Summary

Donald Trump’s popularity among Generation Z voters has sharply declined since the 2024 election, according to a new Economist/YouGov poll.

His net favorability among 18-29-year-olds has dropped from +19 in November to -18, raising concerns for Republicans about sustaining youth support.

While Trump gained ground with young voters in 2024, recent policies—such as his mass deportation plan and targeting of DEI initiatives—may have contributed to this decline.

  • Zero22xx@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    8 days ago

    I get that these kids were brainwashed a little but what bothers me is that it was never any secret what was happening to women’s rights and LGBTQ+ rights but they went for it anyway. It wasn’t some secret plot or trick, these people told us all exactly what they’re about.

    Even if they don’t care about queer people, they happily sold out the rights of their own mothers because the word of some ex reality TV star meat head was more important to them. I feel like even if I was that age being bombarded by propaganda, I would’ve woken the fuck up the moment they started going after my mother and my sisters.

    I actually saw a story on Reddit shortly after the election, that’s a double whammy in this regard. It was a divorced woman who is currently in a relationship with another woman, telling the story of how her own son visited her and fessed up to voting for Trump and happily said out loud “I don’t agree with gay people.” Based on the reactions she described afterwards, this dumb piece of shit kid only realised that the people he was hating included his own mother, after it was already too late.

    It’s all fucked. I forgive these kids to an extent but I know that when I was that age, I did in fact have a sense of morality and could in fact use my own brains to figure things out for myself.

  • DrFistington@lemmy.world
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    10 days ago

    That’s odd because the only Gen z people who liked Trump were the paid Russian propogandists that were creating all the fake bullshit memes for him

    • DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social
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      10 days ago

      I listened in on a conversation between two young male Kroger union members before the election (the store is unionized so maybe that was an assumption, it’s a right to work state…)

      They both agreed they were voting for Trump. I can’t speak to their unspoken motivations but what I can tell you is they absolutely voted on vibes and didn’t have a goddamn clue what was coming for them.

      I don’t know what brain rotted the Gen Z boys in a way that didn’t work on the Gen Z girls but I can tell you it wasn’t fake, those kids are not alright.

      Maybe this will be Gen Z’s Afghanistan and Iraq, the events that push them left against Republican abuse, but I’m not sure they’ll have a chance when they’re getting a steady diet of algorithmic propaganda.

      • KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        10 days ago

        I don’t know what brain rotted the Gen Z boys in a way that didn’t work on the Gen Z girls but I can tell you it wasn’t fake, those kids are not alright.

        its nothing to do with brainrot, its the same shit that makes your dad the single dumbest person you’ve ever seen whenever he speaks on politics.

        • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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          10 days ago

          People have done things where they start with a clean VM and set up something like Youtube, watching the most innocuous of things. Doesn’t take too long before they start getting the red pill shit.

          That doesn’t happen with broadcast media. You don’t start off watching, say, C-SPAN or PBS, and next thing you know you are getting shown Nazi propaganda.

          • KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            10 days ago

            you have to consciously consume it though, as a consumer of information and media, you hold a responsibility to ensure that what you’re consuming is both good, and factually accurate. If you aren’t doing that, that’s your fault.

            People can argue all they want about content algorithms pushing this content, it’s because it’s good content, that’s why its fucking propaganda. It wouldn’t be if it didn’t.

            • stickly@lemmy.world
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              10 days ago

              You really don’t have to consciously consume it. You can literally leave auto-play on YouTube and it will steadily pull you down the rabbit hole. These people aren’t logging in to nazi.com and ravenously looking for content (at least most aren’t).

              It’s served directly to them in mainstream platforms, prepared exactly how they like it. And they’re the first generation to be bombarded by this algorithmic targeting for their entire lives.

              Should adults still be responsible for what they consume and analyzing it critically? Of course. But given we’re in unprecedented territory and this is (at most) their second time voting in a presidential cycle, I’ll give them a mulligan.

              • KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                8 days ago

                You really don’t have to consciously consume it. You can literally leave auto-play on YouTube and it will steadily pull you down the rabbit hole. These people aren’t logging in to nazi.com and ravenously looking for content (at least most aren’t).

                maybe if you have degenerative brain damage, or are asleep, otherwise yes, you are making the conscious choice to watch nazis talk about nazi things for 3 hours, that’s literally something you consciously engage with simply by listening to, or even looking at.

                This is why it’s so important to be conscious of the media you’re consuming, in the same way it’s important to be conscious about the products you’re buying and the services you’re using.

                I’ll give them a mulligan.

                look bro, all i’m saying is that you don’t accidentally become a nazi, if i gave you a knife, and told you to murder somebody, and walked away, you wouldn’t do that, you would probably call the police on me because that’s really fucking weird.

                • stickly@lemmy.world
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                  8 days ago

                  No, they’re making a conscious choice to use the platform. The content itself is whatever pops up and looks entertaining.

                  If the algorthim shows you 2 center-right videos, 3 hard-right videos, and one nazi rant then are you choosing to be a nazi by watching the center right ones?

                  Its never actually 3 hours of nazi things. Its an otherwise entertaining video making some off color jokes. It’s a streamer going on one politically dubious rant in a 6 hour stream. It’s a weekly podcast talking to “interesting” people; some benign, some funny, some actual problems… It’s about normalizing the conversation and the ideas. Nobody is getting handed a knife.

                  Yeah, there are some people take the red pill and actively go down the conspiracy rabbit hole and watch nazi shit. But I’m not gonna go out of my way to crucify people who have shitty ideas in their head at some point, there are lots of people that have stories of escaping the funnel.

                  Because at the end of the day a vote is just voicing an opinion to most people.

                  I was told tariffs aren’t a bad idea”… “Musk has points that there might be wasteful spending”… “Well Rogan endorsed him haha”…

                  If they were told they’re getting drafted to invade Greenland before they voted, they look at you the same way as the knife guy.