Obama: Younger Generation ‘More Inclusive’ Than Older Generations

President Barack Obama stops to talk with visiting school children outside the West Wing o
Official White House Photo by Pete Souza

President Barack Obama says the younger, global generation is less divisive than older generations, something that gives him hope for the future despite the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States.

“Part of what makes me most optimistic is if you look at the attitudes of young people, across the board, young people are much more comfortable with respecting differences,” he said during a press conference with German chancellor Angela Merkel. “They are much more comfortable with diversity.”

Obama added that younger people were “less likely” then their elders “to express attitudes that divide us” and viewed themselves as part of a “global economy.”

The younger generation, he adds, is more comfortable competing globally and appeared willing to work “across borders” economically.

“That’s where the future is. but we have to create that bridge to the future,” Obama concluded.

But Obama warned that young people made it easier to forget the dangers that Russia presented to their freedoms, equating it with the actions of the United States.

“I can say to the German people that the United States has been good for Germany,” he said, citing American values for democracy and civil liberties.

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