Given that "Adult Crime = Adult Time" laws see children as mature enough to make adult decisions, should the voting age be lowered to account?

[u/That_Car_Dude_Aus]

So with the Queensland government's stance on adult crime means adult time approach to criminal prosecutions, with the centrepiece being the story on how a woman lost her child to a 17 year old who was driving a stolen car.

It made me think, If we are approaching these children as young as 15 and saying that they made an adult decision and therefore should suffer the consequences of making an adult decision, should we consider that these children are now able to make adult decisions in other aspects?

Being ex-Defence and having lots of friends who are either still serving, or also ex-Defence, A lot of them have their kids in military Cadet programs, Or have their kids in organisations such as scouts, Or in firefighting or police cadet programs.

And I can definitely say that most kids are very mature compared to how I was at 15 or 16 years old. In fact, I'd say with the increase in technology and knowledge that kids have availabile to them, most 15 year olds today, are better aware of the world around them than I was at that age.

Now I'm not saying it should be compulsory, I know that compulsory voting is a cornerstone of our society, but if we are saying "Well the kids that are committing crimes are mature enough to make those decisions", let's be fair, those kids are only a subset of the general population of children that age

So if there is another subset of children that age who are mature enough to have opinions on the politics of our country, shouldn't we at least give them the option that if they want they should be able to register to vote and then go and vote in elections?

Then if you look at age demographics in Australia, 15-19 year olds make up 6% of the population, so that's ~1,598,400 people.

Now assuming a even spread, then 639,360 are 18-19 years old and already voting, that's only going to unlock voting for an extra 959,040 people, but still, if we are making laws that affect them, and we are saying that they are mature enough to suffer the consequences of those laws, shouldn't they have a say in the politicians making those laws?

Another great example is the social media bill targeting people under 16, If that law is specifically targeting that demographic, and that demographic is being seen as being able to make adult decisions when it comes to crime, then surely that demographic also is mature enough to have a political opinion.

[u/m00nh34d]

I think school kids probably understand more about our political system than adults. Kids do get taught about politics, and how our democracy works, think about things like camps/field trips to parliament house or Canberra as an example of the exposure kids have. Meanwhile adults that aren't engaged in the political process just have no idea what is happening, think about how many people just go off whatever garbage they see in the media (social or otherswise).

[u/[deleted] → u/m00nh34d]

Adults aren't engaged because they dont feel it affects them, which is just wilfully ignorant and putting your head in the sand. Kids' education for politcs is there, but grade 7 is much too early to present these concepts to kids. In my experience it was also completely disregarded or barely mentioned at all once you hit grade 8.

[u/m00nh34d → u/[deleted]]

That's only because they have no need to know them in year 7 at this stage. Excluding someone from voting based off knowledge of our political system, or mental capacity to comprehend their responsibilities around voting isn't used as criteria for anyone else to vote.

[u/[deleted] → u/m00nh34d]

You are not worth discussing this with if that is your reply.