On Tuesday of this week, 17-year-old Fahma Mohamed took a train from Bristol to London to meet Michael Gove to talk about female genital mutilation. With a stack of press coverage, a group of amazing friends and the support of her teacher, she marched boxes containing 250,000 petition signatures into the Department for Education. Three weeks ago the topic was barely on the education secretary's agenda. By 6pm on Tuesday evening he had agreed to write to every school in the country, advising headteachers how they can tackle FGM in their schools.
Mohamed was elated. Campaigners who have worked on FGM for years celebrated this incredible, people-powered victory. Social media were buzzing with how this young woman had taken on a senior member of the cabinet and won.
You might think Mohamed is an unusual case, an outlier in a nation of apathetic young people disengaged from politics and uninterested in the world around them. You'd be wrong. She is one of thousands of young people who are using sites such as Change.org, Twitter and Facebook to make their voices heard on all kinds of issues – and on their terms.
Mohamed is speaking out for girls who can't necessarily speak out for themselves: victims of FGM in her community and around the world. She says we need to stop ignoring something that is happening to girls her age and younger, and she has a simple message that cuts through to people's innate sense of fairness and justice: FGM is child abuse. It happens across the world, but it also happens here in Britain. She called on Michael Gove to take action and said, in no uncertain terms: "We won't back down. We won't go away." It is a message that speaks louder than scores of NGO policy papers or Westminster debates. And with a quarter of a million supporters behind you, it's impossible to ignore.
The web has changed politics in lots of ways. But the most profound impact has been the voice it has given to ordinary people. People like Mohamed; people like Esha Marwaha who, at 15 years old, kept climate change on the national curriculum; or like Yas Necati, a campaigner for better sex education in schools, among many other causes. The connecting power of the internet means that the issues that don't always get high profile in the mainstream media can still rise up the agenda.
The current crisis of confidence in the punch and judy politics of Westminster means the establishment needs to do much better at engaging citizens. But I don't think it matters, because young people aren't sitting around waiting for that. They are taking matters into their own hands and creating movements; they are getting listened to whether politicians like it or not.
Mohamed, Marwaha and Necati – and the countless other young people doing politics on their own terms and in their own way – show us that the future is bright. They are fearless, idealistic and – crucially – speaking for themselves. This is more powerful than you think.
