I don't think it is right for 16 year olds not to be able to vote because most of us know what is going on. We will be the ones dealing with the effects of this election. I also dislike the fact that people want to vote on the color of skin. "IF IM BLACK... i will vote for OBAMA" and "IM WHITE so if i dont vote for MCCAIN the world will be a disaster." Why don't people just worry about the actual concerns that the candidates have to make the world a better place. Personally, i just want the best man to win. I'm not worried about the color of their skin but the way effects they will have on this country. Many people are prejudiced against who should win and it is very sad. People get offended by this. This is supposed to be an election to unite our country but sooner or later it is going to lead to something worse. We are the ones who can not share our point of view on who should win because we are "too young." Most of know way more then the adults in this world. My point is WE [teens] should vote because we are the future.
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Minors can't vote simply because we are not old enough to grasp the issues in their full entirety. I do no like that reason, but unfortunately it make sense. While you may feel as though you understand the issues and the candidates, the point is that we as minors have not experienced enough to understand the history behind the campaigns and the candidates because we did not experience them consciously. You may have been alive at the time, but don't tell me you cared about the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy when you weren't even in school yet. Or that you could have possibly understood the rationale behind the passing of the USA PATRIOT Act at the time it as passed. The point is, we can't have possibly taken everything into consideration. It is still splitting hairs (What's 18 years? It's only two more than sixteen!) but it's still the law.
Most teens aren't very informed like you say they are. Many teens would vote based upon skin color and not actual politics.
I'm sure it's frustrating to you as a sixteen year old who cares about politics, but at some point there has to be a line drawn regarding voter age, and it generally makes sense to have the minimum age be eighteen when you become a legal adult.
I think most people would agree a sixteen year old is capable of making an informed decision if they want to, but what about the four year old who talked about who everyone should vote for on daily basis when she was in my class this spring? or the fifteen year old who's mad at the world and just wants to be able to vote for whom ever their parents don't want? or maybe you've met a sixteen or seventeen year old who would let their parents tell them who to vote for? An eighteen, or twenty, or thirty year old could vote for the same stupid reasons, but most people change and grow up a lot between sixteen and eighteen, so even though it's arbitrary keeping the minimum voting age eighteen makes sense.
"Live above money; put your heart in front of you and follow it."
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I think your right; we are the ones that have to face the issues. Especially the no child left behind act. However I think some people in this country have very immature thinking and poor decision making, and yet you want them to decide who will be leader of our nation? I think that the congressmen and women, and politicians in general should listen to teens about what they think, beside we are their future!
I agree with your blog post. As a 16yo, I know the issues that are most important to me, and I think I should have the right to vote. I can't remember who it was, but this guy wrote a book and it said that minors have half the rights convicted felons do or something like that. I know a few felons and they have quite a few restrictions...and thinking about it, the guy was right...we can't vote, we can't fight in the war, we can't get the majority of jobs out there, we can't smoke (LOL Not that I would if I could), we can't buy lottery tickets (that I might actually do once in a while when I turn 18)...etc...but I'm more responsible and more mature than quite a few 18yos I know and it's just not fair that I can't vote and they can, just because they're 18 months older than I am.
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