The Pnyx: New decade

Michael McShane
News Editor

The 2010s are finally ending.

The curtains are closing on a decade where the United States sent the first African-American to the White House and legalized gay marriage nationwide. Internationally, multiple dictators have lost their power, terrorist groups were defeated and international communication exploded, and even with all that said – I am glad we are leaving this decade.

This decade also left us with a bad taste in our mouths. We had horrific gun violence, an environment wasting away and countries at each other’s throats with world powers failing the leadership test.

The 2020s is the last chance we have for changing things that could very well be untraversable come 2030. Whether you like it or not, global warming will become one of the largest issues tackled in the approaching decade.

We’re already getting snippets of what’s to come, but now we are in the decade where our choices and decisions make a very lasting difference.

We’ll also have to deal with  the rise in authoritarianism. Country leaders such as Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro who is currently blaming a Hollywood star for burning his country, or Russia’s Vladamir Putin who is currently ranked as one of the most powerful people alive and his dealings with the past U.S. presidential election has caused a national crisis.

This trend of people who not only potentially abuse their power, but are willing to do anything to keep it is desturbing and should be looked at with a wide lens. Even with Donald Trump as president, I don’t think we’ll ever get as far as those countries, but we’re now about to enter a decade where anything could happen and there is massive distrust in our world leaders.

The 2020s should be the reset button we need. Next year we are either getting four more years or a new president. The person who stands in front of the nation come January 2021 to take the oath of office will have a massive effect on how the new decade turns out.