Why would anyone think 16 year-olds should be allowed to vote?

[MsAmerica]

Be honest - think back to when you were 16. Did you have an understanding of a broad range of issues? Did you pay serious attention to national news? Okay, even many adults may lapse on the score, but still, it seems crazy to me.

In the U.S., voting age had been 21 and the only reason it was lowered to 18 was that teens were being drafted to fight in Vietnam, and it was felt as unfair for them to have no say.

@SerendipityJane As someone who actually has studied British government and politics, the main parties have been reluctant to look at changing FPTP because it delivers (usually) a clear result and it benefits them. This is because they have constituency strongholds and, until recently, not too many marginals. The marginals are the constituencies that decide what government we get. We also hate horse trading with a vengeance! We look at Germany and Italy and shudder! Not for us we think. Where parties have some support in many constituencies but not enough to win any, their voters are not represented. If Labour don’t watch out, there will be a strong Reform vote in Lsbour strongholds. They won’t feel Labour has benefitted them.

Any other form of voting will involve negotiation and we are too tribal to do it!

Yes that pay thing particularly annoyed me. We don't let new immigrants vote when they pay taxes. Making it about paying in makes that slippery slope for a lot of groups and the wrong argument.

(As a naturalised citizen I can now vote even if I paid plenty of tax before which is how it should be)

I think 18 should stand and pandering to the youth now seems like a form of gerrymandering although it might come back to vote this current party.

Of course, having a child means we will prepare him to be engaged if he will get a vote. And I hope he's not a Reform voter when he's bigger!

@EasternStandard Parties have never cared too hoots about not representing a majority of voters. I’m not sure any party has ever managed this but in the 50s both Labour and Cons came close. In 1951 Labour won the popular vote but got less seats. We are also wedded to Constituences and a mp representing us. We have totally forgotten they are there to be law makers, not just advocates.

Yep I agree. If you do get a majority and a much lower amount of votes the party / politicians will plough on and hold onto it for as long as they can.

Your pp re horse trading is interesting.

Not much has changed, when the voting age for women fell from 30 to 21.

The full thread

The right-wing press is going mad over votes at 16 ("a naked attempt to twist democracy in Labour’s favour", an "election-rigging move"...) Oddly, they said the same 100 years ago when the voting age for women fell from 30 to 21.

Let's revisit the Mail's campaign to"Stop the Flapper Vote Folly"...

https://bsky.app/profile/robertsaunders.bsky.social/post/3lucr7qlrqk2s

I am old enough to remember a lot of epoch changing measures that are now so firmly embedded that no sensible party goes anywhere near the suggestion of changing them.

Starting, arbitrarily at 1967, then legalising homosexuality - not even the loonytunes in Reform are going anywhere near that.

The smoking ban should figure in some peoples memories. Again, despite the howls of anguish at the time, no one seems to be suggesting repealing it.

They aren't necessarily reasons for not debating it, but they certainly suggest taking peoples "outrage" with a small boat load of salt.

@SerendipityJane I have always felt that the 'well, we've always done it this way' argument is the weakest political argument anyone could put forward. The 'status quo is fine' argument was used to deny women the vote, to continue slavery, to keep homosexuality illegal, to keep rape in marriage legal. It's a weak argument that has been used to oppress. And no, not giving 16 and 17 year olds the vote wouldn't be oppression - but using that particular argument is feeble.

Tbf anything that gives a leg up will cause the same. If Reform could get an advantage through some people would react.

Are you me ?😀

Yes, all sorts of inequalities can be maintained - perpetuated even - with the absolute tanker load of bollocks of "we've always done it this way".

One of the reasons the privileged are ambivalent about modern life is the ease with which their carefully constructed house of cards can be blown down. It can be a thing of beauty to whip out documentation to rebut a bland "nobody else has complained" which is often used as a mechanism to avoid change.

The idea is to teach your children to use their own brains, not indoctrinate them to vote the way you want. You might not be as clever as you think you are.

I'm not one of those. I'm fully aware that moving to PR would give parties like Reform many, many more seats in Parliament. But fundamentally, PR is more democratic than FPTP because literally every vote counts. And yes, it leads to horsetrading and negotiation, but I see that as a good thing - you get less of the thing where each government wastes time undoing what the previous one has done, because chances are that some parts of the new government were also in the old government.

And parties like Reform tend to blow themselves up in the end. So far only AfD seems to have escaped that fate - Geert Wilders' PVV has lost a lot of ground, the BBB has all but vanished from the electoral landscape and it's looking very different from the picture at the last GE in the Netherlands (I always vote in Dutch elections).

I think we have a lot in common, including a certain measure of cynicism.

No.... you were very clear..... young people who live at home and dont work/pay rent etc have no clue and don't understand that the Greens will wreck their future prospects.

For sure. I do wonder about some posts on here where people say they’d ‘disown a dc’ for not voting Labour (usually)

Up to a point they’d want PR. Over a percentage and FPTP flips to their advantage.

Over that proportion (30 odd can’t recall) and they’d get a Labour like majority from a similar lower number of votes.

It means the party who gets that separation of votes and majority doesn’t want it to change.

Absolutely, parties make decisions in their own self interest. But that is a disbenefit to overall democracy.

TBH the only person i know who disowned any one, was a Grandfather who did have nothing to do with their Granddaughter because she voted Labour.... lasted about 12months, then he realised what a knob he was being, this back in the days of Kinnock, the Welsh Windbag.

I think nowadays, when there is so little difference between Lab/Con it would happen, they aren't miles apart.

What people say on here about disowning DC may not be RL.......

Have you not learnt yet? I'm just indicating what parents might do....many parents.......

No. You have just interpreted what I was saying incorrectly. Don't worry.

Ar least a 16 year old will be able to vote at some point in their lives. Unlike the women who fought for the vote?

"Did you have an understanding of a broad range of issues? Did you pay serious attention to national news? "

Yes, I was interested in politics. I didn't have the life experience to go with it, but then I didn't have that at 18 either.

They can live alone, have sex, be legal parent of a child at 16, so why not vote too?

Yes what you did say was incorrect.

Perhaps be clearer in future?

I do try. I write really clearly. I don't know what happens when you read it! Apologies.

As with DEI forms, it's worth mastering the art of "lying" ....