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Young people, especially Millennials and Gen Z, are at the forefront of shaping the freedoms and future of our nation. Their voting power is transforming American politics. We will hear directly from young leaders about the issues that matter most to them, the solutions they’re driving forward, and how the 2024 election is pivotal in protecting their rights and shaping the future they envision.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00Tonight is about bridging the divide and actually hearing from young people who are the future.
00:07Young people are not only our future, but they impact elections.
00:12Young voters from the millennial generation and Gen Z are emerging as the demographic center of power in American politics.
00:21Look, tonight we will outline the key issues young people have told us they care most about the solutions for addressing those issues.
00:30And how this election and voting impacts the future.
00:34But first, we got some housekeeping rules.
00:37Now look, y'all, this is a nonpartisan space called focused on voter registration and mobilization.
00:46Further, it ain't a fundraising call, okay?
00:48There are other events focusing on fundraising.
00:52Now we'll be answering your questions, so please put your questions in the chat.
00:57We love questions.
00:58And we'll try to answer as many as we can before the end of the town hall.
01:05Also, as we do every time we go through these events, we want you to see the link for voter registration.
01:13If you have not registered to vote, we have six weeks before election day.
01:18Please do go to hashtag paint the polls black.
01:21And finally, please sit back, relax, and enjoy this town hall.
01:24So tonight, we will be starting with setting the table on the issues.
01:30We are so, so pleased to have two community activists, if you will, with us.
01:37The first is Marlee Diaz, who is an American activist and writer.
01:41While Marlee was in the sixth grade in November of 2025, or no, 2015, I should say.
01:48She launched a campaign called Hashtag 1,000 Black Girls Books to collect 1,000 books with black female protagonists to donate for black girls at other schools in the U.S.
02:02Joining her tonight will be Conscious Lee.
02:04Conscious Lee is a dynamic orator.
02:07He's an innovator.
02:08He's an education and influential content creator.
02:11His work sits at the intersection of media, social political issues, and popular culture.
02:17Both Marlee and Conscious Lee will join us to discuss all the issues that young voters care most about.
02:25Make sure y'all put your questions in there.
02:26So let's go ahead and get into it.
02:30Marlee, Conscious Lee, thank you so much for joining us.
02:33Thank y'all for having us.
02:35Thank you for having me.
02:35You're going to speak for Marlee?
02:36Not bad, Marlee.
02:37No worries.
02:38Thank you for having us.
02:39You're welcome.
02:40So there are a number of issues we want to get to.
02:42Let's jump into it.
02:43Let's start with the economy.
02:44Studies show that young people highlight the economy as the most or one of the most important issues that they care about.
02:53And when they talk about the economy, they overwhelmingly mean lowering prices on food and gas and services.
03:02And then talk about creating more jobs and lowering interest rates and even earning higher wages.
03:08So that's what we're hearing from the press.
03:10And we want to hear from you.
03:12What are you hearing from your friends and your colleagues when we hear that the economy is the most important issue or one of the most important issues that young people care about?
03:22Is it the same in your circle?
03:24So Marlee, maybe we can start with you.
03:26Yeah, I mean, I would say that the current cost of living crisis and inflation over the past years, the past couple of years has been really confusing and hard to understand for people of my generation and in my circles.
03:39Because I feel like we lack a fundamental kind of public economic or civic education in schools.
03:46I was required to take personal finance by the state of New Jersey.
03:49I'm a public school student, K through 12.
03:52But I didn't learn what actually makes the price of something the price of something.
03:58And I once again will go back to the idea that knowledge is power and that maybe not having these understandings in some ways allowed us to go for a while without like understanding the way that economic inequality works or understanding the way the housing crisis works.
04:12But we're growing up and we're now actually in the grocery stores, actually in the apartment hunt, actually in this situation, and we lack the fundamental education to know why a price of rent is the price of rent.
04:24And I think as much as it is clearly a problem, I think it goes back to still this fundamental lack of where is the economic education for young people?
04:34Where is the when do we get a credit card?
04:36Where is the what is a mortgage?
04:38Where is the 1099 forms?
04:40Like, where is this education for people?
04:44And I think the reason why we don't know those things is to economically disadvantage us.
04:48And that information being withheld from public school spaces is not unintentional.
04:53So I think that that's something in local elections we also have to consider is what what types of folks what folks are educated on are interested in equipping the next generation with that education.
05:02And using local elections as a way to put that into the classroom so that we don't face, you know, having 18 to 24 year olds feel so confused and so at odds with their current economic standing.
05:15Okay, this is our future.
05:17Just so we're all super clear.
05:19I'm like, yes, yes, they need to learn how you can pass that responsibly.
05:24But consciously, what say you?
05:26Yeah, I'm born and raised in Texas, and I've heard a lot about people being chesitised specifically for buying avocado toast and coffees.
05:38So when I think about how young people think about the economy, I think sometimes our intelligence is being insulted.
05:45A lot of older people talk about how hard they had to work and how accessible things was.
05:50When we look at how long it's taking for the minimum wage to change or how much more money people are paying for the dollars on the hour in terms of higher education, we see that there's a lot of people that's, you know, proverbially peeing on us and then telling us that it's raining.
06:05I think that a lot of us are a lot more critically thinking about, you know what I'm saying, how we have access to resources and opportunity.
06:14And I think that a lot of us are being very mindful about what opportunities we have and how much longer we have to stay in school and or what the value of our degrees will be once we get into an economy that has a little to no jobs or you got to have a PhD and you're going to get paid $25,000 a year.
06:31And it's like, nobody got time for that.
06:34Nobody got time for that.
06:36That don't even match up.
06:37Doesn't even match up.
06:39Look, I want to ask a question on health care.
06:41Now, polls have also shown consistently higher support for abortion rights among young voters, especially young women.
06:48This support made a difference in 2022, as we saw as well, where many credited concern over abortion rights with boosting Democrats to better than expected midterm results, despite Biden's low approval rate.
07:00When asked about which issue influenced their vote, abortion was the top choice for voters under 30, according to an analysis by the Edison Research National Election Pool exit poll data by the Center for Immigration and Research on Civic Learning.
07:16Look, those who supported access to abortion strongly preferred Democratic candidates.
07:22How do you all rank this issue?
07:25Marlee, I'll begin with you again.
07:27This issue is incredibly salient to me, and I feel it is incredibly salient across the country.
07:31I had the opportunity to write an editorial for the Rolling Stone last summer about the Supreme Court and the way that the affirmative action decision, Roe v. Wade, the overturning of Roe v. Wade, and student debt relief really are at the nexus of the challenges that Black women and girls will face for the next two, three generations.
07:51So when it comes to the overturning of Roe v. Wade, it's really critical that we do not bring this issue back to the states and that we focus on federal protections that can and should have been set in place decades ago to codify this law.
08:08So it is, unfortunately, a series of failures by our larger states to not recognize that this issue has always been on the table in legal scholarship, that Roe was always being looked to be overturned, and 50 years of complacency leads to a global and national crisis.
08:26So to think of the U.S. So to think of the U.S. as a model when we passed this and then now to think of us as a model in overturning this really sets a dangerous tone for what can happen to progress and how generations of not protecting and complacency can create crisis.
08:42Another thing that I would say is important in regards to women's health care is also period poverty, and a lot of women do not have free menstrual, we do not have free menstrual products provided to students federally in schools, we do not have access to menstrual education for girls and boys and kids of any gender identity in schools, we are not focused on the ways that something that happens to women and girls everywhere and as a part of life creation is not considered, is considered something that people would have to pay for, and also goes into the
09:12economic question before. So abortion is clearly also on the table, but we need to think about more universal health care resources for women and girls that are still just women and girls existing, even in the context of crisis or no crisis, that period poverty has remained, and it is keeping kids out of school, and that's something that I think should really be on people's mind for local elections, and something to advocate for in your community is, you should not have to pay for a pad or a tampon, and that is a right that you have as a person
09:41that creates life for your generations in your community, and that's something we can advocate for on a basic fundamental level, that we should really bring into the conversation of women's health care, even in the face of Roe.
09:54Marlee, I know I started out with you asking this question, but I do think that this issue is something that we need to have more men participate and become advocates in as well, and so consciously when we talk about this issue, when we talk about reproductive rights,
10:08what position do you feel, how important is it, do you feel, that men also take part in this conversation and lifting of these issues?
10:20I think ultimately that there will be entire communities and household units that's impacted off of the regulations and restrictions that happens to reproductive freedom, reproductive health.
10:28What we know is that when restrictions and regulations come in, at least in the criminality, Black people will be disproportionately impacted by that.
10:36In this instance, we're talking about, you know, people that can birth in Black women particularly, and what we know is that, especially when we think about those states that's below the Mason-Dixon line,
10:45there will be many different ways that the legacy of states' rights or leading it to the states has always led to, like, Black death, always led to Black incarceration.
10:54So as a male that's thinking very intentionally about what my fight is or what my voice can be used in terms of thinking about reproductive justice, reproductive freedom,
11:03we know that usually power has a tendency to only want to listen to itself.
11:07So what I know is being a man and being a straight cisgender man in this space is being able to be very intentional and purposeful about making sure the access, opportunity,
11:17and resources around gender-affirming care is good, and specifically when it comes to abortions.
11:22And the last thing, being a southerner, you feel me, granddaddy and him taught me to take two to tango.
11:27So when we think about the different ways that pathology happens, it makes it where women are seen as being the bearers of the child.
11:35It allows for a lot of, you know, men to scapegoat their fatherly abilities and, you know what I'm saying,
11:40makes it where we have a hard time coming to collective voices.
11:43So I think that really all hands being on deck when we think about reproductive freedom,
11:48reproductive justice is something. It's something Marley said that's very important is that not only when it comes to the period poverty and local elections,
11:56but thinking very intentionally about how when life is being conceived and or when people are carrying life,
12:02how the ripple effect, how different things and people are implicated.
12:06And that's acknowledging that different people have the ability to do what they want to do with their body.
12:10I want to be clear with that. You know, the last thing I'll say in America, we got freedom of religion.
12:15Nine times out of 10, when anybody's trying to talk to me or chastise and be righteous about abortion,
12:23they cannot get past the separation from church and state. They cannot get past the freedom of religion.
12:28It almost becomes that because you believe in a particular thing. Now I have to conform to your beliefs.
12:34And I think that that is not how freedom of religion works. I could be wrong, but.
12:38I do want to add real quick, even before you ask the next question, just to put out there,
12:44because I know consciously you're from Texas, that there was a report that came out from NBC that said
12:49that since Texas has had its strict abortion ban, that there's been a 50, I believe 57 or 59 percent increase
12:56in maternal mortality rates. And so we got to look at those numbers and look at those states,
13:03especially ones that have certain trifectas within them. And that's also in some you'll be voting on
13:09that when you go to the polls on November 5th. And one last thing, too, to the men listening to
13:13this, when we're talking about abortion, I was very intentional about saying gender affirming care
13:18or reproductive freedom, reproductive health. We should not as mean we should never pigeonhole this
13:23conversation about reproductive freedom as just being about abortion. Because when we do that,
13:28we forget about the unique intricacies to how gender violence specifically happens and how consent
13:34happens and how autonomy happens. In Texas, there are different cases where women are forced to carry
13:39a child to birth and they've been raped. They're a victim of ancestors. They have different medical
13:45issues and medical things going on that they carry the child a term. It will literally bring their
13:50own health into jeopardy. These are all reasons, right? Or it might be a woman that's looking for access to,
13:57you know, get some birth control because she has crazy periods. You feel me? She has a menstrual cycle
14:01that's heavy and her being able to be on this or them being able to be on this allows for them to
14:05mitigate the impact when they're dealing with those periods. So a lot of times us as men, we come into
14:10the conversations being extremely ignorant, extremely ignorant, especially when we have different
14:16individuals that push homophobia and saying you should always already care about the women. Then I think
14:21that that should be very applicable when we start talking about reproductive freedom,
14:25reproductive justice, and not just be a conversation about what your pastor told
14:29you in sixth grade about abortions. Like the conversation is bigger than that. And again, freedom of
14:35religion.
14:38We could talk about healthcare and reproductive justice all day. And I'm really, I think the
14:44point that you just made is incredibly important because I think sometimes people think about
14:48reproductive justice or healthcare within the very narrow lens of abortion, but we're really
14:53talking about IVF. We're talking about contraception. There are all of these other issues that affect
14:59whether and how you can control your body.
15:02Yeah. Black women experience thyroids at a high level.
15:06You better preach, brother. Come on.
15:08That impact that we're talking about. Just to be clear, I'm going to cut you off and find out,
15:11but I know that a lot of our, a lot of our, a lot of our cohorts have a trouble sometimes in getting
15:16into this conversation and not thinking about it in a much more broader standpoint.
15:21No, you're right. I mean, people should know that more than 90% of black women at some point in
15:26their lives will experience fibroids compared to non-black women that are in the twenties or 30%.
15:32So that is an important issue. Shifting from healthcare for a minute to climate change.
15:40I know that I had the, the privilege and the benefit of traveling across the country this summer.
15:46And I went to certain places and said, it can't be this hot, but it was, it was incredibly hot.
15:53And polling shows that young voters across party lines are listing climate as a top issue. In fact,
16:00an NPR PBS poll found that nearly 60% of those between the ages of 18 and 29 believe that climate
16:10change should be a priority, even at the risk of slowing economic growth. It's a question I don't
16:17want to pose to you both. And consciously, maybe we start with you. A larger group, I think 64%
16:23believe that climate change is a major threat and 72% responded by saying climate change is affecting
16:29their local community. As you talk to folks that you engage with day in and day out, is climate change
16:36as important as we're hearing about it? And are you discussing it with family and friends?
16:41Definitely, definitely, definitely, definitely. The way that we treat the environment and or value
16:48environmental degradation is impacting how we pay our bills. If the, if we're dealing with record high
16:55numbers of, you know, temperature, that AC being ran a little bit more, that's going to make the
16:59bill go up. We already worried about the economy. So we see different ways in which climate change and
17:04global warming is impacting a lot of the way that we experience weather. I live in Texas,
17:09down here in third coast, we're experiencing one of the most volatile hurricane seasons. And for us,
17:14that's thinking critically, we know that that ties to global warming, climate change. And we know as
17:20black people is that a lot of times when we think about climate change, it's usually talking about
17:25it to come. We're not currently talking about how there are black people in the status quo that's
17:30already experiencing climate change and global warming, that's impacting their healthcare, that's
17:34impacting the way they feed themselves. And the last thing we know is that though young people are so
17:39worried about the economy, we recognize that if the world does not exist, the money that we have
17:44don't mean much. I'm going to repeat that again. If we know that fracking leads to a whole bunch of
17:50earthquakes and a whole bunch of X, Y, and C, so we being very critical of it. I'm from Texas. I got people
17:55that feed their family by doing fracking. But we know that you being able to gain some profits from
18:00fracking don't mean nothing in 50 years if we're dealing with environment, you know what I'm saying,
18:04cascades and things that we've dealt with before. So I say all that to say, everybody that says science
18:10matters when you're trying to weaponize it against transgender gay people, I find it funny that you
18:17don't think science matters when we start talking about the environment. To me, that never made sense.
18:21And I had to just say that with this time right here, the science matter in every instance. So it
18:25only matters when you want to weaponize it against other people's identity, or does it only matter when
18:30you can ignore the real impacts to save against the profits? I think all those things are unethical.
18:35Facts. Okay. We're in church tonight. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
18:42No, it's absolutely true. Yeah. I mean, I think it's sort of highlighting what I tend to call the
18:48intellectual dishonesty when some of these issues come up, because you can't have it one way and not
18:53the other. Marley, we'll turn to you talking about climate change. And what are you hearing about climate
19:00change as it relates to not only this election, but your cohort and whether or not this is a priority
19:05for them? Yeah, I think what everything that conscious said was said so, so beautifully. And
19:11I could not agree more with the points. And I think the issues of climate change and economics go hand
19:16in hand. And for people in my circle, and I think for a lot of people, it's also an issue of the
19:22billionaire class. And it is an issue of wealth inequality that when we think about the people that
19:27are the individuals when even though in climate change, we generally frame, we put the onus on
19:32individuals as in change your straws or recycle more or take less shower, take shorter showers.
19:37These methods, even if we could get every person to do them is nothing in comparison to thousands of
19:45private jet flights or being, you know, running, running an oil and gas companies to continue fracking,
19:50to push this legislation to ignore and to use your power to profit and your access to wealth to quite
19:57literally pollute the only space that we all occupy is a huge problem. And another thing that, so once
20:05we realize these things of like climate is tied to the billionaire class, it is tied to corporations,
20:10it is tied not to me, even though it has been framed as my individual onus and my creation of the
20:15environment, it's actually generations of labors and industries that have not considered the
20:19climate, considered climate. We also then have this climate doom happening where then young people
20:25realize this fact, but even in online spaces, it is not like, even in news and media, it is not framed
20:31as a contributor to our problem. We do not have politicians because they receive all the time, they
20:36receive support from this class. So they're interested in maintaining this, these forms of inequality. We do
20:41not see actual changes in our local communities and our days are getting hotter and prices are getting
20:46higher. It creates such a mental health crisis for young people of how do I imagine a future when
20:52everyone is ignoring all of the things that are making this future either, either become impossible or become
20:59incredibly unsafe or force me to have to focus on the same recreation of wealth inequality to be
21:05safeguarded from this, this terror. So climate is such a central issue, um, to this election and really to this
21:15moment. Um, and even though I speak so much about racial inequality and book banning and books,
21:19like once again, to consciousness point, like I feel that climate doom and not having a place to do my
21:25activism, not having a black community that has land and spaces to be supported is incredibly concerning.
21:31And the idea that somehow me changing my straws every day or using a reusable bag at the grocery store
21:37is the, I am the person that can single-handedly change that. In the case of climate, it is not about just
21:43everyday people being the change they want to see in the world. It is about eliminating
21:48and getting resources back from folks who have profited off of damaging planet earth,
21:52the only place that has civilizations to humans that is going to end quicker because of the decisions
21:59they've made because of the wealth that they have. And like the lack of, I don't, I don't understand how
22:04in media we do not frame these two things together. And it really has made young people become so
22:10disappointed in older generations because if these facts are not being acknowledged,
22:15it creates such like true anxiety and true like pessimism about the future. And we cannot all come
22:22to terms with climate change's existence and let alone who, and also who has caused climate change.
22:28Ooh, that, that's so, honestly, before we get to the next one, I just want to say,
22:32climate change is one of the issues I feel like we don't talk about enough that affects black
22:35communities in such like a drastic way, whether we're talking about the increase of asthma in
22:42our communities, chronic diseases, and one that we don't really connect it to as much as even mental
22:48health. I hate coming back to Texas consciously, but there was a report that talked about black Texans
22:54were four times more likely to have high post-traumatic stress after hurricane Harvey. And these are things
23:01we just don't connect when we talk about climate change and the effects that it has. But I want to
23:06move on just to, to talk a little bit about public safety and ask you a question there. The proliferation
23:13of guns and gun violence is a huge issue with young voters. And of course we see the impact in black and
23:21brown neighborhoods. Where do you land on this issue? Even solution wise, what is it that you want to see?
23:28And especially after we just saw the school in Georgia shot, four people shot, kids shot,
23:36and then nine others severely wounded. Consciously, I'll start with you when it comes to this issue
23:41of public safety. I think that just, if our politicians kept the same energy and logic when
23:49it came to gun violence, as they do gay books, I think that we would have a different place and space.
23:54Me knowing in Texas, it is much more likely for a Texas student to have a restrict for them to be
23:59police based off of them having a book that the people that don't know what they're reading,
24:03think it's Marxism or think it's communism or think it's socialism. That is more restrictive
24:08than them carrying an assault rifle in the school. I think that that right there is indicative of the
24:12laws and policies, especially known as black people, we get put up under the law, right? What I know
24:16about a lot of the gun enthusiasts in places like Texas, they'll say we should not pass gun laws
24:22or gun reform at all because criminals don't follow the law, but they never had that same energy when
24:27it comes to passing laws to restrict black life. You feel me? They don't feel that same way when it
24:32comes to thinking about how books can turn a kid gay, but they'll say, hey, guns don't kill people,
24:36people kill people, but the book can make a kid gay. It's like this right here is a part of the climate
24:41that I'm very, very much critical of, and a lot of my black people right here, I want to let y'all
24:44listen to this, man. As somebody that pays attention to policy and legislation, a lot of y'all are being
24:50duped, which you care more about drag queens and during story hour than you care about your kid
24:54being shot during story hour, and the particular lawmakers know that. So they know to put at the top
25:01of the bill, which you're going to pay attention to, no drag story hour. At the bottom of it,
25:05they're going to give teachers guns. Do you think that it's good for black kids that
25:09already disproportionately impacted in terms of discipline for their kids to be,
25:13for their teachers to be handed a firearm? No, it don't make any sense. So for me,
25:16it's just very simple. When you look out the rest of the world and you see that there are multiple,
25:21multiple countries that have significantly less gun deaths than us, and they have a lot of common
25:26six, common sense gun laws on the books. We ain't got to reinvent the wheel. The wheel's already made.
25:33But shout out to the NRA though. I know y'all spend money good, and you know,
25:36lobbying is big in our country. And for some reason, the gun lobbyists are able to, you know,
25:41act as people when their money becomes speech and, you know, NRA pay good money.
25:48I think you, you articulated that in such a useful way for people to think about guns,
25:55because I think often they disassociate those issues. So thank you for doing that.
25:59Um, for those of you who are just joining us, you are, uh, we are talking about issues that
26:07have been raised as most directly impacting young people and what young people care about most.
26:12Uh, this is Paint the Polls Black, uh, and Marley and Consciously are helping us dissect these issues
26:18and provide their perspectives on them. We only have a few more issues, uh, to go through with them,
26:23and we want to go through them quickly before our next segment. Um, and the next one is housing
26:28affordability. And Marley, we'll start with you. Uh, we all remember COVID and the pandemic-fueled
26:33housing boom that occurred. Um, and housing affordability, unfortunately, has deteriorated
26:40at a really fast pace. A lot of people can't afford to buy a home and some can't really barely afford rent.
26:47And that influences young voters really when we talk to them and when they go and vote at the polls,
26:53we're already seeing it unfold. 91% of adult Gen Zers say housing affordability is top of mind
27:01as they consider who to vote for in November's presidential election. So can you talk to us
27:06about your perspective on this issue, housing affordability, what you are hearing from your
27:11cohorts, where you're hearing from people that you engage with, uh, with respect to not only
27:16home buyership, but also affording rent? Yeah, I think, I mean, I'm in my, I'm in my junior year
27:21of college and I live in Cambridge, Massachusetts for school. I go to Harvard and it is the most
27:25expensive city. It's the most expensive, I think, place to buy an apartment in the East Coast, if not
27:30in the country right now. So I know kids, there's some kids at school here that are able to afford
27:35those types of places, but for all the people I'm, I'm from West Orange, New Jersey, I am 973 up and down.
27:41That is not the environment and not the experience of what is, of how young people feel in this
27:46country. And I think when we talk about housing affordability, we have to, it goes once again
27:51back to this, this civic economic training. The lack of civic economic training is leaving young
27:57people in the dust about decisions that they need to make to build their future. So that when we,
28:03like the people that are equipped with this knowledge are people that are generationally
28:06wealthy, that have had land ownership since this country was built 400 years ago, either in their
28:11bloodline or inscribed into legislation that they are deserving of such. But for us as Black people,
28:17we have in every way, shape and form, been told that we should not own property. And with this
28:23current crisis, we can only wonder who and who, how and why would people design a system that leaves
28:30Black and brown people out of this equation again. We know that the infrastructure and we know that the,
28:34the, the, the way that we write, wrote and set up at the United States was written in pen.
28:39It does not change. And the ultimate kind of decisions that we've made around who has access
28:44only, they only change face, but they do not change in character. So housing affordability is
28:50once again, just a reminder that Black and brown people and poor people will be treated as a disease
28:57when in reality, race has been fully constructed and poverty has been fully constructed by those that own
29:02land and those that are white. And that is how the United States was created. And that is how the United
29:07States is interested in moving about. So for young people, and for me as someone that got to travel
29:13to South Africa this summer, where I'm living in Rand with USD, and I get to go to Zimbabwe, we are able
29:18to see that there are global options for us to actually be able to live new lives, to be respected,
29:25to be seen, to be heard. And I would urge even as a larger part of this conversation for Black, young Black
29:30people to try, like, take the time to engage in the global diaspora and the global experiences of Black
29:37folks. Because the ways that we are set up here to not be happy were designed. And we can go to other
29:43parts of the world and we can listen and connect to other histories to see the way that people were
29:47either able to gain that back or the ways that they rejected and escaped these things. So when we look
29:52back at Black activists and Black artists also, they also always left this country. Because the infrastructure
29:57has not been built for us to have freedom here. So in freedom search and in housing affordability,
30:04as much as it is important for us to stay in our, to make sure that we vote with this in mind and be
30:09conscious, the system here was also not set up for that. And it is unclear when the United States is
30:16going to take the turn to re-remember its history of building the economy off of Black bodies and also
30:21doing that again through mass incarceration. And if we can't re-remember that, I can only urge other folks of
30:27my, of my generation to choose better for ourselves. Because we, we know better and we deserve better.
30:34So when it comes to this crisis, it's, it is, if it continues to be ignored, I think other, our
30:40alternatives will have to be explored by young people. Because we deserve to own homes and we
30:44deserve to start families and we deserve to feel comfortable. And if that can't happen here, I'm
30:50positive it could happen somewhere. You got consciously about to jump up out his seat.
30:57I saw him about to back out. I saw him having all types of fits, but what you're speaking is so true
31:02and the way you've connected it globally is important. And on that note, I want to just,
31:07just throw in here, talk about international conflicts very quickly. In recent years,
31:12only a small percentage of young people have a rank matters related to foreign affairs among their
31:19top issues and priorities. In polls during the previous election cycles, foreign policy was
31:24chosen as a top three issue by a tiny percentage of youth, right? The Israel-Palestine conflict appears
31:31to be different. Unlike some other policy issues, young people seem to be viewing this conflict through
31:36a different lens that is informed by their generational experiences, especially concerns
31:42about racial justice. Issues that have historically prioritized more and then, and that remain major
31:49concerns for young people. Consciously, I'm going to tap you because you like, you about to explode on
31:54that one too. I'm going to tap you to chime in on this issue, brother. I'm going to try to be not,
31:59I'm going to try to be simple with it close. Like, listen, right now, America giving a full-blown budget
32:05every year. Right now, there are a lot of individuals saying that what is happening to our
32:10Palestinian brothers, sisters, you're not going to form people in Gaza and in West Bank, it has
32:14nothing to do with America. That's what a lot of people are saying. Why do we care about them,
32:16this, that, and the other? I'm going to think, well, there's three issues, policing, healthcare,
32:21and higher education. We know that right now in America, black people are disproportionately impacted
32:26based in healthcare. We know that there are certain times we cannot get access to healthcare.
32:30We know that our country gives our black taxpayer dollars,
32:34send them over there to Israel. So if we're able to be critical about how Israel is able to give
32:39their citizens free healthcare, when we're told as black people, we don't have the budget for it,
32:44we don't have a budget for it, but we can blink $10 billion out of thin air. The next one,
32:49higher education. Here in America, black people are disproportionately impacted off of how we take
32:55those student loans. In Israel, they give their students, you feel me, free education. So when we
33:00start to think about the, the, the, the ways in which the dots can be connected from what's happening
33:04over here to over here, it becomes very crazy. In 2014, when Mike Brown was killed in Ferguson,
33:09there were a lot of guys in this that hopped on Twitter to tell a lot of black Americans
33:13how to navigate the police equipment, because they were literally being sent from Guzza back to
33:19Ferguson, back to Chicago, back to Atlanta. Right now, we're talking a lot about cop city.
33:24Right now we're talking about, now I'm going to police, my last, my last, my last point, policing.
33:28When you look at cop city and think about how these cities are proliferating throughout America,
33:33um, go look at the ties between cop city and the, uh, Israel occupational forces.
33:38Go look at the partnership that the American government has with the, uh, Israeli police force
33:43and tell me again that what they're experiencing over there has nothing to do with us. The last
33:48example I'll bring is a cherry on top right here. We had two democratically elected black
33:53public officials that got de-seeded because they dare to speak power to truth and talking about
34:00the genocide that's happening to Palestinians. That's to Cori Bush and Jamal Bowman. These two
34:07are black officials that's on the local level. You feel me? They don't, they don't, they don't,
34:11they was on a Senate state level. Hey man, they got moved out the way because of the way in which they
34:15spoke about this. I just gave you four and a half different examples about why so many people of color
34:21and so many young, young black folks is so worried about how our taxpayers dollars is being sent over
34:26to Israel. Meanwhile, my grandma got to decide between buying insulin and paying the light bill.
34:35That's a word. Um, I want to tie what you just said consciously to this conversation about education
34:44and student debt. Um, and Marley, I'll ask you to weigh in on this as, as we're, we're running out
34:51of time, but we want to address this issue as well. Uh, the majority of voters say that President Biden
34:57should continue fighting to cancel student loan debt. I believe it's 69% of the voters under 45
35:05have taken that position. Talk to us a little bit about the educational issues that you believe take
35:13center stage for, with young voters that you are hearing about and talking to, whether it be book banning,
35:19a student debt or anything else. Yeah, I'll, I'll be brief, but I really think that book banning,
35:24I mean, the student debt crisis is a problem and of its own, and there are many great resources and
35:29great folks that can speak to that importance. I'm going to take my time to talk about book banning
35:33because I think it is a really important conversation to have about election and to have, um, now. So I'm
35:40the founder of the 1000 Black Girl Books campsite. I started this book drive in 2015 as a 10 year old
35:45girl looking to see more of myself in the books that I read. And I was from under the impression
35:50that this was, and I always referred to it as an unintentional exclusion where my teacher was just
35:56more is through subconscious racial bias, wanted to read books about himself and therefore I would read
36:00them. But now this is in 2015. Now it is 2024 and kids in schools have to sign, get permission slips to
36:11read books about race with, from their parents. Kids in schools watch animated videos of Frederick
36:18Douglas saying that slaves were workers. Kids in school learn that Rosa Parks was too tired and that's
36:25why she sat in her seat. These are your 2060 doctors. These are your 2060 lawyers. These are your 2060
36:34babysitters. These are your 2060 DMV officers. These are your 2060 Congress people that do not know
36:42basic facts about the history of this country. And I won't say more outside of that, but I just want
36:48to remind people that it is 2024 now and we are watching this happen on online and in schools with
36:54eight year olds, 12 year olds, whatever. But we're not considering what would happen when our reality is
37:00millions of racially educated, intentionally created these racial narratives that are being pushed to
37:07literally tens of thousands of kids as we speak in this country every day. And it's different. It's
37:14a different level of hate that we don't always think about that needs to be advocated for on a local
37:19level. And that's why local elections really matter because we let these people into our homes and it's
37:24the people who have more free time who are able to take the time to spread that hate and to perform
37:30the tyranny of the few. But we must reject that and we must create time to speak out against book
37:35banning at a local level. Wally Diaz, consciously thank you, thank you, thank you for sharing your
37:42wisdom, your perspectives on the issues that are most directly affecting young people and their
37:48perspectives. I want to really thank you for taking the time to join us today.
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