Why young people aren't rising up: our readers respond

This week, we published an article by Costas Lapavitsas and Alex Politaki which asked why Europe's young people don't riot any more. The article provoked a long and thoughtful discussion about the reaction to austerity and unemployment, with more than 800 comments. Here we highlight some of the replies from young people who explain why they don't take to the streets in protest:

LondonRoots: 'No obvious route to lasting change'

I am relatively lucky in that I can sustain myself through self-employment at 29. I get approx £10,000 per year pre-tax. My partner has just finished a science PhD at 25 and may get a job on around £25,000 per year pre-tax if she's lucky – although of course she may get nothing but McDonald's. Still, every month we pay £800 in rent/bills (not including food). Suburb of Stockport/Manchester, no frills like Sky TV/dishwasher.

We're looking at house prices and wondering why they are all £200,000 even when they are falling down. 10% deposit = £20,000. That's still pretty hard to save up given the extortionate rent. It would be nigh on impossible if my partner was not qualified up to her eyeballs after 20 years' continuous education.

All the means of group cohesion enjoyed by previous generations have ceased to exist. There is no leftwing party. There are no unions. There is no obvious route to making lasting change. There is every reason to believe the status quo will attempt to shut down any kind of change. The police routinely infiltrate hippy, animal-loving movements and so it's reasonable to assume the same for politically motivated movements. The media has been bought, the major political parties too – whatever stories the established powers want to make up are the ones that will be perpetuated.

We need to take awful jobs with unsociable hours in order to guarantee another month's rent and provide food. Savings? Nigh on impossible to achieve – I save about £100 a month. I'm pretty excited that I have £2,000 in the bank – I've never had that before. That could buy me a 10-year-old car at least (minus running expenses), not that I'd want one.

The good jobs? Well, somebody is already in them by virtue of being born earlier. When I talk to my 50-year-old parents they tell me their first house cost approx three times their combined salary. My current housemate is 48. He's getting divorced and selling up the house. Years ago he received an £8,000 loan (non-repayable) to help buy his first house. Could you imagine that now!? Anyway, the house has risen six times in value over that time so he'll get a pretty penny for it. It's not the fault of the generation before us – you'd be stupid to reject a massively reduced-price house. But I totally reject anyone from an older generation making generalisations about our "laziness" and lack of work ethic. If you were 20 now, you'd be fucked too.

spinnyspace: 'Peaceful protest is treated like a riot'

Protesting has become more than a hazardous pastime. Once upon a time we were allowed to organise a march or a public protest. Today young people face a far more intolerant police force and state. Peaceful protest nowadays is treated like a riot by authorities. Today it's a bonus just being able to walk away after a march – you're more likely to be arrested or worse. And soon it will be water cannons with unknown chemicals pointed at you. So yes, there is a lot of apathy now; that's the alternative to giving in to anger.

scrotgrot: 'It's not worth being blacklisted'

I'm 22, politically engaged, and quite ardently against austerity and all the rest of it. But you should see the number of articles I've been about to share on Facebook (don't scoff too hard, that's how revolution spreads these days), but thought better of it at the last moment. Because we know they're always spying on us – even before the NSA revelations, I'd say that was the underlying assumption. Our generation knows corporations, not governments, rule the world, and we must follow their moral codes. It's not worth going to a protest, getting filmed, photographed or, heaven forbid, written up by a police officer. Because we know they all share their blacklists around and it will ruin our entire lives.

The fact that we grew up during a time when there was no credible enemy nation for the west to set itself against has made us interminably cynical and critical of our own governments. We don't trust a single word that is reported anywhere in the news or comes out of politicians' mouths, particularly if it's positive spin.

The sense is of a corrupt government and corporations arrayed in a constant war of extraction against the people, particularly the disadvantaged.

Our peers who are lucky enough to land a decent middle-class job are seen as modern-day fairytale stories or assumed to have background connections. The fact that a huge proportion of young people nowadays are over-educated has probably contributed to their nationality-blind distrust, not just due to going through university but also the analytical bent of a greatly improved state education. They have been educated about "past" protests and they know they don't achieve anything.

maiaH: 'Elites play dirty tricks with campaigners'

To all those saying violence doesn't work: what was the biggest march in UK/biggest march around the world ever? Against the Iraq war – a single issue. The UK could easily have said no. What's the greatest UK violence in recent decades? IRA. Did they get what they wanted? Most of.

Police, elites, they only respect violence. Why do they stock up on weapons constantly? They're not buying a water cannon to save lives. They nearly always use anti-terrorist legislation overwhelmingly to prevent demonstrations etc in practice.

I've been to ask questions in a debate to save Withybush hospital: "Oh, we changed the rules, now you have to have notified us in writing two days in advance of any question." We all forked out to pay to travel to Cardiff where our leader was guaranteed an interview with the Welsh assembly health minister: he gets his junior to call while we're travelling to say the meeting's been moved forward an hour, knowing full well we're still travelling there. Sue Marsh, the disability campaigner, was mucked around left, right and centre by the BBC, finally allowed on the programme, ooh look the platform's got no wheelchair access and there's already someone in the wheelchair seat in the audience.

Do a tiny little bit of campaigning for even the most innocuous issue – first time I was kettled was with an asthma charity campaigning for a clean air bill – and you'll feel like you're wasting your time because the opposition only plays dirty tricks. I've never had a clean answer – lies, tricks, the works, and I rarely do anything. Plus it'll make you feel like throwing something at them. I never would, but that is their morality, you realise: tricks and lies. Yet they give way to and respect violence. An appalling people.

richardg23: 'My peers care more about reality TV than politics'

As a young person myself, I can speak for the general feeling among our generation and simply believe that not enough people care to educate themselves about the political process. Instead of my Twitter feed (mostly comprised of my peers) being filled with discontent and anger at political parties who offer no distinct ideological difference and simply pander to an elite, I see 140 characters of critique over how the latest reality TV star has been acting. To be perfectly honest I believe this all comes as a result of the saturation of entertainment media and the cult of celebrity in our lives from a young age. Not many my age read the paper, and it simply doesn't seem "cool" to educate oneself and have an opinion on these things any more. What a sorry state of affairs.

Enrech: 'In my country young people are still protesting'

I used to be against rioting but nowadays I don't know if there is another way to change this situation. I'm a Spanish boy and I can assure you that in my country there still are young people protesting, probably not so massively as a few years ago, but they are still protesting in front of some universities and the only thing that they are getting is nothing but being arrested by the police.