What Should the Voting Age Be?

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by OzzyKP
That second link is a bit fishy, so instead here is an article about the study:

http://www.youthrights.org/forums/showthread.php?t=5748

That really don't promote your case - it just says that children endangered matures quickly. It doesn't imply that common peers act in the same way without the same pressure.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by OzzyKP
To get you started here is a study that shows that 16 year olds demonstrate exactly the same rationality as adults to determine competency to stand trial. It also shows that the majority of 11-15 year olds are competent.

http://www.youthrights.org/juvcomp.pdf

Ok, a few points on this article.

1. From page 9:

Our results indicate that juveniles aged 15 and younger are significantly more likely than older adolescents and young adults to be impaired in ways that compromise their ability to serve as competent defendants in a criminal proceeding. Based on criteria established in studies of mentally ill adult offenders (Otto et al, 1998; Poythress et al., 1999), approximately one-third of 11- to 13-year-olds, and approximately one-fifth of 14- to
15-year-olds, are as impaired in capacities relevant to adjudicative competence as are seriously mentally ill adults who would likely be considered incompetent to stand trial by clinicians who perform evaluations for courts.

Then it goes on to say that 16+ have similar capacity to young adults in the trial context.

Kind of a mixed bag for you. Would move the age to 16, but not below. not sure what your end game is, however, 16 might be sufficient.


2.

Finally, we caution against the application of these results to legal issues other than competence to stand trial... However, our results say nothing about whether
youths’ developmental capacities render them more or less culpable than adults in terms of their behavior at the time of the alleged offense.

I think this is the most salient point of the article with regards to our current thread. The question isn't if they are physically capable of casting a vote or commiting a crime, the question is if they are responsible for it, and that question goes unanswered by this paper, which only addresses the understanding of procedures after the fact (competency to stand trial).

A bit difficult to word that...hmm.

[BlackCat]

I find it difficult to seperate voting right and legal responsibility - it doesn't make sense.

[asleepathewheel]

admission-

I used to defend juveniles accused of crimes. I'm not sure how many I represented in my stint, probably somewhere between 150-200, aged between 10 and 18 (meaning they committed the act and then subsequenstly turned 18)

As such, I do walk into these discussions with a developed (biased, if you will) point of view on these things.

I represented kids from all walks of life and mental levels, from the poor to the rich, from the mentally slow, to extremely intelligent kids. And through my experiences with those kids, I believed them to be very impulsive and not cognizant of the results of their actions. Like the above study, older kids did understand the process as well as my 18-20 year old clients, but understanding what is currently happening must be distinguished from understanding and realizing the possible consequences of ones decisions before they take action.

Frankly, I don't want to see my 15 year olds tried as adults, because I don't believe that they can foresee future results like adults can. And I don't want my juveniles to be haunted for the rest of their lives by mistakes made at age 15.

I want them to be protected. And I cannot see that as a possibiltiy if they are given voting rights. Those legal rights are inexorably tied, in my eyes, because of the idea that with added rights come added responsibilities. Perhaps a fallacy.

Now, you might say, why harm the good kids for what the bad ones have done? why throw out the baby with the bath water? to that, I would respond that even good kids need protection. I represented quite a few good kids, with good grades who were headed for colllege or the millitary. good kids can do stupid things, god knows I did .

anyway, that's my pov.

[Jonny]

Originally posted by BlackCat


I don't see how a higher participation would solve that problem - there would still just be two parties to choose between.

If you really want to rock the boat, then set a limit to what a party/person is allowed to spend on campaigns.

I think you may have misunderstood me -- I'm saying ending the two party system would result in higher participation, not the other way around. But limiting spending could help end the duopoly too.

Personally, I'm a big fan of proportional representation, as it would help 3rd parties come into play: right now, for example, a 3rd party pulling 10% of the vote everywhere would likely win nothing at all, but in a PR system they would get some people in congress. Not to mention implementing PR would help end the crazy gerrymandering, as each seat is no longer tied to a particular locale in a state.

[OzzyKP]

asleepathewheel, I appreciate your responses, and I am glad you looked over that study. That study is indeed a mixed bag, but it is all I had with short notice to offer. The parts about it that favor my view take a certain perspective to tease out perhaps, so I shouldn't have tried to make my point by presenting it without editorialization.

Not that I dispute the findings of the study, they seem reasonable to me. However the conclusions of the researchers betray both their facts and their hidden bias.

For example these findings should be shown aside the ideas most people have about teens, especially when cases like this come up. The standard reply is "well sure there may be a few teens out there who are smart and mature, but the vast majority are snot nosed brats who know nothing besides Britney Spears and Brad Pitt." So the findings you quoted about 14-15 year olds that only 20% seem to match up with the stereotype that most people saddle them with seems significant.

However instead of making their conclusion center on the fact that 80% of 14-15 year olds demonstrated competence, it focused on the 20% that didn't. Now surely I have sympathy for those 20%, but why should the 80% be held back because of a minority within their age cohort?

What is also not mentioned is that adults didn't score perfectly either. For the above test, I believe the score for 16+ was about 90% competence. So there is really only a 10% difference between adults and 14-15 year olds. Why is a 1 in 10 incompetence level among adults permissible yet a 2 in 10 incompetence level among 14-15 year olds not? What is the glaring threshold there?

There are differences, to be sure, I don't deny that. But the differences are far more slight than most people in this forum or in the public at large would ever permit themselves to believe. And if nothing else an 80% competence rate should afford the group at the very least a refutable presumption of competence.

And since there is only a 10% difference between adults and 14-15 year olds, I think it is reasonable for us to look closer at these results and try, as NYE and others have suggested, to find some differences in how these individuals are treated, as a class, to perhaps explain the different results.

One conclusion of the study I found remarkably easy to apply this logic to:

Moving beyond formal competence to stand trial criteria, the results of our examination of adolescents’ and young adults’ responses to decisionmaking vignet
a propensity to comply with authority figures, such as confessing to the police rather than remaining silent or
accepting a prosecutor’s offer of a plea agreement.

The younger the person was the more they showed a propensity to comply with authority figures. The researchers imply this is a sign of their mental immaturity, but it seems obvious why youth, among all people, would show such behavior. That is the one lesson, the one message that is drilled into their heads above all else from the time they were born. Obey your parents, obey your teachers, obey authority. I imagine individuals raised in cultures that put a premium on obeying authority would exhibit similar propensities to comply with authorities as compared to westerners.

Yet I doubt a researcher would say that the competence of a Chinese person is biologically less than that of an American because of such results. Whatever the results were the researcher would look at the data critically enough to seek an answer to why the data showed what it did. Or if data shows that black americans commit more crime than white americans, most reputable scientists will not say that its a genetic difference, they will look to social causes.

Why then to scientists rarely, if ever, look at data comparing youth and adults do anything but credit biology the sole contributing factor?

One final point to an already long post, you stated that you don't believe youth amply understand longterm consequences. Since we are discussing matters in the criminal justice framework I present the ridiculous case of Roper v. Simmons, the case that overturned the death penalty for 16 & 17 year olds. Putting the merits of that aside, the facts of the case they studied directly seemed to clearly point in the opposite direction of their conclusion.

The case involved a 16 year old (or 17, i forget) who killed someone (I forget who), and told his friend that it would be alright, they would get off because of their age. Rightly or wrongly, they did consider the consequences and made a decision based on what they perceived to be the long term consequences. (the Court ultimately vindicated their logic)

As far back as I can remember in my childhood (not that thats saying much) I know I would consider the consequences of my actions. As did all my friends. We made a rational cost-benefit analysis before setting out on our many capers and adventures. I think an accurate generalized statement about age groups would be that adults are far more fearful of risk than youth. Society presents that as the golden standard and declares youth to be deviating from that standard and thus defective somehow. But I am personally skeptical that the fear many adults have is any more rational than the lack of fear many youth have. In either case though, they are making rational decisions.

If presented with the same information today about one of the decisions I made 10 years ago would I decide the same? Maybe not. But that doesn't mean my decision 10 years ago wasn't rational. It most certainly was. I understood and appreciated the consequences both long term and short term and weighed the good vs. the bad. This I think is the most we can expect from a person. We may not always reach the "right" conclusion (whatever that is) but if we think it out rationally based on the information we have at hand, that really is the best we can hope for.

Another example, I was in elementry school, probably 8 years old or so. I was with some friends and we wanted to prank call (or crank call or whatever) some 1-800 numbers. We were at my friend Andy's house, his parents weren't home. He wouldn't let us use his phone. He was deathly afraid that his parents would be charged a lot of money for the call, it would show up on the bill and he would be punished. He had confused 1-800 numbers with 1-900 numbers. Me and my other friend tried to persuade him, but he wouldn't budge.

Now, granted he had bad information for confusing 1-800 and 1-900 numbers, but no one can say he didn't rationally consider the consequences. We all did. I and my other friend both knew that there was no way we could get caught, we've done it before, and 1-800 numbers are toll free and thus safe to call. We rationally thought out the consequences. As did my friend Andy.

This similar scenario played itself out thousands of times throughout my childhood and adolescence. To say that kids don't understand or consider the consequences of their actions would mean that the many checks me and my friends, and millions like us, made every day asking ourselves "is this a good thing to do?" "who will i hurt and how much?" "will i get caught?" "what will the punishment be?" "is it worth it?" Don't exist, or are exceptions to the norm. I think questions like those ARE the norm in the vast majority of individuals except the very young like infants.

[OzzyKP]

whew, I wrote a book. I hope someone actually reads it....

[GePap]

Being competent to stand trial remains a very different standard than being competent to serve in the jury of a trial. They are not the same.

And voting is akin to serving in a jury, not being competent to be on trial.

[OzzyKP]

Well I don't have any studies of 16 year olds nationally voting in major elections to point to cause it hasn't happened yet. Maybe you'd support a trial run for a few years so we can get some suitable data to reflect on?

[PLATO]

I happen to have two 15 year olds and find them both to be completely competent in making decisions when given proper information.

The problem is that they do not have the life experiences to be able to determine what is accurate information and what is spin. They often look to me for guidance in these matters and, in particular, on matters of politics.

As they have developed the cognitive abilities as OzzyKP points out, they are quite capable of understanding the information presented. Where they lack is experience in filtering the information received.

Many things require a little experience to do them. We give "learner's permits" to would be drivers.

Why is 18 so bad? It certainly isn't as if their is not enough life left to be involved in politics. Let's give folks a bit of time to use those cognitive abilities that they develop at 13 to gain a little experience with.

[Dr Strangelove]

I've treated thousands of teens over the years. They're not ready for the responsibility of voting at 14, 15, 16 or 17.

[Winston]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
I've treated thousands of teens over the years. They're not ready for the responsibility of voting at 14, 15, 16 or 17.

So, your treatment was extremely succesful.

[Donegeal]

Voting age of 18. Exceptions based on the pass/fail of a test* for those who wish to be able to vote who are in HS.

* Test would be of a GED type.

[-Jrabbit]

I haven't read the thread, so I'll just troll with my own thoughts on this topic...

Having spoken at length with my daughter and her friends throughout her life, I feel the voting age should be lowered to 16. (She's 18 now.)

Reasons: By this age, kids have learned enough about politics and how it affects their lives to have informed opinions. Lots of these kids are WAY more informed than me, and I know I'm more informed than 90% of the other adults around me.

Kids bring fresh perspective, care about the future, and have a good feel for when they are being BS'd. They are not jaded, and actually believe they can and should make a difference. A little enthusiasm would go a long way toward revitalizing politics in the US.

Kids are taught civics in school, and actually know more about the legislative process than most adults. The biggest problem with US politics is the massive lack of give-a-damn. Heck, the mere threat of kids voting might wake people up enough to get involved again.

People, we're essentially down to a single-party system in national politics. The Republicans are spending us into the poorhouse, and the Democrats grow more conservative by the day. Certainly the political atmosphere couldn't get more agenda-driven and anti-populist than it is now...

Give kids the vote? Maybe just the kind of kick in the butt this country needs.

[OzzyKP]

Awesome -Jrabbit