That the voting age should be lowered to 15

Con would now like to remind readers of the purpose of this debate. The resolution states that we should lower the legal voting age to 15. For Pro to uphold this resolution they must first and foremost explain why this is beneficial. Pro makes many seemingly convincing arguments for why this would be beneficial to 15-17 year olds but fails to show why it would be beneficial to the country. Also Con has made convincing arguments that this would be detrimental to a democratic society and has backed up these arguments with scientific evidence. Con will now attempt to summarize the arguments made by Pro and show a) none of the claims are substantiated rather are all hypothesized reasoning and b) Con has refuted many of the claims made by Pro with scientific evidence. Engagement/Education: Pro argues that 15-17 year olds become disenfranchised due to not being allowed to vote and that this creates an apathetic view towards voting which may result in them continuing not to vote once they do reach legal voting age. Con's main argument against this is admittedly partially of an appeal to the absurd which is why Pro characterizes this argument as being a “slippery slope” argument. Furthermore Pro states that in New Zealand students are not taught politics until the age of 13/14 thus 15 is a good age. This is not a slippery slope argument and while Con does make the argument absurd by going as low as 5 years old, Con does not feel it is absurd to consider 12, 13, or 14 year olds when Pro is making the claim that 15 is the “correct” minimum voting age. Furthermore, anyone familiar with US primary education will note that Government/Economics is generally a senior level course (17/18 years old) and thus would rule out 15 being the minimum age by Pro's own arguments for education. This is one of many instances where Pro makes a claim but offers nothing but anecdotal evidence or hypothetical arguments. If Pro's claim is that it is generally normal for children to learn politics as early as the age of 13/14, then Pro should have presented evidence to back up that claim. Without evidence, we are left with either New Zealand's educational curriculum or the United States'. This does not help to clarify this argument. Change: Pro makes the argument that older generations are more stuck in their ways, making them more likely to promote the status quo as opposed to teens who are more likely to adopt new, novel ways of thinking and thus better policies. Con presented polling data showing that, in fact, teens are more likely to merely vote however their parents do. In Con's rebuttal, they attempt to shift the BoP: “To be a valid argument, pro still needs to show why independent reasoning is a valid excuse for not allowing voting. ” Actually Pro's argument, that teens are independent and novel thinkers, has the BoP. Once again, they fail to present such evidence while Con has provided evidence that this is not the case. Pro's one piece of evidence to support this claim is a poll showing that European youth support gay rights at a much higher rate than their older counterparts (. http://www.eyp.org... ) --which they did not even present as evidence for this particular argument. First this claim presupposes that indeed gay rights are a good thing. While Con agrees, this is not objective reasoning and thus does not support the argument that change is a good thing. Next lets look at Pro's rebuttals of evidence that Con presented showing that teens do not make for very good voters. No Stake: First Pro attempts to attack Con's source which states that only 25% of teens in the US have summer jobs [8]. Pro's major problem with this source is that the number is a model not a statistic. I do not know where Pro gets this idea from or how this refutes the source. Even if we go with the historical high of 60%, this still means a large portion of teens do not work (much higher than for normal adult unemployment of <10% and even underemployment of around 20%). “From the 1950s through the 1990s, between 45 and 60 percent of teenagers had summer jobs” [8] Furthermore, following a link from this article shows that this is from US Census Data [9]. Even so, Pro makes the claim that this is irrelevant: “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 future” First, Con has shown points 2) and 4) to be the case with scientific evidence [1, 2, 3, 4]. I ask readers, what evidence has Pro presented showing these to be true? Furthermore, Con never made the argument 1). Instead Con stated that taxpayers have a right to decide where their money goes—this is not directly related to economic decisions. As for point 3), Con has stated that while some teens do work, the majority (or at the least a large portion), do not. Irrational/Immature: This argument comes down to evidence. Con has made the claim that teen brains are still developing and that studies have shown that they primarily use their amygdala as opposed to their frontal cortex when making decisions. This hinders them from making correct cause-effect decisions. This means teens are not likely to understand the ramifications of their political decisions. Pro's only rebuttal to this evidence is to present hypotheticals intended to refute sound scientific evidence. I don't think comparing Early 20th century “neuroscience” with modern neuroscience research is a valid argument (i. e. saying people argued women's/African Americans' brains were inferior—they merely stated this fact, there was no scientific evidence to back it up as I have presented for teen brains). I think the evidence vs. non-evidence speaks for itself. Con has presented numerous sources—what sources has Pro offered to support their arguments? In conclusion, this debate comes down to evidence. Pro has made elegant pleas as to why teens should be allowed to vote. However, all of Pro's arguments hinge on one single assumption: teens will make good voters. Con has presented overwhelming evidence to support the idea that a) teens are irrational and thus cannot make good political decisions and b) teens are likely to just vote the same as their parents anyway. I will end with a quote from one of my sources which I think hammers home the idea that 15-17 year olds, living at home with their parents, are not likely to make independent decisions. “By the end of the high school years, there’s a “high point of agreement” between parents and children, he said. But during the college years, children who no longer live with their parents are “pretty malleable,” subject to influence from peers, the media and current events and issues, Franklin said. ” [6] Sources:[1] . http://www.aacap.org...[2] . http://brainconnection.positscience.com...[3] . http://www.tesh.com...[4] . http://www.cnn.com... [5] . http://articles.mcall.com...[6] . http://gazettextra.com...[7] . http://www.gallup.com... [8] . http://www.slate.com... [9] . http://online.wsj.com...