One of the most interesting narratives to emerge from the US presidential race is the rise and empowerment of the youth as a voting class through the vibrant campaign of Bernie Sanders. As a democratic socialist, Sanders has a vision of America that blends with the dream of the young. In this vision, public universities give free education, healthcare is provided as a basic human right, large Wall Street entities are broken up and trade agreements are reconsidered if they give little direct benefit to the masses.

Sanders was written off by the establishment media when he began campaigning, but he has since shocked the Democrat leadership by proving to be a much stronger contender than first imagined by Hillary Clinton. And while it appears that the former Secretary of State is still leading in the Democratic race, Sanders’ movement will become a defining force in American politics for the foreseeable future.

Clinton is a known moderate, but has already been chased left by the strength of Sanders’ support despite her clear wish to return to safer waters to keep the big money rolling in.

Conventional wisdom dictates that a moderate has a better chance of winning an election, but the 2016 race is anything but conventional. The youth movement behind Sanders, driven as it is by the disenfranchisement of a generation, may yet prove powerful enough to turn conventional wisdom on its head.

To the youth, an idea is more important than an individual politician or a party. It thus becomes quite a problem for the establishment to engender party loyalty among them. At the same time, the millennials dwarf the generation that came before them in numbers. This makes it imperative for political parties to engage them as a political force. More millennials will reach voting age as the year progresses, and the party or individual politician that can capture the imagination of the young and turn that into votes will command power at the polls.

And yet, there is an aspect of the youth response to the Baby Boomer establishment that can be seen as representing the beginnings of a new zeitgeist. While millennials were inculcated with high morals and ideals by the Baby Boomers, they see wars going on forever in that black hole of conflict called the Middle East, they seethe at the greed of corporations, and they suffer at jobs paying less while demanding longer hours of work. There is a cognitive dissonance between what we are taught and what we have been shown by the Boomers, and that is frustrating.

This ideological quarrel between generations will become louder as the youth find it harder to get the same opportunities that the generation before them had.

Malaysian millennials face this existential crisis too. What we lack is a sense of community. Many of us are apathetic when it comes to politics. We think our voice does not matter very much. However, as we become more educated, as more information becomes available at our fingertips, it becomes clear that we have a duty to state our stand, and to state it loudly. It is we who will inherit tomorrow. If we don’t find our voice, we may find ourselves stuck with cleaning up the mess left by the Boomers.