Article

Culture

Education

Politics

26 February 2025

6 min read

Does Gen Z crave the dictator?

If young Brits are turning away from democracy, here’s how to stop it.

Krish Kandiah

Krish is a social entrepreneur partnering across civil society, faith communities, government and philanthropy. He founded The Sanctuary Foundation.

A cat with a small black moustache marking snarls while sitting in front of a tablet.

Kanashi on Unsplash

I knew something was seriously wrong when I hosted a live interactive online assembly for a couple of thousand sixth formers last year. Given a range of emojis the one that was chosen most to represent how they felt about politics wasn’t a thumbs up, or sleeping face, - it was the pile of poo emoji. The vast majority also expressed a deep distrust in government believing they neither listened to nor cared about them. It was then that I realised democracy was in trouble—and not just on the global stage. Here in the UK, a deeply worrying trend is emerging: more than half of Generation Z (those aged 13-27) believe the country would be better off under a dictator.

Recent controversial polling from Craft, commissioned by Channel 4, reveals that 52 per cent of Gen Z believe the UK should be run by a strong leader who does not have to bother with parliament or elections. Even more alarmingly, 33 per cent think the country would be better off if the army were in charge. If that doesn’t make us sit up and take notice, consider this: nearly half (47 per cent) of Gen Z believe our society must be radically changed through revolution.

These numbers are staggering. For those of us who have grown up with a strong commitment to democracy, it is unthinkable that the generation raised with the most freedom, the most access to information, and the greatest digital connectivity could be so willing to give up their right to vote, protest, and hold leaders accountable. But before we rush to condemn, we need to ask the hard question: why do so many young people apparently feel this way?

A lost faith in politics

What if it isn’t so much that Gen Z has turned against democracy, but that they feel democracy has turned against them? Think about it. Their schools are crumbling. Their teachers are stressed. If they need mental health support or special needs support, they have either a long wait or a hard fight on their hands and probably both. If they want to go to university, they have to take on a debt that will last longer than the time they have been alive. And pity help them if they want to buy a house - statistics suggest they will probably have to wait until they are 33 years old to even think about getting onto the property ladder.

You might think that these struggles would force Gen Z to become more politically active. But this generation remains the least politically engaged group in the UK. Whilst it is true that currently many are too young to vote, there is also a large proportion who is too disconnected to see the relevance of formal politics. Voter turnout for young people has been abysmal in the last three UK general elections:

2015: 43 per cent
2017: 54 per cent (a temporary spike due to Jeremy Corbyn’s appeal)
2019: 47 per cent

Compare that to the 70 per cent plus turnout for over-65s, and the message is clear: young people aren’t voting, and in return, politicians aren’t speaking to them. Which only exacerbates the problem. Despite the Labour Party manifesto promise that they would introduce voting at 16, they seem to be in no hurry to introduce the reform.

While Gen Z engagement with traditional politics is low, their political leanings have shifted. Over the past two decades, Gen Z has moved slightly to the centre-left, while older generations tend to lean centre-right. Today, age is a stronger predictor of voting behaviour than social class, which is a dramatic shift from previous decades. Though Gen Z is more liberal overall, they are also more radical in their discontent—and that’s where the real danger lies.

When young people feel unheard, they don’t just disengage—they seek alternatives. Their frustration has left them susceptible to radical ideas and strongman narratives. While previous generations turned to grassroots activism, protests, and community engagement, Gen Z is more likely to be influenced by leaders they can follow online - like Andrew Tate, Jordan Peterson, and Nigel Farage, who offer clear, confident, and often extreme critiques of the system.

The result? Despite strong examples in the positive activism of Greta Thunberg, Marcus Rashford and Malala who have used democratic means to make a positive difference, there is a growing number of young people who see democracy as weak and ineffective, and dictatorship as strong and decisive.

A wake-up call

But there is hope. By engaging young people directly there is an opportunity to change the trajectory. That’s what we discovered at our online interactive event for sixth formers. One of the most powerful voices at the event was Sophia, a recently turned 18-year-old Ukrainian refugee, who spoke about her experience fleeing war. She told her story of being separated from her father who was in Ukraine fighting for democracy. She shared how Ukrainians are fighting—not just with weapons, but with their lives—for the very democracy that young Brits are so ready to discard. Her message to British students was simple: “You don’t know how lucky you are.” She challenged them to see democracy not as a broken system, but as one that requires their participation to work.

It was a powerful moment. And it proved something vital: when young people hear real stories, from real people, they begin to see the consequences of the choices they are flirting with. As a result of that event, thousands of young people signed up to vote at the electoral commission.

Rebuilding trust in democracy

So what can be done? Here are three crucial steps.

Make politics relevant to Gen Z. Young people do care about issues like climate change, mental health, and social justice. But they are turned off democratic political solutions by the bureaucracy, mud-flinging and dragging timescales. By taking time to explain to them the processes, to involve them in the campaigns and to improve accessibility to politics and highlight the difference they can make, we may find that our most disconnected demographic could become democracy’s greatest asset.

Rebuild Gen Z’s trust in leadership. Scandals and dishonesty have left Gen Z cynical. We need leaders who are transparent, accountable, and willing to listen. We need parties who will do what they said they would do in their manifestos and on the doorsteps. We need Members of Parliament who are committed to spending time with the young people they are supposed to represent so that relationships of trust can be deemed possible again.

Empower Gen Z. There are initiatives out there—like our interactive live assembly and the G-EPIC project—that prove a simple truth: when young people feel heard, they engage. When they are inspired, they engage. When they are empowered to participate in the political process, they engage. Perhaps if we create more spaces for them to speak, lead, and act, they will step forward to shape the future.

History shows that democracy is never guaranteed—it must be fought for and protected by every generation. It also requires constant effort to ensure it serves all communities without scapegoating, persecuting, or marginalizing. And history warns us that without democracy, most dictators quickly become tyrants.

The challenge before us is urgent: we must help Generation Z recognize the power they hold to shape their world—before they surrender it to leaders who would take that power away from all of us.

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Article

Character

Culture

Idolatry

Psychology

31 October 2025

6 min read

We need a sense of shame - but need mercy even more

Shame may be necessary, but only if it can be defeated

Belle Tindall

Belle is the staff writer at Seen & Unseen and co-host of its Re-enchanting podcast.

Frankstein stares our from his covered face.

Jacob Elordi plays Frankenstein's monster

Netflix.

I’ve been thinking about the nature of shame a lot recently. Both professionally and personally, it’s a topic that is demanding my attention. It’s following me around, insisting that I look it in the eye, shoving and nudging me – taunting and tempting me to finally snap and wrestle it to the ground. I guess that is the very nature of shame, isn’t it? It’s always so stubbornly there.

I’ve also noticed that it seems to have elbowed its way into cultural conversations; it’s been putting a real PR shift in, seeking rehabilitation in public discourse.

The actor, Jacob Elordi, was recently interviewed by the Wall Street Journal. Kind of interesting, kind of not. The sliver of it that really caught my attention was when the interviewer asked Jacob,

‘What’s one lost art that you wish would come back in style?’

To which Elordi replied,

‘The art of shame. I wish people could experience shame a little heavier’.

Gosh.

It makes sense that this was Jacob’s answer; the interview was conducted to promote Frankenstein, Guillermo Del Toro’s new movie in which Jacob Elordi plays Frankenstein’s monster. So, I get it. He’s been consumed with what components make up a monster, endeavouring to literally turn himself into one. He’s been ruminating on the recipe of evil, and perhaps he’s found one key ingredient – shamelessness. Maybe Jacob, having dwelt on such, has subsequently looked out at the not-so-fictional ‘monsters’ wreaking havoc and has diagnosed the same thing, a distinct lack of shame.

It's a solid thesis.

It reminded me of another recent interview, this one with the acclaimed author, Zadie Smith. She said,

‘Shame gets a bad rap these days. I think it’s quite a useful emotion, corrective on certain kinds of behaviour… I assume people – including myself – are just deeply, deeply flawed. And so, shame is usually quite appropriate on a day-to-day level… shame is a kind of productive thing to create change. I guess I do believe that. I know it’s definitely a Christian emotion, that’s why it’s so out of fashion. But I always thought it quite productive in the gospels, that idea that you assume that you are entirely in sin. I always assume that.’

I half agree with both Jacob and Zadie. In a way, I’d be a fool not to. Not to mention, proof of their thesis.

I cannot deny that I am, as Zadie points out, deeply, deeply flawed. There is a crack in everything I do, a fracture in all my best intentions. And yours, too, I’m afraid (but I have a feeling you know that). There is a brokenness to us, a breaking-things-ness. To each and every one of us, ‘hurt’ is both an adjective and a verb – something we feel and something we do. The things I want to do, I never manage. The things I don’t want to do, I seem to manage every day. I am falling short, missing the mark – I am so fallibly human.

To acknowledge such is not only obvious, nor is it simply ‘useful’, as Zadie suggests. It’s inherently spiritual, it’s paradigmatic.

Last summer, I hosted an event at which Francis Spufford, one of my most cherished wordsmiths, playfully quipped, ‘I’ve heard original sin (the notion that we are, as Zadie notes ‘entirely in sin’) described as one of the few theological propositions which you can actually confirm with the naked eye’. ‘Sin’, Tyler Staton similarly writes, ‘is simultaneously the most controversial idea in Christianity and the one most universally agreed upon’.

There’s something deeply wrong with the world. We all know that.

Which, presumably, is what Jacob Elordi is getting at – he’s observing bad people not feeling bad enough about the bad that they do, or worse still, the bad that they are. A healthy dose of shame is the medicine that this world needs, he suggests.

Oh Jacob, I sympathise with that. The thing is, I have a hunch that the presence of shame makes as many monsters as the absence of it.

And Zadie, I wonder if shame births as much destruction as it does ‘correction’.

While I agree with you both that, in a world as broken as ours, shame needs to exist in some form or another, it also needs an antidote. It’s a dangerous substance; toxic and destructive. Don’t let it fool you, don’t be over-generous to it – shame may (in its most moderate and appropriate forms) be an acknowledgment of the disease, but it is not the medicine. It could only ever be ‘useful’ if it is, ultimately, defeatable.

At least, that’s my – admittedly very Christian – conviction. That’s my take. I can’t pretend that it’s not as theological as it is sociological in its underpinnings.

I’m relatively new to the liturgical aspects of my own faith tradition (that is, the formalised scripts, actions and rituals that have long fuelled religious experience) , so I have the pleasure of not being numb to them. When I read the ancient words of ancient prayers, they shoot right through me, particularly these ones:

‘Almighty God, our heavenly Father, we have sinned against you and against our neighbour in thought and word and deed, through negligence, through weakness, through our own deliberate fault...’

Ouch.

As I read those words, week in and week out, my brain creates a helpful montage for me – whirring through the countless ways in which I have failed – in what I think, what I say, what I do. I’m confronted with the ways that my breaking-things-ness has leaked out of me through my negligence, it’s spilled out of my weakness, the force of it directed at others through my own deliberate fault.

Oh yes, I’m well acquainted with the emotion of shame.

But the only thing productive/appropriate/corrective about falling on my face in shame, is that there is a mercy that can scoop me up. It’s not hopeless, you see? There’s a mend-ability. There’s an antidote to shame; there’s a balm for its burn. There’s a bewildering love that banishes shame from within me – there’s a rescue route from its toxic spiral.

The moment that shame is acknowledged, its presence verbalised, its power felt – is the very moment it needs to be neutralised. It cannot fester, it cannot be afforded the loudest, nor the last, say.

And so, to Jacob Elordi’s interesting wish – that ‘people could experience shame a little heavier’, and to Zadie Smith’s fascinating thesis that ‘shame is a kind of productive thing to create change’- I hear you. I see what you’re getting at. But I can only ever wish people to experience the heaviness of shame if it means that they are more sensitive to the feeling of it being undeservedly lifted off them. That’s where change happens. That’s the medicine.

So, Jacob and Zadie, let’s agree to half-agree on this one, shall we?

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