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Voting Age To 16 Research Paper

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The voting age has been a controversial topic for years now. In Indiana, voters have to be 18 before the next General, Municipal, or Special Education to register to vote. Other states allow you to be younger than 18 when you register as long as the voter is 18 when they are actually voting (“Voter Registration Age Requirements by State.”). However, whether or not the voting age should remain 18 or go down to 16 has been debated and still remains questionable. Although this is quite the controversial topic, many people side with the decision to lower the voting age to 16 and argue that there are several pros. One of these pros is that teenagers spend more than half of their time in a classroom setting. While emerged in this setting, they …show more content…

According to Emma Debonno and Dennis Meaney, teenagers lack the “temperament” to vote. They are not allowed to consume alcohol, tobacco products, etc. so many say they should not be allowed to vote either. Not only are these items prohibited from teenagers, but they do not have a lot of experience in politics like adults that have been voting for years do. These teenagers’ lack of experience makes them vulnerable to outside opinion. People such as parents, guardians, and teachers may be biasing the views of politics for teenagers. Although they might not do it on purpose, these teenagers grow up around the adults and hear their views on the political world. Teenagers need to be able to grow and have their own opinions so that they are not manipulated by the opinions of outsiders. (Debonno, Meaney). Not only are the teenagers at risk of being swayed, but recently the number of young voters has decreased according to Vote.com, and many say that if teenagers are given the opportunity to vote, they would not utilize it. Not only are students uneducated about the candidates that are running for various offices, but they are not educated about general political terms. This would result in an inaccurate count of votes. Teenagers would be likely to go into a voting facility and choose a candidate at …show more content…

16 year-olds are not educated enough to make a decision on who should run our country. For example, at Central High School, a student cannot take a Government class until their senior year, unless the student is graduating early. Therefore, the student would not get a concept of politics unless they had been previously educated by an outside source. The average 16 year-old is either a sophomore or junior. If the voting age was moved to 16, not only would the teenager be uneducated for their first election, but they would not be educated until their senior year. Along with the lack of a political education at school, the student has to endure outside opinions that could potentially swat the student’s political opinion. These outside sources, such as parental views, TV ads, friends’ opinions, etc., make it hard for the inexperienced teenagers to have a mind of their own (Debono, Meaney). The average teenager grows up in a household with a family; a family that has views of their. These views have been instilled in their lives from birth. Once this has happened, the teenager’s first response to anything is what they’ve always know and grown up with. If the voting age stayed the same, it would allow students to take the Government course and form opinions of their

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