this post was submitted on 19 Sep 2024
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About two years ago now, I was sitting on a bench in Central Park writing my initial thoughts on what I didn't know then but would come to know as Youth Rights.

I don't think I'll ever remember why she did, but about halfway through the day Greta Thunberg came to mind, and I looked up the voting age in Sweden. And my blood boiled in a way I've never experienced in my entire life.

16 years old and one of the most famous and recognizable political activists in the world. 16 years old giving a confident, impassioned, admonishing speech to the fucking UN. 16 years old with no legal right to a voice in her country. No voice to vote for the policies she believed in or the people who might enact them.

My writing, already vitriolic to a fault, managed to become even moreso but with the topic abruptly switched to voting. For the first time in my life, I considered where I'd place the voting age if I could do so unilaterally. Not long into considering it I had a thought that I wrote down immediately, a question I've asked well over 100 times at this point with no substantial answer:

When is it reasonable to say to a person, 'If you're not at least this old, then I don't give a fuck what you think'?

And from the moment I had that thought, I have been unable to place the voting age.

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[โ€“] bloodfart@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 months ago
[โ€“] ego_death@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 months ago

เผผ ใค โ—•_โ—• เผฝใค``

[โ€“] beerclue@lemmy.world 0 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

I have a 15yo kid with ASD. While she is highly functional, goes to a good public school, she can't decide which trash bin to use and will just freeze for a while, overthinking it... She can talk for hours about the anatomy of a cat, but knows nothing about politics, or how the world functions... I think 16 is too young to vote, but my perspective is warped.

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It depends on the country. There should be a local law in every country that says who can vote.

[โ€“] intensely_human@lemm.ee -1 points 2 months ago
[โ€“] MapleEngineer@lemmy.world -1 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

26 when your brain is almost certainly fully myelenated to 65 since the future of young people is far more effected by elected officials than the futures of retired people.

[โ€“] ristoril_zip@lemmy.zip -2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

https://www.childstats.gov/AMERICASCHILDREN/tables/pop1.asp

70-something million children. Let's make them eligible to vote, and let parents vote on their behalf if they're too young. As another poster said, the parents who abuse that on "both sides" would more or less come out in the wash. The parents who took it seriously would probably adjust both their vote and their child's vote to benefit the child.

(One interesting thing is that would mean citizen children of non-citizen immigrants would get to vote.)

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[โ€“] CrimeDad@lemmy.crimedad.work -3 points 2 months ago

I don't think age is very relevant. Anyone who files a tax return should be allowed to vote.

[โ€“] bstix@feddit.dk -4 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Perhaps it should be decided by a cognitive test instead of age. This is a dangerous road though, because a lot of people with cognitive disabilities can and should be allowed to vote for themselves.

Maybe the test could be made to test if a person understands what an election is and them being able to form their own opinion.

The main issue isn't age, but rather that a lot of people vote for something that they think others expect them to vote for without ever forming an opinion of their own.

However those people should also be allowed to represent themselves, so I think all elections ought to have the option of voting for "shit, I don't know, I have no idea what's this is about", and if that vote came over a certain threshold, then the election should be void and postponed for a week.

[โ€“] zxqwas@lemmy.world -4 points 2 months ago (2 children)

If I had to change it I'd increase it.

The average late teenager is not suitable to have a say. And half of them are below average in that sense.

I'd like to tie it to actually being a tax payer, you pay you get a say in how your hard earned money is spent. But that would throw people who can't work under the bus.

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[โ€“] deadbeef79000@lemmy.nz -4 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Parents should be allowed a vote on behalf of their children until their children reach whatever age the jurisdiction allows independent voting.

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