July 20, 2004: Voting is gangsta

Here is why you don't matter:
"The youth are only 10% of our [voting] population, but 100% of our future"
This was told to me in an interview with our senator (D) Ben Nelson. Though I am a passionist at heart, and as Rob said I know everything about everything, I restricted my urges to mutilate him journalistically. More on this later.
It is estimated that there are around 25 million or so "young voters," this term referring to the people aged 18 to 24 or so. Even if everyone of those 25 million voted, as Benny bo ben son said, we're only talking about 10% of the vote. But don't you worry because you probably can't do anything about it.
Anyone who has read any newspaper in the last 6 months has some idea that money makes moves in politics. I recommend Fahrenheit 9/11 on the basis of this realization alone. Bush panders to rich people (Estate tax what?) because they fund him!
Now think about it. Erik may make $17 an hour stealing chairs from 54-65 year olds (69 percent of which voted by the way). The rest of 18 to 24 year-olds are either in college or just entering the job market. Both applications of time do not equal very much income. This means that neither the Republicans, nor the Democrats, really would see us as a major player in the voting economy, if you will. Moveon.org, a distributed lobbying organization (admittedly of the liberal persuasion) is effective as a lobbying force because of the many moneyed people who contribute donations. However, even if we (the youth) did the same, the effect couldn't even be near the same. This is assuming we even had said income to donate. This means that while in poltiics, politicians only interest in children ends at around age 12 because this is when parents stop caring as much legally. Who remembers Jesus, whose life wasn't recorded from age 12 to age 30? Well though religion has no place in government, the allusion is powerful. It seems that the bible makers didn't really care either. Wasn't he the freakin messiah?
The very major point I have been avoiding until now is perhaps the more obvious reason of why the youth don't matter: we simply don't make up any sort of large voting bloc. Not only can we not influence politicians with our money, we can't do the same with our vote, because we don't vote. 70 percent of us.
If 70 percent of the youth died, there would be a lot of news flash. Yet when more than a senate majority is absent, no one peeps. Who cares if we don't vote! Let them play their Tupac, and they shouldn't protest a lot.
Or who remembers Bob, from Erik's blog, whose chair Erik stole. 70 percent of his voting bloc, from ages 55 to 64 years of age, get out to the polls and vote. That means for every old timer voting, we have a youth playing one of the top 100 video games instead.

Now let's roll back to Ben Nelson for a second. Our Warrior Element story group had sent him a set of questions ahead of time, so he had plenty of time to craft that statement. He said it around 5 times throughout the 10 minute interview. What it really means that you aren't going to matter until you start voting and making more than 30,000 a year. And truthfully, most of us will move on and start voting, and forget about our unimportant politically days as young people. But the gaping hole will still remain. What can we do?
Get to the polls. You have no excuse. Though we may not be important monetarily, 10% is a whole chunk of people. Ben Nelson wouldn't be spitting out crafted statements if he knew that I actually mattered in his vote.
Those who can't vote? Do what you can. Time is money when it comes to political campaigns, and sometimes this can help, though maybe not in influencing politicians. The more you can get political visibility, the more we can get the politicians who represent us to start doing things.
Young voter enabling is why I respect P.Diddy, but not his rapping.