Why activist shaming is ineffective, the innovation of youth being overlooked, and looking forward to seeing their peers on voting ballots. This is what keeps our next-gen innovator and XPRIZE Connect Advisory Board Member Jordan Naddaf up at night.  

WHAT CAUSES DO YOU CARE ABOUT THE MOST? 

I’m extremely passionate about the world of activism. I’m the co-CEO of a nonpartisan 501(c)(3) nonprofit called the Foreign Policy Youth Collaborative, and through my work, I’ve encountered many youth activists and leaders of different movements.

It’s no secret among youth climate movement leaders that it’s an extremely toxic environment – different organizations focus on bringing others down, even taking legal action on occasion. There is competition among these organizations; instead of working together to find strength in numbers and build a united front, they are pitted against each other.

In addition, a new concept has begun to emerge, one that I like to call Activist Shaming. This is when activists begin shaming other people (or activists) for not avidly promoting a certain issue or for not taking a certain action (example: not going vegan/vegetarian, not living a zero-waste lifestyle, etc.).

I do, of course, believe that everyone has a responsibility to take action to improve the world and benefit movements they support, but it is unrealistic to expect everyone to promote every movement that exists - people need to pick their battles.

It’s also unfair to expect everyone to have the same capabilities and address issues in the same way that you are able to; for instance, someone may only be able to do meatless Mondays or weekends rather than going fully vegan, but this does not make their effort any less important or valid. Alternatively, someone may choose to set up a recycling system in their house that did not previously exist - any action is valid and helpful and should be regarded as such.

I’d like to reiterate that I believe everyone who is able to has a responsibility to speak out on behalf of at least one or two causes and take actions benefiting them while also acknowledging it is a privilege to do so as some may hardly have the necessary resources to support themselves let alone another cause. (I am also not referring to situations like this year’s BLM protests - that was a crisis in which every single person who was able to needed to speak up and use their platforms for good.)

Activist shaming and the toxic environments existing in different movements between groups with the same goals is extremely detrimental; If all of that energy was focused on bringing about positive change, we would get a LOT more done.

WHAT KEEPS YOU UP AT NIGHT?

Climate change. Living in Texas, California, and NYC, I can see the effects of climate change first-hand. The fires in the Bay Area and other areas have been causing school closures these past few years and have negative health effects for ALL of us, not just those with pre-existing conditions.

“I am so frustrated and angry. I cannot imagine how Thunberg maintains such poise when our futures are being threatened. As I write this, my home town is filled with smoke as the Kincade Fire in Sonoma County burns on. Another fire has begun in LA. This is no coincidence. Our planet is burning. My throat is burning. Why can’t world leaders see what’s happening? Why is Donald Trump allowed to take away our futures by pulling out of the Paris Agreement? The time to act has come and gone; we are in a climate emergency.” 

– Jordan Naddaf’s response to Greta Thunberg’s speech at the UN in 2019, October 2019, Foreign Policy Youth Collaborative Op-Ed

WHAT DO YOU WANT PEOPLE TO KNOW THAT COULD RADICALLY CHANGE THE WORLD FOR THE BETTER? 

One thing that I avidly believe in is the power of youth in solving global issues.

Having had the privilege to attend school in Silicon Valley for the past seven years, I have seen the ability of teens and even middle school aged kids; so-called “STEM kids”, innovative do-ers and problem solvers using science and engineering to tackle everything from minor inconveniences to major issues. It’s a term that’s used affectionately, not derogatorily, by students and teachers alike. In Silicon Valley, I’m not afforded the title of “STEM kid” - I’ve taken too little physics and CS classes, and I’m considered more of a humanities student, whereas in other areas where most students are humanities focused, they see me as a “STEM kid” since I haven’t had the opportunity to receive the same humanities education as schools in less STEM-based environments and have been trained to approach problems in a certain way.

I have a classmate, Roya Ahmadi, who used machine-learning techniques to train a mathematical model that was more successful at predicting wildfires than the systems currently in use in the US - an incredible feat, one that won major recognition at the regional Synopsys Science Fair which I had the opportunity to participate in. However, no change occurred as a result of her success.

I had the chance to intern at a UN Summit in the summer of 2019, and I was working with some of the event planners to design a system to check people in. They found a stand on Amazon for about $300, but it would take too long to arrive. I looked at the stand online and told them that I could build it in three hours with a $50 budget. But the event planners said it would be too much work and instead settled for a much less efficient system. It was extremely frustrating to go from an environment at my high school where such innovation was encouraged and pushed for to a real-world environment where it was overlooked. The check-in process ended up being fairly hectic and disorganized, and I knew that if there were even two other students my age there, we could have designed and managed something with half the energy and time on our own.

Running a youth organization has also given me perspective. In the 10 months since our official launch, we went from 12 teens to more than 200. We all work on different aspects of our website, operations, content, outreach, and more. We have fully functioning partnerships and fundraising teams and legal representation.

I see examples of incredible teens every single day and they continue to inspire me to work harder and to push myself. They are capable of bringing radical and necessary change to the world, and every week my co-CEO Maayan Barsade and I have moments where we look at each other and think - “Wow, I can’t wait until these teens are the ones we’re voting for.”

 Youth advisory boards or delegates are becoming increasingly common, but I will continue to advocate for a world in which youth are not just being consulted, they are being given an equal role in working on and solving global and local issues.

Jordan is co-CEO of the Foreign Policy Youth Collaborative, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to making nonpartisan education and bipartisan conversation and activism in foreign policy accessible to all teenagers, regardless of socio-economic, geographic, or environmental factors.