They could not be more wrong. It is time to wake up and shed old stereotypes. It is time to acknowledge the exciting momentum of the youth service movement. While there is no shortage of statistics indicating widespread political apathy on college campuses, the terminology used and types of questions asked often skew the result and lead to a negative conclusion. Although they clearly appreciate the democratic freedoms, they fail to perceive a need to reciprocate by exercising the duties and responsibilities of good citizenship.
Misconceptions abound regarding young men and women.
The current literature fails to acknowledge that social activism has replaced political activism as the principal form of youth involvement. How and Bill Strauss's 13th Gen paint a dismal, if not inaccurate, portrait of American youth while failing to recognize the many positive contributions of youth service. Regretfully, they ignore the facts. Politicians and the media would have us think that youth today are lazy and unconcerned with civic responsibility because they don't buy into the political system. They are sadly mistaken.