Lowering the voting age to 16?

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#3032456 6-Feb-2023 12:58

networkn: So if you are going to exclude 65+'s who have paid tax their entire lives, then do you support excluding other beneficiaries?

I'd probably feel happier if they introduced civics (perhaps drop geography) at school as it relates to dropping the voting age, or perhaps if you want to vote <18 you need to do a term of civics, though that just makes stuff complicated.

My comment on 65+ is somewhat facetious but so far the primary argument against lowering the age is the 16-18s “lack the maturity to vote” while at the same time saying 18 year olds are also immature.

To me having citizens involved in democracy can only be a good thing for society irrespective of age as it helps build local community and in a more physically disconnected and predominantly online society in which we are living in.

You don’t think that way.

You won’t ever see my point, and I struggle with yours as yes the under 25 are immature and lowering the age to 18 perhaps wasn’t the best decision. I however am pragmatic to say the age isn’t the problem it’s our culture so raising it again will make very little difference to NZs drinking culture.

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#3032463 6-Feb-2023 13:16

networkn:

Blah blah rah rah. The reason for discrimination has been given as it would have been for the age of consent, vehicle licensing, gambling, and everything else that has an age restriction. Lowering the drinking age was worse for NZ society in every single metric that exists. That's fact.

Just because you won't accept it doesn't make it invalid.

Endlessly repeatedly claiming it won't make you any less wrong.

Endlessly repeating your invalid argument doesn't make it any less invalid. Drinking age: not relevant. This is a discussion about voting age. Vehicle licensing: not relevant. This is a discussion about voting age. Gambing: not relevant. This is a discussion about voting age. Age of consent: not relevant. This is a discussion about voting age.

The justification for discrimination in scenario X is not ipso facto the justification for scenario Y, which you keep insisting is the case.

All you've done this entire thread is create strawmen. You haven't presented a single valid argument specifically for why under 18s shouldn't be able to vote, except for "because". If we applied your way of thinking throughout history, women still wouldn't be allowed to vote.

For what it's worth, I'd be 100% in support of more civic studies as part of the Social Studies curriculum.

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#3032495 6-Feb-2023 14:33

BarTender:

My comment on 65+ is somewhat facetious but so far the primary argument against lowering the age is the 16-18s “lack the maturity to vote” while at the same time saying 18 year olds are also immature.

I do think 18 year olds on the whole are immature, but far less than a 16 year old on the whole. We aren't discussing raising the age of voting though.

To me having citizens involved in democracy can only be a good thing for society irrespective of age as it helps build local community and in a more physically disconnected and predominantly online society in which we are living in.

I agree with this, so we should introduce civics at school. There are ways to get 16 year olds involvement in democracy without giving them the right to vote.

You won’t ever see my point, and I struggle with yours as yes the under 25 are immature and lowering the age to 18 perhaps wasn’t the best decision. I however am pragmatic to say the age isn’t the problem it’s our culture so raising it again will make very little difference to NZs drinking culture.

When you have 20 year olds giving alcohol to 18 year olds but 18 year olds giving 14 year olds alcohol then it's both, but it's much more about the lack of critical assessment of consequences that occur between an 18 and a 20-year-old. There will be variations but the rules generally apply pretty broadly and it's the exception not the rule, when it doesn't. Seeing your point and agreeing with it are two different things.

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#3032733 6-Feb-2023 22:49

networkn:I agree with this, so we should introduce civics at school. There are ways to get 16 year olds involvement in democracy without giving them the right to vote.

So you have yet to come up with a cohesive argument against lowering the voting age other than they are not mature enough and then pivoting to alcohol, driving, marriage and various other activities in life that while I see the point you are attempting to make actually bare no relevance onto if it would be beneficial or detrimental overall to have participation at an earlier age into our democracy.

You have yet to come up with a solid argument to say what detrimental outcomes would happen if the age was lowered and there was a very small minority who may now feel their voices could be heard
Even when all the evidence of voter participation is all around us that low voter participation leads to terrible outcomes. As I gaze to Auckland with their 35% voter turnout.

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#3032804 7-Feb-2023 11:37

BarTender:

So you have yet to come up with a cohesive argument against lowering the voting age other than they are not mature enough and then pivoting to alcohol, driving, marriage and various other activities in life that while I see the point you are attempting to make actually bare no relevance onto if it would be beneficial or detrimental overall to have participation at an earlier age into our democracy.

Your disagreement is not the same as a valid argument not being made. Examples I have given where we discriminate based on age are entirely valid and apply to voting age for the same reasons. They are totally relevant. It's the entire point.

Your suggestion that it would increase the voters attendance at the polls or generally make for more engaged voters is actually likely incorrect. If we add another say 100K voters for example, and 10% of them 'engage' our voter engagement overall would drop as a percentage.

Initially, I suspect the novelty might create a bit of a surge, but it wouldn't likely last. The problem with voter engagement at the source. Because typically the younger you are the more immediate you expect your gratification to be, young voters would likely become disillusioned even faster and disengage earlier and for longer. Supposition of course, but that's my experience.

We should spend the effort likely thrown at this, to hold our current parties to account for promises made and not delivered, or in finding ways to get the existing voters out to vote.

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#3032813 7-Feb-2023 11:45

I think many would vote once, see it results in next to no change in the entrenched gerontocracy that is NZ politics and possibly be put off forever, or at least until they are full-time earners or students.

That's not to say we couldn't try it, but I would have to explain to my kids about how it's important and how it matters and frankly I'm personally not sure I'm convinced it does anymore.

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#3032825 7-Feb-2023 12:34

networkn: Your disagreement is not the same as a valid argument not being made. Examples I have given where we discriminate based on age are entirely valid and apply to voting age for the same reasons. They are totally relevant. It's the entire point.

Your suggestion that it would increase the voters attendance at the polls or generally make for more engaged voters is actually likely incorrect. If we add another say 100K voters for example, and 10% of them 'engage' our voter engagement overall would drop as a percentage.

Initially, I suspect the novelty might create a bit of a surge, but it wouldn't likely last. The problem with voter engagement at the source. Because typically the younger you are the more immediate you expect your gratification to be, young voters would likely become disillusioned even faster and disengage earlier and for longer. Supposition of course, but that's my experience.

We should spend the effort likely thrown at this, to hold our current parties to account for promises made and not delivered, or in finding ways to get the existing voters out to vote.

So now we have actually gotten to the bottom of your argument is all based on your reckons and nothing else. As you haven't actually bothered to look into any international research or read any of the arguments or have just chosen to ignore anything that doesn't align to your reckon.

Some actual research... not related to any of the other nonsensical and irrelevant arguments you have presented in regards to age of drinking.

https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/news/lowering-voting-age-boosts-long-term-participation-elections

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4020373/

I could go on and find more.. but this was the first page in google: https://letmegooglethat.com/?q=voter+participation+lowering+age I would trust actual research by those big brain researchy type folks on this topic.

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#3032826 7-Feb-2023 12:35

For the first time ever I did not bother voting in our last local elections. Why? Because the electorate is chopped up into neighbourhoods and you can only vote for candidates in your area (though the candidates themselves don't have to live there!). In my case, every candidate I was eligible to vote for was elected unopposed before the election even took place!

The system is broken and whether the voting age should be 18 or 16 is at the bottom of a long list of things that need to be fixed first. I frankly don't care and I doubt it matters much anyway.

Plesse igmore amd axxept applogies in adbance fir anu typos

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#3034257 9-Feb-2023 23:20

Kyanar:

Is it widely accepted? Really? It seems to be widely accepted among conservatives that you must be an adult to vote, but "adult" in New Zealand doesn't appear to be consistently defined. For example [...]".

Yes. And trying to tar me as a "conservative" (whatever that means in the context of this discussion) doesn't invalidate the point. I think if you asked most grown ups whether voting was an adult thing, and whether a person should have to be a certain age to vote, the answer would be a resounding yes. In addition, the polling I have seen seems to indicate that there is majority support, by a decent margin, support for keeping that age at 18. Which is the age at which we generally consider people to be adults, able to do adult things.

Just because there are some exceptions and anomalies (e.g., when someone can hold a passport), largely for historical reasons, doesn't invalidate the point. And the reference to the Oranga Tamariki Act defining a young person as 18 to 21 years of age is a total red-herring, to the point of being deliberately misleading. It defines "young person means a person of or over the age of 14 years but under 18 years and also has an extended meaning that includes some young adults for certain purposes under section 386AAA" So essentially 18. Sections 386AAA and 386AAD provide that in some limited circumstances a person aged 18-21 may be entitled to remain with a caregiver (not obliged, entitled, and unlike a young person placed in care they can refuse to do so - See s386AAD(4)(c) - because they are an adult with autonomy and decision making rights). It most definitely doesn't say they aren't considered an adult.

As to the definition of adult to use, I think the answer is pretty straightforward. It's 18. which is the age at which someone is usually considered a grown up, and where the social consensus appears to be in this case.

Kyanar:

As to your suggestion that Parliament simply "amend the Bill of Rights Act", that is patently unthinkable. You're setting a dangerous precedent updating the core "as close to constitutional protections as you get", for something as silly as preventing youth from voting. For a bunch of people who grumbled bitterly (I wanted to use stronger language, but didn't think it appropriate) about Labour's ill-conceived plan to entrench provisions of Three Waters on the basis that it was a slippery slope toward the practice being used more widely in unwanted ways, you seem awfully quick to jump to doing the same thing when it supports your own preconceptions.

Entrenchment in that case was an abuse of process. Plus it doesn't work anyway - it's a fundamental principle that parliament is sovereign and no parliament can bind a future parliament. Legally all a parliament would have to do is repeal the entrenching clause by a simple majority (as the entrenching clause isn't entrenched), and then the previously entrenched clause could be repealed by a simple majority. What it did with Three Waters was cheapen that signalling via entrenching in the Electoral Act that there was broad consensus around electoral matters that shouldn't be tinkered with for partisan reasons, by blatantly using it for a partisan policy reason. Which makes it more likely that parties will use entrenching clauses for their pet interests (sale of state assets, benefit entitlements, hate speech .....?), to be repealed by later parliaments. Just devaluing the point of entrenchment.

And whether you like it or not, the Bill of Rights is Just an ordinary bit of legislation. Parliament passed it. Parliament can change it. Parliament can repeal it. As per above, parliament is sovereign and no parliament can bind a future parliament.

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#3034258 9-Feb-2023 23:24

Kyanar:

As to "social consensus", any consensus which is established by a majority to exclude a group from society is invalid prima facie.

Cobblers.

Firstly, this isn't about "exclusion from society", but saying you have to be a certain age before you can do certain things - such as voting, drinking, smoking, leaving school, or joining the army. Because children aren't adults, and until they are some of their decisions get made for them. Or are you also advocating scrapping/lowering those age limits as well. Maybe we could serve beer in primary school cafeterias so the children, and they are children, don't feel excluded?

Secondly, we frequently exclude people from society, or large aspects of it, by social consensus in other areas. We exclude murderers from society and strip them of many of their rights (permanently or for a fixed period) when we convict and jail them. We do the same for child molesters. That lunatic who perpetrated the Christchurch shootings will (rightly) likely never get out of jail, and I doubt many people would object to that.All is this is done pursuant to laws passed because of broad social consensus. Are you also saying that jailing murderers is invalid prima facie?

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#3034467 10-Feb-2023 11:58

JimmyH:

Cobblers.

Firstly, this isn't about "exclusion from society", but saying you have to be a certain age before you can do certain things - such as voting, drinking, smoking, leaving school, or joining the army. Because children aren't adults, and until they are some of their decisions get made for them. Or are you also advocating scrapping/lowering those age limits as well. Maybe we could serve beer in primary school cafeterias so the children, and they are children, don't feel excluded?

Secondly, we frequently exclude people from society, or large aspects of it, by social consensus in other areas. We exclude murderers from society and strip them of many of their rights (permanently or for a fixed period) when we convict and jail them. We do the same for child molesters. That lunatic who perpetrated the Christchurch shootings will (rightly) likely never get out of jail, and I doubt many people would object to that.All is this is done pursuant to laws passed because of broad social consensus. Are you also saying that jailing murderers is invalid prima facie?

Strawman. The removal of individuals who pose a risk to society at large is completely irrelevant to whether a group should be entitled to vote. Nothing to do with social consensus.

And since you lot continue to miss the bloody point (repeatedly) - giving someone one of seven million votes is not a risk to society at large, or even to oneself. Drinking, smoking, joining the military, having children, murdering people. These all have significant impacts, even life long impacts, to an individual, and others.

I don't recall where anyone suggested that a 16 year old should be given 100,000 votes.

Absolutely none of any of your arguments are relevant or valid, especially the rubbish "social consensus" one. There is quite simply no justification for why a 16 year old should be barred from being able to cast a single vote out of millions. Any argument that they're "not mature enough to vote" can be shot down by pointing out that maturity isn't one of the eligibility criteria for voting, and if it were then a lot of over 18s would be disqualified too. You lot just don't like that they might not vote your way.

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#3034468 10-Feb-2023 12:07

JimmyH:

Yes. And trying to tar me as a "conservative" (whatever that means in the context of this discussion) doesn't invalidate the point. I think if you asked most grown ups whether voting was an adult thing, and whether a person should have to be a certain age to vote, the answer would be a resounding yes. In addition, the polling I have seen seems to indicate that there is majority support, by a decent margin, support for keeping that age at 18. Which is the age at which we generally consider people to be adults, able to do adult things.

Just because there are some exceptions and anomalies (e.g., when someone can hold a passport), largely for historical reasons, doesn't invalidate the point. And the reference to the Oranga Tamariki Act defining a young person as 18 to 21 years of age is a total red-herring, to the point of being deliberately misleading. It defines "young person means a person of or over the age of 14 years but under 18 years and also has an extended meaning that includes some young adults for certain purposes under section 386AAA" So essentially 18. Sections 386AAA and 386AAD provide that in some limited circumstances a person aged 18-21 may be entitled to remain with a caregiver (not obliged, entitled, and unlike a young person placed in care they can refuse to do so - See s386AAD(4)(c) - because they are an adult with autonomy and decision making rights). It most definitely doesn't say they aren't considered an adult.

As to the definition of adult to use, I think the answer is pretty straightforward. It's 18. which is the age at which someone is usually considered a grown up, and where the social consensus appears to be in this case.

Conservatives are people who insist on maintaining the status quo because "that's the way we've always done it". I'm not trying to tar you as that, you paint yourself as that pretty plainly.

I think if you asked most adults (not grown ups, since a lot of people over 18 aren't very grown up) they'd probably say you should be an adult to vote because they're adults, so it's excluding someone else. Your polls do the same thing - ask people who can vote if someone else should be forbidden from doing so. Those people aren't affected, so who cares what they think? Following your logic to its conclusion, women still wouldn't be allowed to vote because the majority of people given the vote thought they shouldn't be allowed to vote too. Social consensus is a rubbish argument because it boils down to tyranny of the majority. If you can't find a justification that can be summed up in an actual impact statement, you have no argument.

JimmyH:

Entrenchment in that case was an abuse of process. Plus it doesn't work anyway - it's a fundamental principle that parliament is sovereign and no parliament can bind a future parliament. Legally all a parliament would have to do is repeal the entrenching clause by a simple majority (as the entrenching clause isn't entrenched), and then the previously entrenched clause could be repealed by a simple majority. What it did with Three Waters was cheapen that signalling via entrenching in the Electoral Act that there was broad consensus around electoral matters that shouldn't be tinkered with for partisan reasons, by blatantly using it for a partisan policy reason. Which makes it more likely that parties will use entrenching clauses for their pet interests (sale of state assets, benefit entitlements, hate speech .....?), to be repealed by later parliaments. Just devaluing the point of entrenchment.

And whether you like it or not, the Bill of Rights is Just an ordinary bit of legislation. Parliament passed it. Parliament can change it. Parliament can repeal it. As per above, parliament is sovereign and no parliament can bind a future parliament.

Which is it? No parliament can bind a future parliament? Or it can, but only if you agree with it?

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#3034469 10-Feb-2023 12:10

So essentially you're saying that there should be no minimum age for voting at all? That four year olds' vote is only one in several million...

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#3034470 10-Feb-2023 12:14

Ge0rge: So essentially you're saying that there should be no minimum age for voting at all? That four year olds' vote is only one in several million...

The Bill of Rights, the closest thing New Zealand has to constitutional protections, sets the floor for discrimination at the age of 15 , which the Supreme Court case and several posts in this thread have pointed out. Your post clearly ignores context just to make a snarky remark, which is just silly.

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#3034480 10-Feb-2023 12:28

And yet parliament can change the Bill of Rights.

It wasn't a sparky comment, it was a legitimate question. You appear to be arguing that a law set by parliament is descriminatory, based on another law set by parliament. If the Bill of Rights was to be amended, then you would no longer have an argument.

I guess I'm tying to understand why you believe it's ok to use one discriminatory law, passed by a tyrannis majority, to then justify changing another?

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