It is a simple fact that certain political parties dominate different citizen outreach strategies. For years, those who possess liberal ideologies have utilized social media exceptionally well, lending to the massive amounts of political material being created for social media sites. A massive consequence of this is that an unfair amount of political messages favoring the left have been created and distributed to children without any meaningful oversight or conjecture as to their effect.
To ensure that our population is given the chance to develop beliefs on their own without the influence of others, children should first be taught how to think critically and understand how to investigate the credibility of claims before being exposed to political content. The current norm, however, is that members of the Democratic Party capitalize on the youth’s proclivity to side with whatever information they receive first. The targeted content for children and pandering that is done across various platforms is essentially preying on children before they can develop their own opinions. I find the tactics used by aggressive members of the Democratic Party to be, at their core, not suitable for children because it is often the case that the true consequences or goals of legislation emanating from the Democratic Party are explained. The youth in this country have simply not been presented with the necessary resources to analyze policy claims and political stances. Due to this, they should not be constantly presented with content designed for them that possesses political issues on the platforms they utilize.
I do not intend to imply that adopting a liberal ideology is the wrong choice; I am simply advocating for the end of targeted manipulation tactics on the part of aggressive members of either political party. By no means do I mean to argue that this is the work of the Democratic Party themselves, nor do I believe that this is an officially backed agenda or policy. I am simply pointing to a phenomenon that I have personally recognized. It does seem as though these kinds of tactics are disproportionately being employed by individuals and groups that have a liberal lean to elicit a response and convince children that siding with Democrats is the right choice. In addition to not providing children with the entire truth, these individuals and groups constantly demonize the right while offering nothing more than moral posturing.
My position on this matter is simple. Children should first be taught how to think critically and understand how to investigate the credibility of claims before being presented with politically biased messages. Our main goal should be to educate our children with a comprehensive civic program, not create a generation that sides with a particular political party. Some may say that these individuals and organizations creating these materials are simply trying to get kids involved. I say that the same goal can be achieved without the political lean by providing children with a non-biased education.
I think that this phenomenon is being recognized more than ever, however, and will result in an unintended consequence. I expect a subsection of this highly targeted generation to present themselves on the political stage with an agenda that is in contrast to the pandering and manipulation that they were presented with their entire online existence. It is hard to escape this kind of echo chamber, with algorithms constantly ruling our absorption of information and forcing certain political ideologies into our consciousness. Despite this, I believe that those who grew up seeing the same targeted information will soon realize that they were being targeted and consequently develop a distrust of the liberal agenda.
