Engaging the 20-somethings

Last week The New York Times featured an op-ed by Thomas Friedman titled Generation Q.

I just spent the past week visiting several colleges — Auburn, the University of Mississippi, Lake Forest and Williams — and I can report that the more I am around this generation of college students, the more I am both baffled and impressed.

I am impressed because they are so much more optimistic and idealistic than they should be. I am baffled because they are so much less radical and politically engaged than they need to be.

...I’ve been calling them “Generation Q” — the Quiet Americans, in the best sense of that term, quietly pursuing their idealism, at home and abroad.

To read the full op-ed click here.

Friedman offers a thoughtful take on the 20-somethings of 2007 and concludes that "Generation Q" spends a lot of time quietly building houses for the poor, volunteering for "Teach for America", and signing online petitions.

Friedman continues,

But Generation Q may be too quiet, too online, for its own good, and for the country’s own good. When I think of the huge budget deficit, Social Security deficit and ecological deficit that our generation is leaving this generation, if they are not spitting mad, well, then they’re just not paying attention. And we’ll just keep piling it on them.

As Friedman closes his op-ed, he makes what seems a pressing (almost desperate) call to action to the 20-somethings; telling them that they need to "speak truth to power, face to face, in big numbers, on campuses or the Washington Mall," while referencing MLK and Bobby Kennedy.

Do you think Friedman is right? Does "Generation Q" spend too much time quietly volunteering and signing online petitions? Or do they strike a healthy balance in expressing their opinion while not getting involved in sometimes seemingly nonstrategic protests?