Max Bottaro

It’s no secret that todays younger voters are the most underrepresented demographic in the U.S. (presidential) elections. Not only do 18-29 year olds have the least amount of voters, they also have the lowest percentage of eligible voters who actually register to vote. 45-60+ year olds have the majority of the voting power by a large margin.

Answering the question of why today’s youth doesn’t seem to have the motivation to get out and vote is a difficult question to answer, and probably is the result of a number of reasons. The best I can do is to give you my biased 21 year old perspective, and some of the reasons I didn’t vote.

1) Registering and voting is a hassle. I’ve noticed the Y generation has no patience. We want everything to be done online, at the swipe of a credit card, or the click of a button. I personally didn’t feel motivated to go down to the local elementary school to wait in line, fill out forms, and then do the same thing come Election Day. Although the voting process is slow and aggravating, I would still do it if I was excited about a candidate or if I thought my vote would actually make a difference, which leads me to my next two points.

2) I am forced to choose between a giant douche bag and a turd sandwich. I think the South Park episode “Let’s Get Out and Vote!” does a pretty good job of summing up this point.

I have never been truly excited about a presidential candidate, or felt that any political issue was personally salient enough for me to go out and vote. I could vote for a 3rd party candidate, but I might as well toss that ballot in the trashcan.

3) The Electoral College makes my little Californian vote useless. This is probably true if you live in New York, Alabama, or any other state with highly partial political tastes. I can honestly say that my vote won’t matter. I don’t know if Barack or Hilary will win the primaries, but I can tell you that California will go democratic by a landslide. If this isn’t the case, I will personally write a blog on how stupid I am, and the importance of voting. Another thing I find unsettling about the Electoral College is that more Americans can vote for one candidate, but through some outdated system the other candidate can still win. How does this embody democracy or popular sovereignty, two of the cardinal values or country was built on?

I think it would be more appropriate to weigh all people’s votes equally; but if you are going to skew things with an Electoral College, why not base the number of representative votes on something more salient, like productivity or economy contribution? I know some people out there aren’t going to like this, but California’s back is tired from carrying the rest of the nation in terms of productivity, technology, and economy size. We should at least be able to get the president we want; after all, we contribute more to this country than any other state. (Yeah, I went there).

4) The presidential candidates have poor visibility to youth. I know who the candidates are, but I don’t have the energy to go out and find where they stand on issues I don’t care about, and how they are going to solve them. If they want 20 something year olds to vote, they need to throw their message in my face like Coca-Cola: repeatedly, in simple, jargon-free terms, and on media medians I use. And no, P Diddy is not an example. Yes, he used MTV which is a relevant media outlet for youth, but he isn’t someone I would entrust with weighty political decisions, and his message was crude: Vote or Die. ..Um, no? I am not going to let a talentless, washed up, cookie cutter, making of the band, reality TV show, hip hop star tell me that I am going to die if I don’t vote for a giant douche or a turd sandwich.

Even after this seemingly half-assed and pointless campaign, I was left with the question why? Why vote? Because P diddy told me to? What if I don’t like the candidates or don’t have enough understanding of their political views to make an educated decision? I’d rather save my time then just vote for the sake of voting. Vote or Die is not only a dumb campaign, it is bad advice. I wonder how many mindless 19 year olds went out and voted for whomever just because P Diddy threatened to kill them. Luckily it wouldn’t have mattered much because of the Electoral College.

Figure 1: Idiot

With all these factors put into perspective, I think it’s safe to say that the political apathy that today’s youth exhibits is both understandable and defensible. It’s sad, but until the political system changes to cater to today’s youth, the pathetic voting percentages will probably stay right where they are. The fact that candidates know that most of their votes will come from older people doesn’t help either, because they end up trying to appeal to that demographic instead. In conclusion, we are apathetic because we are disenfranchised.