16 Year olds to vote?

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/fed...-to-16-says-bill-shorten-20151030-gkmy9o.html

Labor is proposing the voting age be lowered to 16. What do you think?

 

At 16 most teens dont know what they want to do in a days time let alone what they want a govt to do

 

Sure, why not.
What difference does it make?
Our short term governments achieve nothing regardless of who is voted in.
We could even do it with a dial-up number.
SMS 'SHORTEN' to 1800 ALL LIARS

 

Voted to raise the age and if I had my way there'd be a test to pass too.

If we want more intelligent decisions from parliament then it follows we need from intelligent decisions from voting public as well.

 

Until I was 23 or so I was usually still hung over/drunk to make such adult like decisions. I was just there for the snag on bread!
Raise it I say

 

At 16 my daughter could not care less about politics....come to think of it she is like 99% of the population

 

Many 18 year olds are not responsible to vote, just as many 16 year olds are not. Some 16 year olds are more engaged than some 40 year olds. Additionally, 16 year olds are subject to government decisions and legislation and most importantly are required to pay tax if they work. How can it be fair to tax them and take their money without giving them a say in how it is spent?

However, lets look at this for what it really is. A ploy by labor to increase their vote. It isn't exactly a secret that those in that age bracket are much, much more likely to vote to the left of the political spectrum than the right. It's a pretty transparent strategy. This would make a big difference in the marginal seats.

 

What makes you think that?
I think most people 16-18 would either vote for who their family says to, or against whichever party is in at the time. "Damn I hate Poli X, our situation is crap" - regardless of which one is in.

 

Consistent polling over decades. There is a trend towards the right as people age: You will also notice that the conservative parties start to get a swing the day after the election as postal votes come in, as it is the elderly who generally use postal votes.

As for voting against the party in power, this is true. The issue is that the vote tends to go to the left of the governing party. I know that this was thrown around when the ALP was in power for example, but they were too afraid of losing seats to the Greens. This would still be a concern for the ALP.

And yes, many are influenced by their parents, but it's the ones that aren't that overwhelmingly vote to the left of centre, which skews the demographics as a whole in that direction.

And this makes a huge difference in the marginal seats that decide government.

I've been involved in a few campaigns during a previous life.

 

As they get smarter

 

I agree with you Beezlebub. Another factor is the education system - whether teachers mean to or not, there is a lot of left leaning ideology being pushed through our schools. At 16, you are heavily influenced by your teachers.

Note: not saying this is true of all schools or teachers. Basing this on my own experience.

 

It may be, but I don't think it's a given for the policy push by Labor.

 

Yep, I'm now a teacher and I can confirm. It's a very left leaning profession. In a sense I think that teaching does, in a way, need to be left of centre to facilitate critical thinking. For example, my political opinions sit to the right, yet I'm constantly exposing my students to left wing ideas for the purposes of challenging their thinking. The problem is if I'm to the right and doing this what the hell are teachers on the left doing?

I know one history teacher, during a lesson on feudalism, was presenting the idea that our current political system is a feudalist one, complete with diagrams that show bankers at the top of the feudalist pyramid. Had to roll my eyes with that one.

The best was back at uni when one of my fellow teacher students raised objection to images in a poem of a man riding a horse because it was demeaning to animals. It didn't seem to matter that the point of the poem was all about the treatment of indigenous Australian's, her concern was that riding horses is cruel.

 

Oh look! A butterfly. Heaven help her pupils.

No, under 18's shouldn't have the vote - care factor (in most cases) = zero.

 

I'm surprised this hasn't been mentioned yet but I think the key reason why Labor want to lower the age to 16 is to get more votes. Young people tend to vote for Labor.

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I would suggest to the short one that there are probably more pertinent issues that he could latch onto.

 

As mentioned already, just a sad ploy to try bolster left aligned party votes which has been sliding in Australia for years.

Keep it at 18 where rights and responsibilities are fully available to citizens. Anything earlier and we're just increasing the influence of under informed and not engaging fully with the greater community and economy.

Next we just need to get voluntary voting + longer elected terms through and we'll start making progress.

 

I like compulsory voting... I think voluntary voting is the right wing equivalent of lowering the voting age.

Voluntary voting means those apathetic voters won't vote - more likely left voters

 

Compulsory voting means everyone gets a say... But at the same time 3/4 of the country probably aren't fit to vote

 

You could ask 16 year olds to vote but unless it's in an app, I don't think they would want to.