistic about their ability to make things happen, and Generation Xers have given them just enough skepticism to be cautious,” she said. “If you want to remember one key word to describe Generation Y, it’s realistic.”

And yet we have Barack Obama, a candidate who went after the youth vote that had largely been cast aside by previous candidates. Obama, a relatively young presidential candidate, looks hip and relaxed in his breezy tailored suits sans tie as he turns a generation of cynics into believers by merely declaring his manta: yes, we can.

Obama has been able to lead his opponent Hillary Clinton in the polls among young voters because not only does he inspire them, but because he doesn’t patronize them and he can relate to them in a way no candidate has been able to do. He is intelligent without being arrogant (a pratfall of former Democratic presidential hopeful John Kerry).

Clinton, for example, has recruited her 28-year-old daughter Chelsea to help her campaign cater to young voters. The younger Clinton talking to an audience full of her peers about what a great job her mom would do in the White House is a sad display at best. After all, Obama doesn’t need to recruit his daughters to help him reach the youth vote. And they wouldn’t be able to reach the podium anyway.

It has long been discussed that the 2008 presidential election is the most historic election in recent history. No matter what candidate is elected, it will be an election of a significant first in our history. The first female, the first African-American, or the oldest white guy- it’s an utterly mixed bag.

But to a generation who grew up on the culturally diverse teachings of Sesame Street, having a black or female president doesn’t seem to be that earth-shattering. The overwhelming sentiment of Generation Y is, “well, what took so long?”

As for Clinton, she has trouble inspiring young women because Generation Y’s women entered a work world where women have held high corporate positions for some time and where sexual harassment training is mandatory for all employees.

Newsweek contributor Sarah Kliff stated that Clinton is not able to inspire young women to chant, “Yes, we will!” because, in a sense, they already have.

“[Generation Y’s women] have taken more advanced placement classes than their male counterparts, enrolled at universities at higher rates and graduated with better GPAs. They are doctors, investment bankers and lawyers in training. That makes the possibility of a female president hardly revolutionary or cool,” Kliff said.

The fact that how “cool” a candidate is so significant to Generation Y in terms of who they will vote for is what makes Generation Y’s parents and grandparents shake their heads at this young generation. As a responsible person, shouldn’t a vote be cast for the candidate who will truly do the best job rather than who tells the best jokes on The Tonight Show or who dances up a storm on The Ellen DeGeneres Show?

How soon we forget the presidential election of 1960. Americans voted JFK into the White House because he too espoused the ideology of hope. His family, a beautiful wife and two adorable children, was the physical manifestation of the old-time American dream. JFK’s Camelot cast a spell on the American public and they, too, wanted to buy in on the dream. After all, this was a guy who wanted to go to the moon. It’s really not all that different nearly fifty years later.

In the end, generations may change and attitudes may be different, but in the dawning of our lives, as young people, no matter how cynical we are, we all secretly want to go to the moon. We just need a candidate who can take us there.