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Voting Is the Key to Ending Generational Suppression
Voting is one of the most powerful things people of color can do to change the world we live in
“But voting doesn’t work, it doesn’t really matter. Our vote doesn’t even count, and they’re going to do what they want anyway, regardless of what we vote for,” my mom let me know when I was 15. Like many other Latinx folks, my mother raised her children with the belief that voting would not make a difference. Voting was frowned upon because it was simply a waste of time. Your vote wouldn’t count, and no one would bother to listen, anyway.
I completely believed her, because growing up in a Latinx household, I was hardly allowed to question authority, and my mother, a very opinionated Mexican woman, was typically always right. My mother—and people of color alike—were oppressed in multifaceted ways, ultimately allowing for my voting beliefs to be suppressed at a young age. And that voter suppression strategy was not merely a coincidence, but rather an intentional tactic and direct threat to a democratic society. This passed-down belief, ladies and gentlemen, is what I call generational voter suppression at its finest.
Voting is merely one aspect of creating the type of change we hope to see in our country, but it is the first step in the right direction.
In 2020, 32 million Latinos are eligible to vote, a major increase from 2016, when the figure was 27.3 million. This year, the Latinx community will be the largest racial and ethnic minority group, with about 13% of eligible voters. Among this group, Latinx youth, ages 18 to 35, make up about 40% of eligible Latino voters. In Arizona alone, over 1.2 million Latinx folks are eligible to vote in 2020.
I wasn’t raised in a family that believed in the power of our votes, but being the forever curious and relentless child I was, I began to ask questions and constantly sought answers, despite the pushback I encountered. I became heavily involved within my Phoenix, Arizona community — reporting and writing to uplift diverse voices as an aspiring journalist, fighting against voter suppression bills on a weekly basis at the state legislature…
