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Reduce Voting Age to 16 Essay

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The legal voting age should be reduced to 16 instead of 18. We can work, we can join the army, we can even get married at the age of 16, but we can't vote at 16? We can leave school, we can move out of the family house and live on our own independently if we wanted to at the age of 16, but yet we are considered immature and not responsible enough to vote at 16, why?

Why is electing a political representative much more important than authorising a 16 year old to go fight and potentially die for their country.

The voting age was lowered from 21 to 18 in 1969 during the Vietnam war, because it was only fair to those aged 18 - 20 dying for their country have a say in how the country is run. Therefore if 16 year olds are now capable of …show more content…

If maturity is the issue, it important to take into account that 16 year olds are just as informed as 18 year olds (in some cases more so). In fact there could be many 20, 30, or even 40 year olds who are irresponsible, do not make informed decisions and are clueless; this does not mean we deny them the right vote. Just because they are older necessarily does not mean they know everything in detail about politics because they have more life experience and can make better informed judgements than a 16 year old.

What is it about electing a political representative that is seen to be much more important than choosing a life partner or becoming a soldier, why don't we have the rights of an adult? If we work for the government, and pay tax to the government, why can’t we have our say in it?

At 16 we are considered as young adults – accepting responsibilities of our own action – should we not then be treated as one too and hold a position in the political world to prove that we can be trusted to cast our vote wisely. Who is to say at what age we have entered the adulthood mentally and are mature enough, responsible enough to finally be able to vote. Giving the vote to young adults would force politicians to take our needs and desires more seriously instead of it being neglected. By not allowing

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