Most of the electorate doesn't, and not like the worn partisan joke.
Look at any mainstream candidate's website and how they talk about issues. They never go into the depth and complexity of a problem; they just make it a talking point. Any informed voter would read these high-level blurbs and think this candidate has no idea how things actually work. Yet they somehow win.
Candidates dumb down policy discussion for voters because it wins elections.
> My instinct is to think that 16 year olds generally don't have the maturity to make these kinds of decisions.
My instinct is that people who are 40+ and who are financially secure shouldn't be voting either, because they will likely vote for tax breaks for the rich, and other things that help make their unsustainable lifestyle even easier/lazier.
It's a fair use of their vote if those are the issues most important to them. You can't disenfranchise people because they oppose your interests, not in a democracy.
On the other hand take something like Brexit, that went into effect well after the referendum on it. There are a significant amount of people who would have opposed/supported it who were 18 when it went into effect but not when it was voted on.
Given they will inherit the mess being created now, I think the only moral choice is to allow 16 year olds to vote so they have a say in the future and ban anyone over about 65 or 75 from voting.
They’re retired, not paying taxes and will not live long enough to fully reap the results of their vote. Society is not theirs anymore.
People keep saying this like the American voting public is dumb. They (I am a US citizen) knew exactly what they were getting and wanted it. They would rather suffer as long as they “own the libs”, have a government that is hostile to non straight, non White people and Isreal is protected so Jesus will have some place to come back to (no exaggeration).
No I don’t have a personal opinion on Isreal either way. I don’t know enough and I’m sure there is more nuance than I’m aware of.
They would rather suffer as long as they “own the libs”, have a government that is hostile to non straight, non White people and Isreal is protected so Jesus will have some place to come back to (no exaggeration).
Exactly. And that doesn't qualify as "dumb" in your book?
If you are going to use the inherit argumenT, then why not 14 or 9?
I keep hearing that the human adult brain is still growing and changing until they are 24. It almost makes more sense to raise the age.
Most 18 year olds have not held a job, ran a hose hold, had a kid, managed other people, lives on their own, bought a house, or even own a car. But yes for the sake of “the will inherit” we should allow people with a childlike understanding of the world to sway votes of emotion void of logic.
There is a case of lowering the max age. As they could potentially sway votes for only ultra short term reasons.
The whole point here is to get young people involved and have them feel they actually have a say and the ability to steer the ship away from the rocks it is about to slam into.
> If you are going to use the inherit argumenT, then why not 14 or 9?
It's a good question. It doesn't seem correct, but I can't find any argument for having it at 16 or 18 or 21 that doesn't also apply for having it at 14 or 9 either. But having it at 25 or 30 based on development smacks of disenfranchisement and eg jim crow literacy laws.
It's not a question I think we can get a satisfying answer for through a scientific-medical model. An 18 year old is still developing, but is also still capable of making informed decisions. So to a lesser extent, is a 16 year old, and to an even lesser extent a 9 year old. And adults who for any reason are less intellectually sophisticated still have the right to vote, which again is a matter of societal values not medicine.
Looking at cultures through history, the timing of transition from childhood to adulthood, the rituals that mark it, the responsibilities that accrue with it, that's really what we're talking about here. The age varies quite a bit across time and place (and different groups may have different reasons for placing it where they have settled on, as do we) but 14-20 probably catches the majority of when most people would consider this change to have taken place. And 16-18 may be pretty much the median? I don't want to assert it too strongly but probably anything within these ranges is "fine" with certain tradeoffs one way or another.
> But having it at 25 or 30 based on development smacks of disenfranchisement and eg jim crow literacy laws.
Nobody said they would have a test based system. Fairly sure we uniformly say brains are not fully developed until 24. So your Jim Crow comment is unfounded, at best as a misunderstanding or at worst an attempt to throw race into a conversation to try and strengthen your position with past atrocities void logic.
Well, are people with medically arrested development given the franchise under this system? Developmental delays and learning disorders? At what age, how severe, who decides, etc. Is the franchise removed from people with dementia? Traumatic brain injury? Who pays the doctor that decides? There is so much to figure out & manage here with very high stakes.
We've landed at universal suffrage for a whole host of historical reasons, yes including past atrocities but also just as a way to avoid all those questions above. I didn't "throw race into" this; when discussing who may be permitted to vote it is already there whether you want to acknowledge it or not. Defining "universal" remains fraught significantly but not only because of that, and age remains the only exclusion. Maybe with good reason, maybe not.
Because the number of senile/crazy people voting is a tiny percentage. The 16-17 year old block is potentially much larger, and might actually swing an election.
I share the opinion of many here that almost all those below 18 are too ill-informed, poorly educated, and immature to deserve a vote. They'd be easily propagandized and peer-pressured into voting poorly. That's not to say that many 18 and older don't fall into the same category, but we don't need a new large group like that.
Agreed. Feels like it would be rather wise to figure out a generally agreed upon upper and lower limit, and snip it on both ends.
But we both know that every party will accuse the other of cheating, voter disenfranchisement, possibly even racism, based on how each age bloc votes. Seem's in the US at least, we're probably stuck with what we have.
"There's already a forest fire across the road, so nobody will care if I toss a cigarette out on this side" is the sort of idea I might have embraced myself... at 16.
It’s not like most 16yos will vote. Getting them engaged is a good thing.
Who among them will? I’d guess the most engaged and the most based (for lack of a better word), so probably not much difference from the current electorate, except that youth skews left.
That's one of those time-honored political truisms that turns out to be based on... not much of anything. Trump made massive inroads with younger voters this time around.
It's all about outreach (and, in the US, Christian youth evangelism.) It's the stated goal of the American right(1) to dismantle public education precisely for that purpose.
Good point, thank you. Maybe youth skews towards breaking the wheel. In any case, younger voters are not going to destroy democracy. They’re just another group to be swayed to Pokémon Go to the polls.
> lowered levels of voter maturity isn't the answer.
In the US, I can see letting 16 year olds vote bring up the average level of "maturity". Older voters brains have been too cooked by watching decades of Fox News.
As a USian I can't say anything about the UK, but here, apathy seems to be at least a big a problem as immaturity. We re-elected a traitorous felon because people couldn't be bothered to vote for a candidate who didn't "inspire them."
At some point we have to decide whether democracy is a means to an end -- a stable, peaceful, prosperous, just, and exemplary society -- or an end in itself. Lowering the voting age certainly serves the latter goal.
This is for general elections in the UK overall. Scotland lowered the voting age to 16 for Scottish elections in 2016 (appropriately!) and Wales for Welsh elections in 2020.
Both countries failed to fall apart from this measure :)
You must be 18 in the UK for getting a tattoo, buying alcohol, watching porn, purchasing cigarettes, using a sunbed or being tried as an adult. Why would they lower the voting age to 16?
There was some talk a few years ago in the country where I live to lower the voting age. That talk was mostly driven by the parties that would benefit the most from a younger electorate. It had nothing to do with “democracy”.
On the one hand, it’s their future. On the other hand, a fully developed prefrontal cortex is handy in order to make it a good future. On the third hand, that’s still no guarantee against people voting against their own self-interest.
I don't think this is a good idea, but it's fun to toy with the idea of weighting votes by life expectancy, maybe with intellectual maturity as a second factor. It's interesting that the vote of someone who has a handful of years left counts the same as someone who has to live with the consequences of the election.
It will be interesting to see how electioneering adjusts to encompass this now important demographic that has massively different priorities than even 18 years olds.
As I have gotten older, I have come to believe that the current voting age is already too young. I thought I was right about things when I was 18, but with more experience I realise how naive I was.
Thrilled Labour actually followed through on this. Especially as the population ages we need some balance to the hordes of retirees voting right so they can keep their oversized homes and ludicrous triple lock at the expense of young people.
My instinct is to think that 16 year olds generally don't have the maturity to make these kinds of decisions.
At the same time I'm not sure their choices would be any less intelligent or mature compared to the current crop of voters.
Most of the electorate doesn't, and not like the worn partisan joke.
Look at any mainstream candidate's website and how they talk about issues. They never go into the depth and complexity of a problem; they just make it a talking point. Any informed voter would read these high-level blurbs and think this candidate has no idea how things actually work. Yet they somehow win.
Candidates dumb down policy discussion for voters because it wins elections.
> My instinct is to think that 16 year olds generally don't have the maturity to make these kinds of decisions.
My instinct is that people who are 40+ and who are financially secure shouldn't be voting either, because they will likely vote for tax breaks for the rich, and other things that help make their unsustainable lifestyle even easier/lazier.
It's a fair use of their vote if those are the issues most important to them. You can't disenfranchise people because they oppose your interests, not in a democracy.
My only point was that they probably make as stupid decisions at 16 year olds, so if they are allowed, 16-year olds should be allowed to vote as well.
On the other hand take something like Brexit, that went into effect well after the referendum on it. There are a significant amount of people who would have opposed/supported it who were 18 when it went into effect but not when it was voted on.
The young were always going to be the big victims of Brexit, so excluding them from the referendum was disgusting.
Given they will inherit the mess being created now, I think the only moral choice is to allow 16 year olds to vote so they have a say in the future and ban anyone over about 65 or 75 from voting. They’re retired, not paying taxes and will not live long enough to fully reap the results of their vote. Society is not theirs anymore.
I'm not convinced voters are good at voting for their own interests anyway.
People keep saying this like the American voting public is dumb. They (I am a US citizen) knew exactly what they were getting and wanted it. They would rather suffer as long as they “own the libs”, have a government that is hostile to non straight, non White people and Isreal is protected so Jesus will have some place to come back to (no exaggeration).
No I don’t have a personal opinion on Isreal either way. I don’t know enough and I’m sure there is more nuance than I’m aware of.
They would rather suffer as long as they “own the libs”, have a government that is hostile to non straight, non White people and Isreal is protected so Jesus will have some place to come back to (no exaggeration).
Exactly. And that doesn't qualify as "dumb" in your book?
Dumb implies lack of knowledge and is being a little too generous. It’s malicious.
Well I think guiding your life choices based on whatever imaginary being you grew up believing in is “dumb”. But that’s just me…
If you are going to use the inherit argumenT, then why not 14 or 9?
I keep hearing that the human adult brain is still growing and changing until they are 24. It almost makes more sense to raise the age.
Most 18 year olds have not held a job, ran a hose hold, had a kid, managed other people, lives on their own, bought a house, or even own a car. But yes for the sake of “the will inherit” we should allow people with a childlike understanding of the world to sway votes of emotion void of logic.
There is a case of lowering the max age. As they could potentially sway votes for only ultra short term reasons.
18 is arbitrary anyway.
The whole point here is to get young people involved and have them feel they actually have a say and the ability to steer the ship away from the rocks it is about to slam into.
> If you are going to use the inherit argumenT, then why not 14 or 9?
It's a good question. It doesn't seem correct, but I can't find any argument for having it at 16 or 18 or 21 that doesn't also apply for having it at 14 or 9 either. But having it at 25 or 30 based on development smacks of disenfranchisement and eg jim crow literacy laws.
It's not a question I think we can get a satisfying answer for through a scientific-medical model. An 18 year old is still developing, but is also still capable of making informed decisions. So to a lesser extent, is a 16 year old, and to an even lesser extent a 9 year old. And adults who for any reason are less intellectually sophisticated still have the right to vote, which again is a matter of societal values not medicine.
Looking at cultures through history, the timing of transition from childhood to adulthood, the rituals that mark it, the responsibilities that accrue with it, that's really what we're talking about here. The age varies quite a bit across time and place (and different groups may have different reasons for placing it where they have settled on, as do we) but 14-20 probably catches the majority of when most people would consider this change to have taken place. And 16-18 may be pretty much the median? I don't want to assert it too strongly but probably anything within these ranges is "fine" with certain tradeoffs one way or another.
> But having it at 25 or 30 based on development smacks of disenfranchisement and eg jim crow literacy laws.
Nobody said they would have a test based system. Fairly sure we uniformly say brains are not fully developed until 24. So your Jim Crow comment is unfounded, at best as a misunderstanding or at worst an attempt to throw race into a conversation to try and strengthen your position with past atrocities void logic.
Well, are people with medically arrested development given the franchise under this system? Developmental delays and learning disorders? At what age, how severe, who decides, etc. Is the franchise removed from people with dementia? Traumatic brain injury? Who pays the doctor that decides? There is so much to figure out & manage here with very high stakes.
We've landed at universal suffrage for a whole host of historical reasons, yes including past atrocities but also just as a way to avoid all those questions above. I didn't "throw race into" this; when discussing who may be permitted to vote it is already there whether you want to acknowledge it or not. Defining "universal" remains fraught significantly but not only because of that, and age remains the only exclusion. Maybe with good reason, maybe not.
If the senile and the crazy can vote, why not 16-year-olds?
You did not read my comment. I called out a case for limiting the upper ends, but I guess your emotions responded.
Because the number of senile/crazy people voting is a tiny percentage. The 16-17 year old block is potentially much larger, and might actually swing an election.
I share the opinion of many here that almost all those below 18 are too ill-informed, poorly educated, and immature to deserve a vote. They'd be easily propagandized and peer-pressured into voting poorly. That's not to say that many 18 and older don't fall into the same category, but we don't need a new large group like that.
If the senile and the crazy can vote, why not 16-year-olds?
But they can be trusted to be behind the wheel of a 2 ton car going 70+ mph?
It’s just like an 18 year old can be drafted, legally carry a weapon, but not drink in the US (even though many do).
> ... their choices would be any less ...
Particularly at the top end - where myriad medical issues make competent, informed voting virtually impossible for many.
Agreed. Feels like it would be rather wise to figure out a generally agreed upon upper and lower limit, and snip it on both ends.
But we both know that every party will accuse the other of cheating, voter disenfranchisement, possibly even racism, based on how each age bloc votes. Seem's in the US at least, we're probably stuck with what we have.
True. But I'd love to see the reactions, if disenfranchising the elderly was proposed as a pro-natalist measure.
> My instinct is to think that 16 year olds generally don't have the maturity to make these kinds of decisions.
Well _my_ instinct is to think that anyone who disagrees with me is equally unable to decide, grampa.
You don't need "instinct." We have peer-reviewed, highly-reproducible scientific studies on brain development.
We also have similar for age-related decline. My dad is facing vascular dementia at 90.
If the senile and the crazy can vote, why not 16-year-olds?
"There's already a forest fire across the road, so nobody will care if I toss a cigarette out on this side" is the sort of idea I might have embraced myself... at 16.
Agreed on both points. Whatever is going wrong in society these days, lowered levels of voter maturity isn't the answer.
That's not an old man's opinion, but a former 16-year-old's.
It’s not like most 16yos will vote. Getting them engaged is a good thing.
Who among them will? I’d guess the most engaged and the most based (for lack of a better word), so probably not much difference from the current electorate, except that youth skews left.
except that youth skews left.
That's one of those time-honored political truisms that turns out to be based on... not much of anything. Trump made massive inroads with younger voters this time around.
It's all about outreach (and, in the US, Christian youth evangelism.) It's the stated goal of the American right(1) to dismantle public education precisely for that purpose.
1: https://civilrights.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Project-2...
Good point, thank you. Maybe youth skews towards breaking the wheel. In any case, younger voters are not going to destroy democracy. They’re just another group to be swayed to Pokémon Go to the polls.
> lowered levels of voter maturity isn't the answer.
In the US, I can see letting 16 year olds vote bring up the average level of "maturity". Older voters brains have been too cooked by watching decades of Fox News.
As a USian I can't say anything about the UK, but here, apathy seems to be at least a big a problem as immaturity. We re-elected a traitorous felon because people couldn't be bothered to vote for a candidate who didn't "inspire them."
At some point we have to decide whether democracy is a means to an end -- a stable, peaceful, prosperous, just, and exemplary society -- or an end in itself. Lowering the voting age certainly serves the latter goal.
This is for general elections in the UK overall. Scotland lowered the voting age to 16 for Scottish elections in 2016 (appropriately!) and Wales for Welsh elections in 2020.
Both countries failed to fall apart from this measure :)
No they voted for him because he was and still is giving them exactly what they want. He is very much a reflection of a large part of America.
You must be 18 in the UK for getting a tattoo, buying alcohol, watching porn, purchasing cigarettes, using a sunbed or being tried as an adult. Why would they lower the voting age to 16?
There was some talk a few years ago in the country where I live to lower the voting age. That talk was mostly driven by the parties that would benefit the most from a younger electorate. It had nothing to do with “democracy”.
On the one hand, it’s their future. On the other hand, a fully developed prefrontal cortex is handy in order to make it a good future. On the third hand, that’s still no guarantee against people voting against their own self-interest.
I don't think this is a good idea, but it's fun to toy with the idea of weighting votes by life expectancy, maybe with intellectual maturity as a second factor. It's interesting that the vote of someone who has a handful of years left counts the same as someone who has to live with the consequences of the election.
It will be interesting to see how electioneering adjusts to encompass this now important demographic that has massively different priorities than even 18 years olds.
This seems like a good thing to me.
As I have gotten older, I have come to believe that the current voting age is already too young. I thought I was right about things when I was 18, but with more experience I realise how naive I was.
Thrilled Labour actually followed through on this. Especially as the population ages we need some balance to the hordes of retirees voting right so they can keep their oversized homes and ludicrous triple lock at the expense of young people.
Now where’s the age cap?
I think only people that pay taxes should be able to vote.