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I want to determine Government Policy... right after I’ve tidied my room and finished my homework
Why...
Should a 16 year-old get the right to vote? Winston Churchill once said the biggest argument against democracy is to hold a five minute conversation with a voter. God knows what he would have said if confronted with an acne-infested child whose only experience of voting is on Big Brother or X factor! There is good reason to keep the vote at 18. It’s called maturity and experience. The same reason in the UK you have to be 18 to:
- Buy cigarettes, rolling tobacco and cigarette papers
- Buy alcoholic drinks in a pub or a bar
- Buy fireworks
- View, rent or buy an 18 rated film
- View, rent or buy pornographic material that does not contravene UK obscenity laws
- Place a bet in a betting shop or casino
- Get a tattoo
- Join the Army and fight in conflict
- Drive a car
- Fly a plane
...and another thing
Apart from President Macron, who whilst wearing shorts and a school cap decided he would marry his teacher, most decisions made when you are sixteen are short term. I am willing to bet quite large amounts of money that currently what most occupies a 16 year-old mind is:
A) Sex
B) Sex
C) Sex
D) Alcohol
E) Drugs
F) Who to sms?
G) Which Marvel and which Fast and Furious film is the best in the franchise?
H) Sex
I) What are the Kardashian’s doing?
J) Sex
The idea that this entitles a 16 year old to vote on matters most cannot spell let alone understand is clearly bonkers. At 16 a five year term in government for a UK Parliament seems a lifetime. It’s a third of your entire existence and probably half your conscious one. An eternity at sixteen is waiting for the microwave to go ‘ping’!
...and another thing
Extinction Rebellion? Well of course the countries that are the biggest perpetrators of C02 emissions like China would not allow such nonsense and lock everyone up before a single traffic jam formed. I don’t see anyone lining up to demonstrate in Moscow to challenge Putin on his record or protest at Kim Jong Il at the garbage North Korea belches into the atmosphere. Perhaps an appreciation of the freedoms granted to be allowed to demonstrate might balance the enthusiasm to disrupt everyone’s lives.
You wanna make a difference? Lead by example. No TV in every room, surgically remove your mobile phone from your hand, stop eating junk food, stop carrying bottled water as if every journey was a trek across the Sahara and drink out of a tap. And do something pro-active when you leave school with a J-O-B rather than stand on the sidelines bellowing.
And here’s a spoonful of reality as these adult/children hurl abuse at the City and the capitalist system. The one thing that will solve pollution is capitalism. Money is being poured into various new ways of supplying clean energy because a fortune will be made from it. I guarantee no Government or Socialist state will cure the problem… but the hope of nasty evil profit will!
...and another thing
I can see an argument for age change on voting; just at the other end of the spectrum. I’m not sure by the time I need incontinence pants and spend my day watching repeats of ‘Wheel of fortune’ whether what I think is really that relevant. I’ll either be gaga or so near to both feet in the grave that it is unlikely I’d survive the onslaught of a political advertising campaign let alone a five year term of office.
If I marched the corridors of power it would be no vote till you paid some form of tax after 18 or reached 21 and no vote over 90. But you’d still be allowed to spend a disproportionate amount of time thinking about sex!
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2 Comments
Spot on sad but absolutely true. Great blog
Patrick
Everyone knows that at 18 someone is mature, experienced & responsibility.
Great article, and yes we have to give the good example and money is needed for research to create new things, news systems that will help protect the environnement.
The difficulty for everyone is to acquire the maturity to be and feel responsible.