For months, I watched my generation—my classmates, friends, and peers—turn Zohran Mamdani’s campaign into a movement. New York City, long considered the symbol of capitalism and business, has now elected a self-declared socialist as its mayor. But the most remarkable part of Mamdani’s rise isn’t his ideology but how he became the voice of a generation shaped by an education system that forgot to teach us how to think.
Mamdani’s campaign thrived on the credibility it gained from the education establishment. Endorsements from the United Federation of Teachers—representing nearly 200,000 members—gave his movement both money and moral weight. When teachers take sides politically, their students notice. After all, teachers shape how young people understand the world.
Yet what schools fail to teach is just as revealing as what they do. Debates on tariffs, immigration, or the economy are often avoided under the excuse that they’re “too controversial.” Instead of analyzing competing viewpoints, students are taught to see issues through a moral binary: oppressor versus oppressed. That framework, reinforced through diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs and critical race theory (CRT), has saturated classrooms.
Mamdani’s campaign capitalized on that mindset. With more than 50,000 volunteers—an extraordinary number for a city race—his movement was powered by Gen Z activists, most of them students. Their motivation came not from data on crime or taxes but from emotion. They were told they were part of a moral revolution that equated socialism with justice and capitalism with greed.
When George Floyd died in 2020, many students—including myself—experienced our first taste of civic engagement. Few discussed policing reform or legal nuance. Instead, we absorbed a single lesson: America is structurally racist. That worldview soon expanded to economics and foreign policy alike.
Mamdani often insists the wealthy “don’t pay their fair share.” Yet IRS data show the top 1% pay about 40% of all federal income taxes, while the bottom half pay less than 3%. In school, those figures were never taught. Instead, capitalism was framed as exploitation, and socialism as compassion—until reality proves otherwise.
This is not only a New York problem. It represents a generational shift rooted in classrooms and now reflected in politics. A 2023 Wall Street Journal poll found that only 30 percent of adults under 30 believe having children is very important—down from 59 percent in 1998. Meanwhile, 62 percent of Gen Z views socialism favorably.
A generation detached from faith, family, and civic duty becomes far more receptive to state control as a substitute for personal purpose and responsibility.
Mamdani’s victory was a direct result of an education system that prioritizes ideology over inquiry. When schools abandon critical thinking, they inevitably become institutions of indoctrination rather than education.
As a high school student, I do not believe this trajectory is irreversible. But reversing it requires more than a political shift—it demands an intellectual one. Real reform begins in the classroom, not at the ballot box. Students deserve the freedom to debate, to question assumptions, and to engage with facts rather than slogans.
If schools continue rewarding conformity and punishing curiosity, Mamdani will not be an exception—he will be the beginning of a new political normal.