Tag: youth
A Chat with Nick Steiert, Co-Founder at Youth and Student Travel Company: Intravelr
Intravelr is a company that specialises in providing unforgettable experiences to the young generation, creating life changing cultural exchange opportunities…
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‘Enforcement squads’ to tackle youth vaping in government crackdown on illegal e-cigarette sales
Record-breaking Wisconsin Supreme Court flip sparks reflection on youth voter mobilization
The Wisconsin Supreme Court flipped majority blue this week, as Democrat-backed circuit court judge Janet Protasiewicz defeated conservative former justice Daniel Kelly in a swing state election dubbed one of the most important of the year.
The balance-deciding win — resulting in the nonpartisan court’s first liberal-leaning majority in 15 years — was driven by record numbers at the polls, with more than 1.7 million people casting their vote in the spring election, representing at least 36 percent of the voting population. The voter engagement, along with early reports of high youth turnout, has spurred reflection on the impact of youth-led civic organizing and the successes of national networks behind the push.
Across the nation, young, issue-based voters have nurtured a growing concern toward protections for what matters to them, their health, and their rights, and they’re using their voices in creative calls to action for generational organizing.
Many Wisconsin voters were focused on a legislative future centered around reproductive justice and voting rights. This year, the court is expected to revisit the state’s outdated 1849 abortion law, which bans abortion in nearly all circumstances, and could revisit redistricting maps criticized as gerrymandered.
Behind the record-breaking flood of voters were both national and local efforts from youth-oriented political groups, adding digital exposure and generational organizing power to the high-digit campaign. The race was the most expensive state Supreme Court race in U.S. history, triple the previous record of $15 million set in 2004 in Illinois, CBS reported.
Credit: Daniel Boczarski/Getty Images for Democratic Party of Wisconsin
From app-based pushes to traditional, on-the-ground campus campaigning, the success of national organizers in Wisconsin is adding new considerations to an ongoing conversation on the power of the youth vote and how to harness it.
Voters of Tomorrow
Voters of Tomorrow is a Gen Z-focused advocacy group founded in 2019 by then-17-year-old Santiago Mayer. Voters of Tomorrow seeks to build youth political power through online and on-campus campaigns as well as generation-focused research that informs a “Gen Z Agenda” for economic justice, healthcare, climate and educational justice, and more. The organization operates a national network of young “political strategists, communicators, and policy-wonks,” it explains, “to encourage Gen Z to vote for pro-democracy candidates.”
In Wisconsin, the group partnered with college advocates, the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, and Grassroots Democrats HQ to organize the youth vote on the ground. Grassroots Democrats HQ reported reaching more than 435,000 voters ahead of the election, including 35,000 calls to young voters.
NextGen America
NextGen America, a national youth voting organization founded in 2013, seeks to mobilize young and first-time voters for progressive policies. In 2020, the organization reported a historic youth voter turnout, ushering 4.6 million young people to the polls.
Ahead of the Wisconsin election, members of NextGen America hosted a dating app campaign to get people out to vote. Taking to the customizable options on the app Hinge, advocates changed their personal locations and profiles to appeal to Wisconsin “matches,” turning dating opportunities into political advocacy. First attempted during the 2022 Wisconsin Senate races, the organization’s leadership said they’ve found success in unconventional campaigns, especially in a state with such a strong youth voter presence.
Traditional methods still helped, though. NextGen America, and its political action committee NextGen PAC, also connected with young voters on college campuses and online.
“Young people are the future of progressive politics and the future of our democracy,” said NextGen PAC President Cristina Tzintzún Ramirez in a statement responding to Protasiewicz’s victory. “Today’s victory for Judge Janet Protasiewicz proves yet again that when you invest and commit to educating, mobilizing, and connecting with young people on the issues that matter to them, they will use their voices and stand up for what they believe in.
“Young Wisconsin voters are pissed off and tired of their basic rights being threatened and taken away, and today they said ‘enough’ to extremist leaders like Dan Kelly whose only plan is to take us back in time. Abortion rights and voting rights are too important for us to stand idly by, and young people will stop at nothing to protect the future we believe in.”
Swing Left
Swing Left is a grassroots political advocacy organization founded in 2017 to provide voters with information about nearby swing elections. Since then, the organization has expanded its progressive election guides, in collaboration with groups like voter outreach organization Vote Forward, and collected millions of funds for Democratic candidates.
Swing Left volunteers campaigned in Wisconsin and supported youth-led voter outreach on college campuses.
Project 72 WI
Project 72 WI is a newly-founded and youth-focused organization that began a statewide campaign in Wisconsin to educate student voters ahead of the supreme court election. The group’s strategies combined on-the-ground organizing with digital outreach efforts, including planning and promoting social events like drag nights and college bar trivia, and reaching potential voters through TikTok.
Project 72 WI also offered paid opportunities and training for college campus organizers and Get-Out-The-Vote organizing fellows ahead of the race.
Leaders Igniting Transformation
Leaders Igniting Transformation (LIT) is a Milwaukee-based, “Black and Brown-led” nonprofit founded in 2017 to organize young people for social, racial, and economic justice. The organization leads state and local advocacy campaigns, invests in youth organizing training, and hosts leadership opportunities for students of color.
Leaders Igniting Transformation, supported by national youth advocacy group Alliance for Youth Action, conducted a statewide door-knocking campaign and outreach effort to address concerns of voter fatigue and voter suppression among its target demographic ahead of the spring election. Along with publishing its own comprehensive youth voter guide, the organization spoke to more than 50,000 people to galvanize the vote.
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Meet The Modders Fixing The Bad Sonic Games Of Your Youth
Sonic the Hedgehog has come a long way in the past few years. From the open-world reinvention Sonic Frontiers to the financial success of the movie franchise, everyone’s favorite Sega mascot is enjoying a boom period. But while some at Sega might want you to forget some of Sonic’s more mediocre (or downright terrible) outings–especially those of the mid 2000s–the die-hard modders in the surprisingly active 3D Sonic scene are here to fix the problems that annoyed thousands of schoolchildren back in the day.
Of the many, many Sonic games that have emerged over the years, it’s fair to say that 2006’s Sonic the Hedgehog is the most infamous. Featuring a wildly ambitious spread of playable characters and a doomed cross-species love story between Sonic and a human princess, “Sonic ’06” is one of the best-ever examples of publisher hubris. That said, does it deserve its reputation as an all-time bad game? According to Sonic fan ChaosX, absolutely not. And he’s far from the only one who feels that way.
ChaosX is the Argentinian developer behind “P-06 (Project ’06),” a decidedly unofficial remake of the Sonic 2006 game made in the Unity engine. When the developer first played Sonic 2006 as a kid, he was fascinated by its mix of soaring highs and abyssal lows–here was a game that had some of the best art design and music that he had ever seen and heard, yet it struggled with the basics of the platforming genre.
Police officer shot ‘while coaching youth football team’ in Northern Ireland
Hulu’s new docuseries ‘Stolen Youth: Inside the Cult at Sarah Lawerence’ is based on a horrifying true story
Hulu’s new docuseries Stolen Youth: Inside the Cult at Sarah Lawerence brings the story of Larry Ray’s manipulation and exploitation of a group of Sarah Lawerence students to the small screen.
The story was brought to light in 2019 in a New York Magazine feature story which led to an FBI investigation resulting in Ray being sentenced to 60 years in prison for sex trafficking, extortion, conspiracy, and forced labor last month. The three-part docuseries features first-hand accounts of Ray’s abuse that spanned a decade. Here’s the true story behind the documentary:
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Who are the victims?
Ray first met the group of sophomores at Sarah Lawerence through his daughter Talia, herself a student at the New York liberal arts college. After his release from prison in the fall of 2010, Ray moved into Talia’s dorm, inserted himself into her friends’ lives, and gained their trust through “therapy sessions” he conducted. Ray’s victims included Talia’s boyfriend at the time, and her roommates Santos Rosario, Daniel Levin, Isabella Pollok, and Claudia Drury. Later Rosario introduced Ray to his sisters Felicia Rosario and Yalitza Rosario, who also fell under his influence.
After becoming a confidant of the young people, he convinced Talia and her friends to move into a one-bedroom apartment on the Upper East Side of New York where his relationship with the students escalated. He mentally and physically tortured them, coerced them into confessing to crimes they didn’t commit through sleep-derivation, verbal abuse, and sexual humiliation, and extorted hundreds of thousands of dollars from them and their families. He forced one young woman into sex work and pocketed the hundreds of thousands of dollars she earned from it.
Who is Larry Ray?
Ray’s sphere of influence and expert manipulation extended beyond the Sarah Lawerence students. Prior to his involvement with them, the Brooklyn native became close to former NYPD commissioner Bernie Kerik, a connection that lead to a stint as an FBI informant for a pump-and-dump stock scheme operated by a capo in the Gambino family.
“Larry Ray is a psychotic con man who has victimized every friend he’s ever had. It’s been close to 20 years since I last heard from him, yet his reign of terror continues,” said Kerik in the New York Magazine article.
FBI reports revealed that Ray was an unreliable informant and may have in fact used the role to cover his own complicity in the Gambino stock fraud scheme. In 2000, he was charged for his involvement in the scheme and was sentenced to five years’ probation. By 2007, Ray would again serve time due to a child custody dispute, which prosecutors argued was a violation of his parole. It was upon his release from that charge that he preyed upon the Sarah Lawerence students.
Where is everybody?
According to New York Magazine, it was Levin who first put the pieces together that Roy’s treatment of the group was characteristic of a cult. By 2016, Yalitza and Levin had escaped from Roy’s control, but the others remained under his dominance until his arrest in 2020. What began as a normal college experience ended in unimaginable horror for this group of students.