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　　Young people today are more likely to give time and effort to improve the world than young people were in the past.Do you agree or disagree?

　　Though they can perhaps be faulted for their hubris and naiveté, young people are valuable wellsprings of ambition and hope. Where time may have rendered older generations impotent through dejection and cynicism, youths become especially important to the betterment of the world. It has often been said that the world's youths are its primary engines of change, and I think at no point in history has this been truer than it is today. Young people today are more willing than ever to try and improve this planet we call home.

　　The first reason for this is simply a greater sense of global awareness. With the advent of prompt and wide-reaching information distribution networks like radio, TV, and especially the Internet, everyone knows more about the state of the world than what was previously possible. Just the larger absolute number of people made aware of various circumstances, from wars to disasters to grievous social injustices, is enough to increase the absolute number of youths mobilized to action.

　　The second reason for more young people are getting involved today is our growing sense of social justice and social responsibility due to a greater intellectual enlightenment. Altruism is a rational response rather than a purely emotional one; the growth of human knowledge and rationality has steadily emboldened youths to pursue philanthropic courses of action. We are smarter than we were in the past-this allows us to look more easily past false dichotomies of us versus them, or indefensible prejudices arising from fear or selfishness. Over time it has become clearer that there is only us, and that we are all responsible for our collective wellbeing. This overarching shift in consciousness not only encompasses young people, but is driven by them.

　　Finally, young people today are more independent and have a greater ability to effect change than ever before. For proof of greater independence, we need only examine how young people in almost all societies have become increasingly willing to break from tradition, disobey authority figures, and transgress established modes of thought-the increasing regularity of political protests worldwide is one indicator of this out of many. This greater independence is important, because it encourages young people to break from ossified, established channels of inquiry and change as means of improving the world. For proof of greater ability to effect change, we need only look at the abundance of new organizations, websites, projects, missions, and tools created and spearheaded by young people today: Micro-financing websites like Kiva, which would have been inconceivable even 30 years ago; The Secret Society for Creative Philanthropy, which, in a creative twist, gives $100 grants to those who conceive of novel ways to use that $100 to help others.

　　Young people today are more socially aware, feel more socially responsible, and have greater drive and means to effect change than ever before. It thus stands to reason that they are more likely to spend time and effort improving the world than young people in the past.