Justice Amick is a junior news journalism major and writes “Pencil Shavings" for The Daily News. Her views do not necessarily agree with those of the newspaper. Write to Justice at jramick@bsu.edu.
When I planned to vote in the presidential election in 2016, I didn’t know much about it. I was the person who had to go online and look up instructions on how to register to vote and then how to go and vote the day of.
I almost felt a little left behind compared to other people I knew who seemed like they had tons of information on the matter. The only thing I knew was who I didn't want to win, so I ran with it.
In the end, I didn't get to vote. I registered in the wrong area and didn't have time to change it.
When the votes came in and Trump became our new president, I was upset. His ideals and values, to me, did not line up with anything that America needed in that moment.
I was more upset when I realized later, reading an article by Pew Research Center, that the Millenial age group had the lowest voter turnout.
We didn’t vote. Only 46 percent of us voted to be exact. That leaves about 54 percent of us out of the equation.
“So where were we?” I wondered. “Why didn’t we turn out?”
Our generation, the Millennials, is at its peak. We are pushing for change, rallying behind each other, standing together. Our voice is a united front against those who doubt, mock and threaten us.
We take up 31 percent of the electorate, leaving the only other age group to combat us being the Baby Boomers.
I understand that some of you may not see the point. It may seem as though your vote is nothing compared to the bigger picture, especially if who you vote for doesn't win.
However, you need to think bigger. Our generation has to follow behind the generations before us, our parents and grandparents, and fix things. We all know things could be better, that’s why we’re marching and walking out and calling out the adults of the nation.
We are a collective voice. We may all be different and believe different things but I know that all of us are behind the fact that things need to change. Not later, but right now.
There will be people who mock you, who say that our generation can’t and won’t do anything. We’ll do this for a couple of months and go back to our smartphones.
That is not going to happen. Our voice has been booming across the nation for months, everlasting and ever growing. People have even dropped as low as mocking us on all platforms to try and make us feel as though we need to focus more on passing math class than worrying about silly things such as legislation and laws.
But we do need to worry.
We need to worry because this nation will soon be ours to run. We need to worry because more of us are dying everyday from preventable problems. We need to worry because our little sisters and brothers are coming into a world full of hate, bigotry and way too much violence.
Go vote. The only way we get people into office who are going to listen to us and understand we are not backing down, is by voting.
The results may not be instantaneous, but they will come. Good things come to those who wait.
If you don't understand, go look it up. If you don't know who to vote for, do a little research and pick someone who has one thing on their agenda you want to see happen. Honestly, go vote for a gorilla, I honestly don’t care. Just vote. And if you fail like me, that’s fine, but at least you tried.
In order for progress to happen in our nation, we need to come together more than ever before.
We have a voice that is the loudest and strongest the nation has ever seen. We have a vote that could be the change our world needs.
Ballot up.
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