This has got to change!

[SHRED]

Link to tweet

Brian Krassenstein🐬
@krassenstein
In 2016:

70% of 18-29-year-olds DID NOT vote
60% of 30-44-year-olds DID NOT vote

Only 38% of 45-64-year-olds did not vote & just 15% of 65+ did not vote

There is a reason America isn't progressing. It’s because the people who care about progress don’t care about voting

VOTE!!

6:15 AM - Mar 25, 2018

[Va Lefty]

1. VOTE!

[jberryhill]

2. One in five Americans will move this year

Without a longstanding fixed address at which you receive utility bills in your name, it is difficult in many areas to register to vote.

The difficulties are compounded in particular with young voters. If you are sharing a rental with roommates, you often have nothing that is acceptable as proof of your address.

Voting registration rules in many places are skewed to produce these results.

[pandr32]

11. Affidavits ought to swear to residence sufficiently

[Exotica]

33. great points, I cannot stress enough how some of the biggest weapons in the RW quiver

are all about voter suppression, caging, purging rolls, barriers to registration, reducing polling places and hours, and gerrymandering, etc etc.. The Rethugs know that without those forms of LITERAL cheating and thuggery, they are FUCKED.

[geardaddy]

34. Excellent points.

[dchill]

3. Vote as if your life depends on it.

[Moostache]

6. Because it literally DOES!

Continued ennui by the youth on election day only ensures policies like our disastrous non-response to climate change and tacit approval of the expansion of drilling and petrochemical usage guarantee an inhospitable world in the lifetime of the very people NOT showing up to vote...

Vote as if you lives depend on it because your lives DO depend on it.

[Wounded Bear]

4. This is why the marches last Sat were so critical...

Young people talking to young people and encouraging them to register and vote.

Yes, we need to change that, and the youth look like they are on the right path.

[HopeAgain]

5. THIS

Whining about independents, getting mad at Bernie, those are not solutions.

GOTV is a really simple, but hard to achieve, solution. This is why the MSD kids could end up making a huge impact.

[Ligyron]

9. +1

[KPN]

21. No, THIS.

[FakeNoose]

7. They've stopped teaching Civics classes in high schools

Civics became one of the first things to be cut in a tight school budget.

So it's been 20 years or more, and those kids who didn't vote are now parents who don't vote.
And they're raising kids who don't vote.

We need to go back to teaching Civics in high schools, and holding remedial classes for the parents.

[askyagerz]

10. Civics? Doesn't Honda make those?

I graduated in 96 and they had already given up on most classes that actually help you become a better adult.

[csziggy]

24. Apparently Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School does teach civics

One thing Florida seems to be doing right!

Why are Parkland Students So Articulate? Because They Were Taught Civics in Middle School

Students in Florida have benefitted from the country’s most successful effort to teach civic knowledge and engagement.
by Frank Islam and Ed Crego
March 5, 2018

<SNIP>

Even more striking is how passionate, articulate, and effective these students are in making their case. This was apparent in TV interviews within hours of the shooting. Indeed, one Stoneman student, senior David Hogg, had the presence of mind to interview his fellow students on his camera phone while the shootings were underway.

<SNIP>

An alternative explanation that is worth considering is that the students at Stoneman Douglas, as well as all of the students in the state of Florida, have been the beneficiaries of what is arguably one of the nation’s most comprehensive and successful efforts to teach civic knowledge and engagement.

The roots of this effort go back to 2007, when former Senator Bob Graham (D) and former Congressman Lou Frey (R) realized that adults in the state of Florida scored at or near the bottom of surveys that measure civic health and engagement. The two joined forces and formed the Florida Joint Center for Citizenship to get civics education legislation passed. After a few failed attempts, in 2010 the Florida legislature finally approved, and then-Governor Charlie Christ signed, the Sandra Day O’Connor Civic Education Act, named for the former Supreme Court justice who has had made civic learning and engagement her post-SCOTUS life’s work.

Four aspects of the law make it unique. First, while most civics classes in America are offered, if at all, in high school, the O’Connor Act aims to educate students in middle school. It mandates a civics course in 7th grade and the incorporation of civic education content into the K-12 reading language arts curriculum. Second, while most states require that students be tested only in reading and math, the O’Connor Act mandates a comprehensive civics test at the end of 7th grade. That sends a message to teachers, administrators, and parents that civics is a core subject that needs to be taken seriously. Third, the act provided modest funding to the Florida Joint Center on Citizenship to contribute to the implementation of the legislation by providing assistance in areas such as professional development and curriculum development.

More: https://washingtonmonthly.com/2018/03/05/the-civic-education-program-that-trained-the-parkland-student-activists/

When I was in high school we got "Communism vs. Capitalism" which convinced me that neither of those two systems were desirable but which do offer any alternatives or ways to advocate for alternatives.

[FakeNoose]

38. Yes you're correct

I was talking about the schools with tight budgets, they have to cut important things like music, art, foreign languages, etc. Civics was an easy target because parents wouldn't complain if it got cut like they do for other things.

The discussions of communism vs. capitalism were sure to cause trouble. Parents get up in arms when they hear that their kids have been taught about politics, sometimes a teacher gets demoted or fired for that. Inner city schools have parents that are far less likely to complain, however those are the schools with the leanest budgets.

I'm not saying that's right, that's just the way it is.

[exboyfil]

29. It is a required course in Iowa

for graduation. Most states require it. Here is a summary of the statutes.

http://ecs.force.com/mbdata/MBQuest2RTANW?Rep=CIP1601S

[CrispyQ]

31. Let's cut the class that teaches you about the one thing that touches every aspect of your life-

Government! We had social studies in 5th grade, civics in 9th grade & American problems in 12th grade. That was back in the 60s & 70s.

[Brogrizzly]

8. More polling locations/voting window increases.

I still don’t understand why we can’t have a whole week to vote, extending the poll hours seems to me the easiest solution.

[NCTraveler]

13. +1

Yes. It needs to be about easy access.

[KPN]

23. Vote by mail in Oregon yields relatively

high participation rates, involves a paper ballot, and is verifiable. Plus the ballot comes in the mail about a month before the deadline (8PM on Election Day) and can be completed and returned by mail or a secure ballot drop off location anytime in between. Works great!

[NCTraveler]

12. It's more understandable than one might think.

The feeling of disenfranchisement is real. The fact that it adds to an already difficult work day is real. Many of us don't understand the value of our disposable time.

What those numbers tell me is that not voting is determined to be a better alternative than voting for over half of the people under 44, for one reason or another. We need to remove impediments to voting and continue to address the youth vote.

I want a minimum of three days(24hrs/day) for voting, including the weekend. I've moved past wanting it to be a national holiday as not all employers give off national holidays. I want college students with a voter registration card to be able to vote on their campus, no matter the state they reside(their vote would count in the state they reside). All US citizens should be able to vote. No felony restrictions.

There is just so much more we can do to make the process easier to access for all. Some of my ideas are good and some are bad. When you mess with one area of the vote it impacts other areas.

[CanSocDem]

14. NOT voting...

...is a political statement that you're refusing to listen to. Suggesting that this age group is disengaged from social change is ignoring the obvious. This is the age group that Occupied Wall Street, rallied nation-wide against the NRA when no sitting politician would give them support. Maybe they had no one they could 'trust'....

They should be celebrated for not throwing away their vote based on mindless propaganda and pie-in-the-sky promises.


.

[lame54]

15. The Parkland "kids" will change that...

I put "kids" in quotes because they may be young but very mature

[lpbk2713]

16. Some may have voted more than once.

Coulter was found to be registered to vote in Florida and Connecticut for years.


Link: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/brad-friedman/ann-coulter-to-face-vote-_b_753671.html

[blake2012]

20. Being registered is different than actually voting

Why propagate the idea of in person voter fraud since that is so exceedingly rare and plays into Republican voter suppression efforts.

[spanone]

17. and what happens? we get a fucking trump for 'president'

[Iggo]

18. Yeah, come on kids. Help us out.

[blake2012]

19. What is history of attempts to create voting holiday?

Do we know if more people might vote if that day was a federal holiday?

We’ve got to come up with better ways to inspire more people under 40 to vote.

[bearsfootball516]

30. It's practically guaranteed to boost voting.

Or, make it a weekend long event. You can vote Saturday or Sunday. That way if Saturday is just really bad for you, you can still make it out.

[blake2012]

22. I wonder what the stats were in 2008

[Bernardo de La Paz]

25. Ironically, voting affects people more & longer the younger they are. Need to understand that. . .nt

[KPN]

26. Not voting is s choice that many make.

In the long run, untless or until we address the reasons for that choice, GOTV efforts will only work effectively when there is a very good reason for them to work. I suspect the desire to reject Trumpism is one. We shall see.

[mahigan]

35. I have said for years that not voting

is voting with your feet.

But let me use Canadian voter turnout numbers to suggest one possible reason. In 2015 the voter turnout was the highest in many years. Overall turnout was 66% of eligible (not registered) voters - an increase of 7.6% over 2011. Among 18 to 24 and 25 to 34 year olds the turnout was 57% for both with increases from 2011 of 18% and 12% respectively.

In 2015, the leaders of the 4 main national parties (and therefore the possible prime ministers) had a maximum age of 60 while the youngest and current PM, Justin Trudeau, was 43. Compare that with the ages of most of the serious US presidential contenders in 2016.

Young people like and respect their grandparents but they don't necessarily trust them to provide the leadership and solutions necessary for the world of the future.

[KPN]

36. Good point. The right person with the right age

gets out the vote in and of itself. Didn't Obama GOTV relatively speaking?

[BoneyardDem]

27. I really do think that 2018 and 2020 will see some movement in those numbers

Getting registrations for this younger group is a HUGE< > HUGE step forward. And many speakers at the rally pressed registration and reminded the fired up kids that change can only come from the votes. They seriously loved the idea of giving the NRA loving politicians, the ultimatums.

[Snake Plissken]

28. And 100% of the candidates running for President where 65+

[exboyfil]

32. We need to have a candidate in their 40s-50s

We went from one of the youngest presidents to be elected to the oldest. We basically regressed a generation (Trump was 23 years older than Obama when the two where elected).

[uponit7771]

37. Dems need to pull the younger age group like KGOP pulls older

[Sophia4]

39. End the electoral college and a lot of people who belong to the minority party

in a state that is primarily just one party will vote at least in presidential elections.

In most contests, you know from the start which party dominates the area and will therefore win.

Democrats are the minority in some states like Nebraska and many others.

Give each voter an equal vote in presidential elections, no matter what state they live in, no matter what the majority in that state vote, and a lot more people will become interested in politics.

Amend the Constitution to end the electoral college.

[Skittles]

40. to be fair, it has really always been that way

but I have hope that with activism from young people, things will change