Maybe the Future is Brighter Than We Think

 

 

“Ukraine is incredibly lucky to have so many young people in positions of power.”

Something struck me today while watching a member of the Ukrainian parliament being interviewed on television.  She pleaded for help while vowing to continue the fight for her nation’s future sovereignty.

The revelation was how Ukraine’s resistance is being led by so many brave YOUNG people.

Ukrainian members of parliament, cabinet misters, city mayors, civic leaders, even the president skews remarkably YOUNG. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is 44. He was 41 when he assumed office (by contrast, the youngest U.S. president in history was 42).

I looked at data on Ukraine’s parliament and was stunned to learn that two-thirds of the members are under age 45. Nearly half are under 40. There are 30 members of the Ukrainian parliament under age 30. What’s the number of members in the U.S. Congress under 30? One. That’s right, just one.

In fact, the average age of a U.S. congressman is 58. The average age of a U.S. Senator is 63.

My supposition from this is — the Ukrainian youth movement will be a huge factor. Young people have more at stake. Young people, especially leaders, have more to fight for. Young people are more willing to risk their lives.

Ukraine is incredibly lucky to have so many young people in positions of power. What happens in countries under attack when they’re ruled mostly by older people? The elders flee. They take their money and seek exile elsewhere. Old people don’t think as much about the future, unless it’s their own future. They run. They hide.

Young people don’t have that luxury. In most cases, 30-year-old members of parliament don’t have shady business connections, or vast wealth, or lots of connections to other old people who run the country. They tend to be more idealistic. If cynics want to characterize that idealism as unrealistic, then so be it. But it’s that idealism (and bravery) that’s keeping Ukraine alive right now. It’s also mostly 18-35 aged soldiers risking their lives at the front.

My generation tends to look at young people with some derision, and I’m certainly guilty of that. But let’s acknowledge that were it not for Ukraine being led at the moment by countless young people, it would have been steamrolled by now and wiped off the map.

What’s coming next? Who knows. But wherever the next front might be, I hope young people are in charge of things.

I think there’s a lesson in what’s happening in Ukraine for all the rest of us.