Weep for the Future
Posted by Hazel Stone | Filed under Over The Seas
Ah England, bonny England…you’ve flat lost it. The Labour party wants 16 year olds to vote because they’re generally liberal little barstids and can be counted on to always vote the bread and circuses ticket.
From the, er, horse’s mouth:
Labour backbencher Julie Morgan spent the day in the Commons arguing for the voting age to be lowered from 18 to 16.
“The purpose of the voting age (reduction) bill is straightforward: to reduce the legal voting age to 16 for all public elections across the United Kingdom,” she said.
“That is the only way to engage the young people to whom we desperately need to talk as politicians and the only way to send the message that we really care about the issues that affect those people.
From the sounds of things, you’re not going to even pique the interest of 16 year olds, much less “engage” them, without a bottle of uisghe or a swingin’ cod. People with those sorts of priorities are not in the least bit interested in the political process.
If you lot could un-ossify your brains, you might recall YOUR priorities when you were 16 years old involved transportation, tail, and fundage…and the order of importance depended on the hour of the day.
These are the fine upstanding citizens you wish out there casting votes? No, these are the malleable, suggestable blank slates you wish to train to party standards. Get ‘em while they’re young and impressionable.
“I believe that by involving young people at a younger age we are more likely to involve those in older age groups as well, because people can get into the habit of voting when they are still in schools and institutions.
See? They don’t want thinking voters, they want habit voters. “Oh, this is all too complicated, I’ll just vote Labour and they can sort it out.”
“The longer young people are denied involvement in the formal democratic process, the less chance there is of engaging them ever.”
“…denied involvement…” Waiting two measly years to gain a bit of much-needed emotional maturity is denying involvement? No, stupid, it is simply common sense. Adults surely do become engaged later in life…when they see what a cocked-up mess you troglodytes have made of everything, and move to vote you out of power.
At least those who bother paying attention do.
Tags: (formerly) great britain, death of common sense
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June 12th, 2008
There are times I think 18 is too young to vote these days, and 21 or 25 would be more appropriate.
June 12th, 2008
MRS, I agree with you wholeheartedly. Granted, the draft of 18yo kids when the vote was 21yo was unjust — but 18 is to young and inexperienced to be voting. It says something rather profound (and even sad) that we, as a society, allow voting at 18, but forbid anyone from tossing back a beer until 21.
June 16th, 2008
Nate:
If 18 is too young and inexperienced to make adequate decisions on voting, then surely it is too young to decide you want to strap on a gun and go kill some bad guys as well.
There has to be some age where we declare someone is an “adult.” For each person that time varies, I agree. However, my thinking is that more are likely to act like an adult if we expect it out of them.
June 16th, 2008
StraightDs
Which brings us back to the whole drinking age/military service issue. I’d rather not prefer to think such a system is a good idea, except for the fact that 18 is no longer really the age of majority, what with so many kids continuing to live off of their parents to some degree after the age of 18.
I’m sure we could all dream up all sorts of graduated franchising schemes, and I’ve seen such discussions on other forums.
Me personally, I’d do 18 as the age you can legally be bound to a contract, 20 for drinking, and 22 for voting in federal elections. No exceptions for military service.
BTW, I left home the day after I turned 18. When I turned 13, my father said Happy Birthday, you got 5 years to get your act together. At any time after that day, I could ask my father how long I had left, and he would rattle off the countdown to the hour. When I asked him about staying home after I turned 18, he would say sure, the rent is $100 the first month, $200 the 2nd, $400 the third, $800 the fourth, etc.
So I was a bit motivated to grow up.
June 17th, 2008
I too left home shortly after 18. My parents were not quite so harsh about it, but by that time it was instilled in me that to be a real “man” i.e. “adult”, I would need to go it alone at some time and make my own way. It never would have even occurred to me to stay at my parents house after that. I definitely would have felt bad about it that is for sure. Having said that, they were kind enough to give me enough money to get me through my first semester at a state college, which I am forever grateful. After that it was jobs and loans to get through. Back in the mid- to late-80s that was not too difficult to do, I must say.
Basically I was raised in a similar fashion I would suspect. Sounds like I had a lot more “help” in my walk out the door – but there was no mistake that it was going to happen. There was no way in HELL my old man was going to support an “adult” male under his roof.
I think more young-uns need a kick in the pants. I don’t have children yet, and being that Im currently 40, by the time they are 18 we shall see if I still have the same opinion that I have now.
But on the original topic:
When I was 16 or 18 was I mature enough and interested enough to vote responsibly? No. I was basically a parrot of my parents ideals at the time. Which was extremely right-wing conservative. College turned me the opposite for a time, then I finally became mature enough to form my own opinions which fall somewhere in the middle.
Perhaps the age for voting should be around 35.