The Young Vote

I remember sitting in political science classes as a freshman and sophmore at TCU. It was then that I learned the most interesting and powerful fact in politics. Young people don't vote. This shocked me. I remember filling out my first vote for Bill Clinton as a high school senior. I grew up in a political household. My dad was a political science major and history teacher as well. It just seemed natural.

Furthermore, I remember thinking at the time that other demographic groups voted less. Not true. The youth vote in horrible numbers historically. In the 2008 election, the youth was energized like it had never been before. MTV and other pop culture centers have tried to motivate the 18-25 group. They've used phrases like "Rock the Vote" and "Vote or Die". These are all somewhat successful, but the fact remains that the youth have to find politics relevant to them. Midterm elections are always a hard sell for all voting blocs, but this time around might be more crucial than most.

Democrats have a lot riding on the youth this time because of all the things youth represents. Young people tend to be more Democratic than the older groups normally, but these are historic times. The youth are more crucial than they have ever been before. Consider the following facts when it comes to our 18-25 crowd.

• Young people tend to be more tolerant than older people. In an election cycle where the right is trying to crack against Islam and subtely crack against minorities in general, we need the young to vote because they generally don't care about race, creed, or sexual orientation.
• The young are more adept technologically. Although this is not universally true, they are also better trained at determining what is a good source of information. Gullibility is usually more heavily associated with young people, but we are seeing the older crowd buying into information that could charitably be called dubious.
• Young people are more energetic when they have something they care about. The right has the power of money and power on their side. Energy is the best defense for that. If you have boots on the ground in a campaign you can overcome money, power, and lies.

When I taught government and economics, it was my mission to make sure that my students became good consumers of information. No, I didn't succeed all the time. Teaching students how to research for research papers or just to be knowledgable was often frustrating. However, it has to be done. We cannot continue to have people go on and accept everything being told to them. You have to consider the source. What interests and biases do they have? Is anyone backing them up financially that might cloud their judgment. Have they reported falsehoods in the past? These are all questions our children must learn to ask. In the interim, we need those same young people that were so dedicated two years ago to return in full force now.