With America gearing up for its massive 250th birthday celebration in July, the media has suddenly discovered a shocking new mystery: Gen Z and younger millennials don’t seem especially patriotic.
The patriotism gap between Generation Z and Baby Boomers is hard to miss. Recent polling found that only 56% of 18- to 34-year-old respondents said they were “somewhat” or “very” patriotic – compared to 86% of people 65 and older. While Boomers grew up during an era that emphasized national pride and civic identity, many younger Americans have been raised in a culture far more focused on criticizing the country’s flaws than celebrating its history – creating a sharp generational divide as America approaches its 250th birthday.
In a recent opinion piece from USA Today [1] by Trump-hating Sara Pequeño, she discusses declining patriotism among younger Americans and explains why she thinks so many in Generation Z feel disconnected from the country. Her reasons include the demographic dealing with things like economic pessimism, school shootings, COVID shutdowns, racial unrest, climate change fears, wars, and global instability.
What the writer fails to mention is that the way these issues are constantly framed and reported on plays a major role in fueling that loss of patriotism among the younger generations. Add in the fact that when the person in charge (President Trump) isn’t someone they support, activists and commentators view the entire country itself as the problem.
In the USA Today piece, Pequeño calls Trump a “tyrant” who has “no respect for the rule of law.” That’s the kind of BS that people like her write about over and over again – and not just in opinion pieces. It shows up in so-called “news” articles. It’s been a non-stop Trump hating mantra for over a decade.
Yes, a lack of patriotism is what happens after the leftist media has spent almost 11 years portraying America as racist, oppressive, corrupt – especially under President Donald Trump, supposedly one election away from dictatorship. And the liberal schools back up those ideas.
Turns out that spending years telling young people how bad their country is may come with consequences. When an entire generation is marinating in social media outrage, “democracy is under attack” headlines every other day, endless “No Kings” protests portraying America as the villain, and a nonstop stream of “America is broken” messaging from left-wing activists, Hollywood celebrities, teachers, singers, late-night hosts and even former presidents, it’s not exactly shocking that patriotism is in the toilet.