If there was a referendum on the ballot this Nov 2nd saying

Quote :

"[i]The voting age shall be changed to 16 ( ) For ( ) Against"

How would you vote?

10/29/2010 2:24:54 AM

Supplanter is the ReceiveDeath/BubbleBobble of The Soap Box.

10/29/2010 2:37:24 AM

If I was the BB of TSB it'd look more like this:

10/29/2010 2:41:18 AM

10/29/2010 2:41:39 AM

Okay, I think I've made my point.

10/29/2010 2:42:05 AM

Against.

10/29/2010 3:00:19 AM

While I do think that many 16-year-olds can be impressionable and still stuck blindly following (or blindly rebelling against) the ideologies of their parents, there are plenty of people 18+ who are just as gullible or thoughtless...

So, I'm indifferent. I don't think adding those two extra years of voting age would make a difference, in the long run. With our current political climate, it'd likely add to the liberal/Democratic vote somewhat, but ultimately I don't see it having a big influence.

10/29/2010 3:08:48 AM

How about a voting age maximum?

I can reasonably assert that voters 65 or older are WAY off.
And why should someone about to die have much say anyway?
Seriously.
Think about it:
If a large majority of the supporters of any particular issue are 65 or older, what does that say?

10/29/2010 3:50:28 AM

Voter age maximum eh? I could see how older voters might tend to push more social conservatism, or maybe care less for the environment since they wont be experiencing it much longer or maybe push for more entitlement programs for the elderly. And I could maybe see that older voters get to vote for as long as they live, and younger people can't vote (& tend to take a while to get into the habit of voting even when they can), which maybe biases election results in a way that negatively impacts younger people who don't get a say. Maybe having slightly younger voting could balance against this?

One of my professors said that when he was working for the EPA or considering working for them, I forget which, said that in doing their cost benefit analyses they tried to not use a one size fits all value of a statistical life, but instead use an age appropriate one that would treat young, middle aged, and older people differently. But older people protested, maybe it was the AARP that led the protest, b/c they saw it as old people's lives being less valued. In so doing they forced the EPA to overvalue things that older people wouldn't get as much benefit out of, and in a way shot themselves in the foot.

http://www.2pass.co.uk/ages2.htm
Driving ages: 14/15/16 depending on state. In some ways that is taking your own life, and others, in your hands.

http://usmilitary.about.com/od/joiningthemilitary/a/enlage.htm
"the minimum age for enlistment in the United States Military is 17 (with parental consent)"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_consent
"Close-in-age—while most legislation dealing with age of consent sets a single age under which sexual relations are illegal, some jurisdictions (such as Canada[11]), have adopted close-in-age exemptions. In Canada the age of consent is 16, but there are two close-in-age exemptions: teenagers who are 14 or 15 may have sex with a partner who is less than five years older, and children aged 12 and 13 may have sex with a partner who is less than two years older. In the United States, these exceptions are colloquially known as "Romeo and Juliet" laws."

There are a number of precedents in the United States for taking on greater responsibility for your own life and decisions at various younger ages than 18. I don't have strong feelings either way at the moment, just wondering. Maybe it'd engage people in civic involvement more if it was 17, so that serious consideration of voting would begin to happen earlier and/or more rigorously.

10/29/2010 4:47:14 AM

for

10/29/2010 7:30:34 AM

We should at least have a maximum age for Senators. I can't figure out why people still elected Byrd and Thurmond when they were well over 90.

10/29/2010 7:46:56 AM

I think you guys are digging too deep into age-based discrimination with this min/max voting age thing.

To me it might make sense to allow someone to vote as long as they are not listed as a dependant on anyone else's tax returns.


Side joke - lets bring back the 3/5ths compromise for youth voters

10/29/2010 10:45:53 AM

Quote :

"To me it might make sense to allow someone to vote as long as they are not listed as a dependant on anyone else's tax returns."

Ooh, after that could we restrict it to landowners and heads of households? Because, you know, tax returns and financial stability are totally the best ways to gauge that sort of thing.

10/29/2010 10:48:31 AM

for, because it would be beneficial to the party I generally agree with.

10/29/2010 11:05:15 AM

Quote :

"To me it might make sense to allow someone to vote as long as they are not listed as a dependant on anyone else's tax returns."

Why do you hate housewives?

I could see 17. I've always felt there's no reason that someone in the military shouldn't have the full range of benefits of being a citizen. Voting, smoking, gambling, alcohol. If you're willing to be shot at for the country you should at least have a vote in who's going to be shooting at you, and it'd be easier to extend voting to all 17 year olds than just to those who are enlisted.

10/29/2010 11:07:44 AM

Almost as good of idea as going Starship Troopers and having it so only military and former military can vote.

10/29/2010 11:09:45 AM

for

10/29/2010 11:38:20 AM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiBCRQL58_k

10/29/2010 11:39:24 AM

I think anyone, regardless of age, should have to pass a basic test on what their voting for. For instance a random multiple choice test that asks "What is Candidate A's stance on gay marriage?"

I think voting should be a privilege, not a right. Maybe I am biased, but I really don't think some idiot who has absolutely no idea what they are voting for should have their vote counted against someone who does their research and actually knows a little bit about the issues and what they are voting for.

For instance, my mother-in-law swears up and down that "she is a democrat". Yet the majority of the time, she has no idea what Obama (nor any of the state democrats) stance is on any of the major topics. But yet she goes to the voting booth and fills in the circle for every democratic candidate every election.

10/29/2010 2:56:34 PM

against

10/29/2010 2:59:20 PM

against

but it would be nice to have some kind of exemption for 17-year-olds in the military.

10/29/2010 3:09:07 PM

^^Would you offer your voter tests in more than one language?

10/29/2010 3:10:43 PM

move the voting/military service/whatever age to 25.

10/29/2010 3:18:40 PM

Against. Voting age should be aligned with the age where a young person is considered a legal adult by the law.

Quote :

"How about a voting age maximum?"

The problem is that once you start setting these sorts of guidelines for adults on who can vote, it becomes very easy to come up with other reasons. So-and-so didn't go to the right school, didn't take a civics course, didn't serve in the military, has a criminal record, failed a drug test, wrong sexual orientation, wrong gender, wrong race, not landed gentry, wrong ideology, etc.

In a magical, ideal world we would have some sort of means to discriminate who is intelligent and mature enough to vote. However, we don't live in such a world; we instead live in a world where you cannot quantitatively measure such things, and even if you could, there is a broad range of conflicting factors to use for such a metric. Since we can't determine what a "good voter" is, we have to do the next best thing which is to allow all direct stakeholders, citizens, the opportunity to cast their ballot even if they believe in things we consider irrational and idiotic.

Similar to the whole "best government" argument. Ideal government is run by a benevolent dictator, but since you can't decide on what makes a dictator "benevolent" and have no way of guaranteeing said dictator would be or stay that way, we have to settle on the mob, our democratic society, which at least ensures that a change in leadership doesn't involve violent bloodshed.

10/29/2010 3:28:18 PM

Quote :

"^^Would you offer your voter tests in more than one language?"

Good question.

Since the US has no official language there would obviously need to be some kind of way to communicate with anyone who is allowed to legally vote. So perhaps making the test available in English and Spanish (and maybe other languages depending on the area), and if they spoke another language, allow a translator.

10/29/2010 3:42:41 PM

Quote :

"move the voting/military service/whatever age to 25."

We would have serious issues keeping the military manned if the minimum age was 25.

10/29/2010 3:44:23 PM

You know, age is really such an arbitrary measure to use. There are 75 year olds out there that are probably more articulate and well informed than anyone here. There are 35 year olds that are unbelievably ignorant. the specific number of times the earth has orbited the sun while the person in question has been alive is not the concern I have.

My primary concern is that certain individuals suffer from an intellectual disconnect between their votes and the longterm consequences of their votes. This is mostly due to a lack of education in the areas of history, government, and market processes. Ideally, only informed voters would vote. A test for voting seems very undemocratic, though. My solution would be to remove all age restrictions on voting, but to completely redo the ballots. The ballot would be write-in only (as someone on here recently suggested). The only thing on the ballot would be blank fields. You'd have "House Representative for the 4th district of North Carolina: __________" or "President of the United States: _________".

I suspect people would argue that such a ballot would reduce voter turn out. I agree that it would, but I don't view it as a negative consequence. Voting turnout, as a percentage, is commonly used as a metric to rank countries, with a higher percentage equating to a more democratic system. I don't agree with that. If 95% get out and vote, but 40% of those people are just picking candidates because of the letter next to their name, I don't think any of us are better off. What I'd really like to see is some requirement for voters to actually prove that they know someone about the candidate, but I'm unsure of how that could fairly be implemented, or how the ballots could be fairly counted. If a twelve year old can walk into a voting booth and write down the name of the candidate and why they're voting for them, they should be allowed to have a say in how the system (which they're forced to participate in) is run.

10/29/2010 4:52:55 PM

I think the big flaw there is that any 12 year old who could do that is most likely simply repeating the opinions of his teachers/parents/etc.

10/29/2010 6:56:03 PM

No taxation without representation no representation without taxation

10/29/2010 7:33:43 PM

^Does a 17 year old, working at a fast food restaurant, and buying their 3D movie tickets or silly bands, or whatever the devil kids are into these days, not pay any taxes?

10/29/2010 8:16:07 PM

Then you better be willing and able then to extend the other rights and obligations of adulthood on children of whatever age it is you extend the right to vote to.

[Edited on October 29, 2010 at 8:27 PM. Reason : .]

10/29/2010 8:26:46 PM

^^as long as he/she is paying income tax and all other normal taxes

10/29/2010 8:31:21 PM

^^Which rights would we need to extend if we changed it to 17?

10/29/2010 9:05:16 PM

Quote :

"I think the big flaw there is that any 12 year old who could do that is most likely simply repeating the opinions of his teachers/parents/etc"

Most adults are the same way. I knew more about American politics when I was 14 than most adults I meet on a daily basis. And, when I was legally able to work at age 15, I could even be taxed.


[Edited on October 29, 2010 at 10:12 PM. Reason : ]

10/29/2010 9:50:27 PM

^also many a child has very independent thoughts, although they can shift more easily too, like I used to be a hard-core conservative atheist (like a young S. E. Cupp), and then I became some combination of a commie and a Bible-thumper (only without the Bible), and after I came to value freedom higher than security, retributive justice, or deference to authority (and after I started reading about economics late in high school), I self-identified as a "libertarian" once I looked up that term I had briefly heard about 6 years earlier, even though I still considered progressive taxation to be right and just.
As I learned more about the variety of ways in which communal action is actually better than individual action (like common infrastructure, adverse selection in things like used cars and non-mandated insurance, and standards of weights, measures, and quality of food and medicine) and how individual behaviors end up perpetuating racial inequalities in housing and employment, my self-imagined libertarianism developed several exceptions; then when I watched Sicko and saw how insurance companies routinely cherry-picked people and dumped them for the most bullshit reasons right when they actually had to pay out claims, I firmly joined the single-payer crowd (after earlier having posted "Why do you hate freedom?" in response to someone advocating it), thought it intellectually dishonest to still call myself a libertarian, and took an identity as a liberal.

10/29/2010 10:50:38 PM

have y'all tried to hold a conversation with a 16 year old lately?



AGAINST!

10/29/2010 10:55:26 PM

against, % of voters that are 18 vs population is very low, lowest of all the age demographics (48%) all you would be doing is diluting the voting pool more with additional repeat votes, un-informed votes, as well as making the US voting process look even less involved by % of voting population participating

10/30/2010 12:10:53 AM

If you think they are responsible enough to vote at 16, then why are liberals trying to get the age of juvenile court raised to 18 from 16? If they aren't responsible enough to pay the price for their actions like adults, join the military, or fuck whoever they want, then they certainly aren't old enough to vote for who they want. And in that case, insurance companies should be able to require 16 year olds to prove they are in school full-time to keep their insurance from their parents, if that's the premise you are going with.

99% of kids at 16 are too busy with school, social lives, etc. to care to be informed about elections. Their voting would be based off their parents and teachers. I have always been extremely interested in voting, and made sure I was informed about the candidates on my own, and have voted in every election that has happened since i was 18. But even I at 16 would have been voting more on what mom and dad and teachers said than any actual opinion I head formed about the candidates from my own research.

10/31/2010 8:29:39 AM

Quote :

"Their voting would be based off their parents and teachers."

This.

At 16, I thought I was a pro-life Democrat.


(I'm actually a pro-choice Libertarian... :america: )

10/31/2010 10:58:31 AM

Quote :

"I think the big flaw there is that any 12 year old who could do that is most likely simply repeating the opinions of his teachers/parents/etc."

Reminds me of an Onion article set after women got the right to vote that predicted no change in electoral demographics and that everyone's vote count would just double since wives would obviously just go along with whoever their husband was voting for.

10/31/2010 11:12:09 AM

^
Does it remind you of that because you think grow women have the wisdom and intelligence of a child?
No?...so what's the relevance? We're talking about children, not women.

10/31/2010 11:27:13 AM

Quote :

"Does it remind you of that because you think grow women have the wisdom and intelligence of a child? No?...so what's the relevance? We're talking about children, not women."

Wisdom and intelligence is not what allows one to cast an informed vote. Even smart people can be fooled by slick politicians who say one thing and do another. A person has to be willing to educate themselves on what the candidate stands for and what their track record is.

A 16 year old is not a child. We have met 16 year olds that are incredibly knowledgeable about politics and history. We're not living in an age where learning is limited to the classroom. Anyone armed with Google and Wikipedia is capable of learning a great deal. It's anecdotal, but I know it's true - I was more informed at the age of 16 than most 18 year olds, and probably most voters period. In addition, my views at that time did not resemble a carbon copy of my parents' views. We disagreed on a number of things. But, even if I was just parroting the things my parents told me, that's no different than many voter blocks now. How many people have you heard say, "Well, my family always voted Democrat, and I still vote Democrat." Or the other way around. For some, politics is more like a sport that can be talked about around the dinner table than it is a subject of any real consequence.

[Edited on October 31, 2010 at 12:42 PM. Reason : ]

10/31/2010 12:41:22 PM

There is no way 16 year olds should be allowed to vote all it does is add to the unemployed trashy liberal population who is voting for pizza for lunch and free vending machines in the cafeteria. We have enough of those clowns in the general election.

How about if you didn't pay federal taxes in the past 2 years you get no vote on federal elections, and if you didnt pay state taxes in the past 2 years you get no vote on state elections?

Wouldn't that bring us closer to our desired goal of not letting the trash in this country bring us down further?

10/31/2010 12:49:47 PM

^I like it

10/31/2010 1:16:03 PM

^^obvious bigot is obvious

10/31/2010 1:18:56 PM

Quote :

"^^Which rights would we need to extend if we changed it to 17?"

All rights of adulthood minus the access to alcohol.

10/31/2010 5:04:06 PM

Quote :

"Against. Voting age should be aligned with the age where a young person is considered a legal adult by the law."

same here... personally, i think drinking age should also be 18, but that's a whole 'nother can of worms... as is driving, although much of that is currently worked out due to liability with parents/etc

if legal adult is 3 1/2 then voting age is 3 1/2

10/31/2010 5:40:55 PM

^This.

Either a person is an adult or they aren't. If 18 is when you're a grown up, then you get everything associated with adulthood at 18. Driving, as you've alluded to, is different; it isn't associated with adulthood, nor is it necessarily a right.

And I'm opposed to lowering the voting age. I would have loved to have voted at sixteen (though that would have been in 2001, so all I really missed was lopsided midterm election), but I'd gladly have given up the right to keep it from the masses.

Think about it: if you're in high school, odds are you've got a fairly narrow set of issues that concern you, and odds are a lot of those issues don't really concern anybody else. In a way, face has a point -- any candidate who offers better school lunches, less restrictions on teen driving, or easier curricula is going to get a sixteen year old's attention regardless of whether the rest of their policies are good or bad. In terms of education policy you start giving the lunatics a say in how to run the asylum. Couple students' desire to not have to do shit with teachers unions' desire to not have to do shit and you're going to end up with an educational system that doesn't do shit (assuming, of course, it's doing shit now).

Quote :

"I can reasonably assert that voters 65 or older are WAY off."

No, you can't. At best you can reasonably assert that they vote differently than you do.

Quote :

"And why should someone about to die have much say anyway?"

We should probably start stripping the rights off of people with cancer, too. I'm also glad that you can predict with such accuracy how long a person will live. A 65-year old might reasonably expect to live for another twenty years, and could hope for forty.

Quote :

"If a large majority of the supporters of any particular issue are 65 or older, what does that say?"

Probably that it impacts them, just like with anything else. Legislation affecting older people will continue to exist and they should have a say in it. What purpose in complaining about people with a vested interest in an outcome working to support it?

[Edited on October 31, 2010 at 8:26 PM. Reason : ]

10/31/2010 8:20:29 PM

Quote :

"Think about it: if you're in high school, odds are you've got a fairly narrow set of issues that concern you, and odds are a lot of those issues don't really concern anybody else. In a way, face has a point -- any candidate who offers better school lunches, less restrictions on teen driving, or easier curricula is going to get a sixteen year old's attention regardless of whether the rest of their policies are good or bad. In terms of education policy you start giving the lunatics a say in how to run the asylum. Couple students' desire to not have to do shit with teachers unions' desire to not have to do shit and you're going to end up with an educational system that doesn't do shit (assuming, of course, it's doing shit now)."

I don't disagree with the actual issue, but the argument you are making here could be used to deny voting rights to any other minority. I would stick with the "non-adults have less rights because they are not fully developed" rather than "a minority will vote to serve it's own interests".

10/31/2010 8:51:41 PM

This seems like a troll thread. Kids are fucking stupid -- nothing more needs to be said.

10/31/2010 9:07:58 PM