That the voting age should be lowered to 15

EngagementMy opponent does not actually have a rebuttal to this, so he simply refers to his old slippery slope fallacy. I've maintained throughout the debate that at the point where you have a reason to be engaged with politics, you should be allowed to vote, without going too early (before you have a reason) because of the disenfranchisement. Maybe we're all just really dumb in New Zealand, but basic social studies units on politics are taught at age 13-14, upon completion of which they should be able to vote under my model (age 15). The reason why this is a reasonable compromise is because that's when we grant them the necessary rights and responsibilities to be a politically active member of society at that age, and social studies exists to prepare them for that fact. Of course, I've already conceded that in a minority of countries where teenagers are extra-smart and thus taught politics at an earlier age, they should be allowed to vote earlier as well. The harms of a disengaged society are sweeping, as I've pointed out in much greater detail in my first round and my opponent does not respond to. Ultimately, the choice is whether age 15 or 30 is a better estimate for when people become politically engaged. I've presented evidence throughout the debate that youth after around age 15 do think politically, and my opponent has presented none to the contrary. The point stands. EducationMy degree is in business, and one of my finals papers was on this very topic (and I went to the most prestigious, top-ranked business school in the country). Business is not an independent discipline. Mathematics, for example, is crucial for business, even though it (in and of itself) has nothing to do with it. Same with science, or engineering, the basis of all the major disruptive technologies. Ethics overlays strongly with business, as does history. Simply because one is not exclusively a business student (something that I think quite irrational, since business always in some way or another depends on other disciplines) does not mean one does not pursue business studiously. And the same goes with politics. The reason why 15 year olds don't pay attention is because, as I've already explained in great depth in my disengagement point, they are given strong incentives to not pay any attention. People used to wonder why women didn't care much for certain disciplines (for example, law or accounting). People put it down to all kinds of silly, apparently "scientific" explanations about female brains. All of them have now been completely debunked. Turns out that the reason they didn't care is because they had no chances of getting a career in those fields, since there were no other workers of their gender there. A few affirmative action programs later, and now women outnumber men in these fields in many countries. Similarly, give youth the vote, and they'll start paying attention more. I'm glad my opponent concedes that the "advanced" students at age 15 don't even need to do this. Much of this point has gone unanswered by my opponent as well, such as how I talked in round two about creating incentives to learn more about politics and learn more generally, or about how youth have access to better resources, or about how basic learning theory shows that youth are best placed to make political judgements, or about how youth can be a catalyst for political discourse in the general population. The point is that 15 year olds generally have all the right educational advantages to qualify them to make a more informed decision. ChangeMy point was that youth do not accept social orders and seek to break them down. My opponent mostly concedes this argument, but claims that youth will just follow their parents and that these social orders are moral. The latter claim can be easily dismissed as there's no evidence for that. Denying blacks civil rights was a social order, and most people would agree breaking that was morally good. One of the most pernicious social orders today is ageism itself, which needs to stop. In any event, the bias towards conservatism in political discourse is unsettling because it isn't representative. The former claim is empirically not true. Many children would rebel, and my guess is many more would if the cycle of apathy is broken as under my model. But even if the difference would not be made by every person who is now given the vote, it would be a change for the better, since all the remainder would only be reflective of the rest of society. Slippery slopeHistory is not political studies. For everything else, see my engagement point. No stakeCon's 25% figure comes from a blog, which cites an article, which cites some computer model projections, where the computer's most pessimistic prediction was that youth WOULD only have 1/4 employment. It's not a statistic, it's a model. And the article then goes on to describe how this model's prediction is extraordinarily low. And that's just summer jobs - what about all the other forms of employment a teen might have? Nevertheless it's not relevant, because con has never justified why:1) voting is an economic decision or has primarily economic impacts2) teenagers cannot make decisions on behalf of others they care about3) we should not care about those teenagers that do work, and4) teenagers cannot think about their futureCon does say that paying taxes gives you the right to vote. Which is incredibly strange, given that he thinks older people are better voters. Pensions are in fact huge drains on tax funds, especially in our aging society - and that's not to mention the massive costs to society of dole bludging, or worse, tax dodging. The fact is that you do not "buy" a right to vote with your money, and any suggestion that taxes are for that purpose would be to completely undermine democracy. Irrational/immatureRather than rebut my argument, con chooses to rebut two random sentences of my argument. As to his claim that the science is on his side, his first article agrees with me that teens are quite capable of making good decisions, the second agrees teens make rational decisions (both in the last paragraphs), and the other two are blogs by professional writers. It's an attempt to ignore all my substantive analysis and examples to the contrary (EYP, MUNA etc). For the other claim, that raising the voting age is a "cheap and reasonable equivalent" of barring stupid voters, that depends on who gets to define stupid. I for one don't want to live in a state where people are segregated based on perceived intelligence. The point is democracy is to hear all voices - even those you think are stupid. Was David Yuval, the kid who campaigned against landmines, stupid? Malala Yousafzai, the girl who campaigned tirelessly for girls' education? Hamza Ali al-Khateeb, the greatest martyr of the Arab Spring? It took a lot of guts for adults to take these young people seriously, and they changed the world for the better. Stupid just because they're young? I don't think so. These kids went after the causes and they got the effects. Independent reasoningTo be a valid argument, pro still needs to show why independent reasoning is a valid excuse for not allowing voting. None of his sources explains how entirely independent reasoning is even possible, and they certainly don't explain why they are a necessary standard for voting. The point of my 40% figure is that the difference in independent voting (as opposed to reasoning) is very small between youth and adults. The difference is no surprise, given that there is disengagement, and it has nothing to do with independence of thinking. It's simply a sign of an apathetic attitude. I hate it too, but the difference is that con wants to reinforce it - I want it eliminated. I have a vision that we can live in a society where every voice is heard and respected. That's what I'm standing for in this debate. The resolution is affirmed.