I'm disappointed that college campuses (and the rest of the country) were so complacent about our two wars last decade compared to their reactions to Vietnam. And while OWS was certainly a thing, it didn't last long. Have young Americans lost their activist spirit? edit: relevant
The lack of a draft most likely massively reduced pressure in comparison to the Vietnam War. Also, the Civil Rights protests helped give a framework for the anti-war movement to work within.
Perhaps this is one of the downsides to the Internet. It seems that by clicking on an icon to support a petition people feel like they've accomplished some sort of civic duty. I suppose this is similar to people signing petitions in person, but when you sign a petition in person you are often conscripted to join a cause in person. There's an old saying, "you sell belly to belly", meaning face to face. It is not enough to start an online petition or an online movement to actually affect change, it needs to happen belly to belly. That is what I think is missing.
OWS was also dramatically unfocused. Its not that the youth is any more complacent, its that the people who used to protest are the ones in the government. So they set about learning a few things from the war; not letting journalists have unlimited access to things, strict control of information, etc. The bad things come out gradually; we hear things about some kids getting shot, but I mean hey, WMDs right? Gotta kill that evil dictator. Awesome. Oh, there's torture? Well I mean. That's not good. Oh they punished the three people involved, awesome. Hey, more civilian deaths? That's pretty bad guys. Give people bad news slowly and they get used to it. All you need to do is distract them long enough until what is occurring becomes every day, and from that point on you can basically do whatever. Shit, drone strikes? We've already killed or displaced so many people either directly or indirectly that a few drone strikes here or there don't even register on my moral radar. We'd need to nuke a country for people to take notice.