The land of the brave and free.

​Well, I’m not feeling either.

​I was talking with a friend the other day, texting and joking, and sending each other silly videos. Usually, the topic of ongoing social issues in society don’t come up, but soon enough, it did. Having conversations like that always sours the mood, and she said something very interesting to me.

​“u know it’s not fun knowing that people are actively against me, and i can’t ignore them because everything around me is pointing right towards them. im just stuck in the middle.”

​Everything has just felt so ignored.

Ignored, yet so in your face that you can’t ignore it, but you can’t say or don’t want to say anything because it makes you have a pit in your stomach, and so you ignore it, and so the cycle continues.

College, tests, retirement, classes, their style, their culture, their race, their love, their gender, their financial struggles, mental struggles, physical struggles.

Students are living in a time where the social meets the political, to the point that students are feeling forced into it simply because it involves their very existence. Like Atlas holding up the sky, students have felt the weight getting heavier and heavier to where it might break them. Yet they keep on holding it up because if it falls, they do too.

It isn’t that being involved in politics is bad or unimportant. It’s the simple fact that they’re only following it to make sure that the people who are supposed to improve their lives aren’t going to make breathing illegal. It’s simply being in a state of limbo, being unable to anything. If you simply try to live your life freely, you’ll always be reminded of those who want to actively hold you back. If you try to stand up and be brave, you’re shot down. No matter what you do, you lose, and we know that.

And most people wouldn’t know it, not unless you asked. Even people who I know, who are very outspoken in their advocacy, don’t speak out anymore in class. The climate in all schools simply does not allow it, even if your school supports it. It’s now something bigger than just the community around you. It’s tiring.

These students have been told ever since they were younger by everyone around them that America is the freest nation. You’re able to do and be whatever you want, as long as you put in the hard work for it. These expectations have been ingrained. But with the rise of social media, with the rise of people being more aware of the world around them than ever, that belief has fallen.

Blow, after blow, after blow. How are we supposed to fix this? How are we supposed to restore the spirits of the youth and consequently students when the whole weight of the sky is on them? How do we restore our own confidence? Why is it that the only reason students are paying attention to politics is because it is unignorable?

The solution is simple, and it goes hand in hand. Let their voices be heard and let them live. In the land of the brave, they should be allowed to be brave and speak up for their own future. In the land of the free, they should be able to live without worry about their future. The amount of worry and anxiety internally is something that’s going to build up to a point of no return. And when the future educators, factory workers, politicians, doctors, service workers, electricians and entrepreneurs break, then no one will be brave, and no one will be free.