16 hours ago, swansont said:

Who did? This is the only time “trust” appeared in the thread.

I thought it was implied in the premise of the OP, but fair enough.

6 minutes ago, sethoflagos said:

I don't know the UK 18-40 age group well enough to comment. I think my daughter votes responsibly, but like me, my son is long-term non-resident.

Younger generations, particularly those yet to be born, obviously get a free pass on the social contract.

Isn't there a whiff of whataboutism in this line of enquiry? The OP is simply asking whether our age group, those who really should know best of all, are able to justify continuation of their voting rights with a better argument than "Snot fair!"

The OP does have a point though, the rapidly ageing demography has upset the political balance and artificially (perhaps) lead us down a more and more concentrated conservative path.

I'm pretty sure, if done in secret, a child with a working knowledge of a pen would vote against their abuser, the way to balance the societal books isn't through disenfranchisement, for all the above reasons, it's through enfranchiseing the whole herd...

34 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

for all the above reasons

The only persuasive one I've heard so far is that it would be a political non-starter within most existing democratic frameworks.

1 hour ago, sethoflagos said:

The OP is simply asking whether our age group, those who really should know best of all, are able to justify continuation of their voting rights with a better argument than "Snot fair!"

But why the impatience? Why is waiting for the elderly to die such a problem that they need to be disenfranchised early?

I think the ethical principle also applies: if one demog is deemed unfit to vote, why not others? Are people who flunked, or skipped, social studies (aka civics or, in UK, broken down into citizenship, history, geography), really capable of selecting a candidate in an informed way? You see the problem here. Pretty soon it's just an elite voting, like Athens or Rome.

45 minutes ago, sethoflagos said:

The only persuasive one I've heard so far is that it would be a political non-starter within most existing democratic frameworks.

Really???

Do you look forward/backward to being of sound mind, but literally and legally unable to express it???

One person's political non-starter is another person's poison.

A political non-starter is yesterdays news, we have Trump to thank for that...

He has such a lovely cursive, it's impossible to ignore his signature.

35 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

Really???

It doesn't rely on value judgments. Such arguments tend to be pretty robust.

43 minutes ago, TheVat said:

I think the ethical principle also applies: if one demog is deemed unfit to vote, why not others? Are people who flunked, or skipped, social studies (aka civics or, in UK, broken down into citizenship, history, geography), really capable of selecting a candidate in an informed way? You see the problem here. Pretty soon it's just an elite voting, like Athens or Rome.

Now that you put it that way, the "Thin End of the Wedge" is a pretty convincing argument too.

4 minutes ago, sethoflagos said:

It doesn't rely on value judgments. Such arguments tend to be pretty robust.

Why?

I stumbled across another counterintuitive finding on the age (and gender) split:

31% of Gen Z men agree that a wife should always obey her husband and one third (33%) say a husband should have the final word on important decisions, according to a new global study of 23,000 people.

Gen Z men (born between 1997 and 2012) were twice as likely as Baby Boomer men (born between 1946 and 1964) to have traditional views on decision-making within a marriage, with just 13% and 17% of Baby Boomer men agreeing with those statements respectively.

By contrast, far fewer Gen Z women agreed that a wife should always obey her husband (18%) and an even smaller share of Baby Boomer women (6%) held that view.

https://www.kcl.ac.uk/news/almost-a-third-of-gen-z-men-agree-a-wife-should-obey-her-husband

4 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

I don't know the UK 18-40 age group well enough to comment. I think my daughter votes responsibly, but like me, my son is long-term non-resident.

Younger generations, particularly those yet to be born, obviously get a free pass on the social contract.

Isn't there a whiff of whataboutism in this line of enquiry? The OP is simply asking whether our age group, those who really should know best of all, are able to justify continuation of their voting rights with a better argument than "Snot fair!"

I subscribe to the theory of inalienable rights, and as such, no justification is necessary. The question is: what is the authority the government has to justify removing those right?

As I stated earlier, I’d be swayed by evidence that you no longer have the capacity to make an informed decision, but I don’t expect such evidence exists. Does age necessarily degrade one’s sense of responsibility for the younger generations, which presumably enters into the equation for parents?

3 hours ago, CharonY said:

I stumbled across another counterintuitive finding on the age (and gender) split:

Maybe that's why younger people no longer bother with marriage ...

1 hour ago, MigL said:

Maybe that's why younger people no longer bother with marriage ...

It is likely part of it. There a few articles describing a rather desolate state of affairs where young men and women have increasingly incompatible views and with a system that emphasizes convenience in relationships (e.g. dating apps), things might not look so good. And at the same time folks feel more lonely than ever.

3 hours ago, swansont said:

I subscribe to the theory of inalienable rights, and as such, no justification is necessary.

Isn't enfranchisement usually classed as a 'civil' rather than 'inalienable' right? As such it would seem to be beyond the remit of 'human rights' as understood internationally, and therefore well within the legitimate remit of government, wouldn't it?

I'm not saying that it's an inappropriate theory to subscribe to, but like my own version (rather loosely expressed as 'do as you would be done by) it's quite value laden. Doesn't always travel or translate too well.

4 hours ago, swansont said:

Does age necessarily degrade one’s sense of responsibility for the younger generations, which presumably enters into the equation for parents.

The young do presumably understand that one day they will be older and reliant on sympathetic legislation that they may support in part out of self-interest.

The converse is not the case.

31 minutes ago, sethoflagos said:

Isn't enfranchisement usually classed as a 'civil' rather than 'inalienable' right? As such it would seem to be beyond the remit of 'human rights' as understood internationally, and therefore well within the legitimate remit of government, wouldn't it?

That seems to come under the notion of "conflict of interest".

4 minutes ago, KJW said:

That seems to come under the notion of "conflict of interest".

Doesn't it just. (Gerrymandering etc.)

3 minutes ago, sethoflagos said:

  8 minutes ago, KJW said:

That seems to come under the notion of "conflict of interest".

Doesn't it just. (Gerrymandering etc.)

I was actually thinking of gerrymandering as another example.

34 minutes ago, KJW said:

I was actually thinking of gerrymandering as another example.

This arrived in my feed this evening. It's generally relevant, and highlights key differences between UK and US practice in these areas.

1 hour ago, sethoflagos said:

Isn't enfranchisement usually classed as a 'civil' rather than 'inalienable' right? As such it would seem to be beyond the remit of 'human rights' as understood internationally, and therefore well within the legitimate remit of government, wouldn't it?

It’s not clear that these two categories are mutually exclusive. Anyway, there are a number of governmental constitutions or other documents that recognize voting as an inalienable right (the states of New York and California, for example)

1 hour ago, sethoflagos said:

I'm not saying that it's an inappropriate theory to subscribe to, but like my own version (rather loosely expressed as 'do as you would be done by) it's quite value laden. Doesn't always travel or translate too well.

The young do presumably understand that one day they will be older and reliant on sympathetic legislation that they may support in part out of self-interest.

The converse is not the case.

Parents generally want to protect their children (and other relatives) and leave a better world for them.

A little bit off topic but still broadly relevant is that voting is compulsory in Australia. That is, voting is not just a right, it's an obligation.

20 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

It doesn't rely on value judgments. Such arguments tend to be pretty robust.

Everyone assumes that their veiw of reality is the correct one, almost no one ever question's that assumption, unless presented with a more robust argument.

No body wanted to give up their slaves, they were forced to by the value judgments of the majority, not all of which were enfranchised at the time.

13 hours ago, KJW said:

A little bit off topic but still broadly relevant is that voting is compulsory in Australia. That is, voting is not just a right, it's an obligation.

In a perfect world it's both, but no doubt that to would degrade, as the lawyers pick over the bones of meaning...

22 hours ago, swansont said:

It’s not clear that these two categories are mutually exclusive. Anyway, there are a number of governmental constitutions or other documents that recognize voting as an inalienable right (the states of New York and California, for example)

This raises an important point of principle. I've raised a new thread to discuss it in detail at To What Extent should the Right to Vote be 'Inalienable'

23 hours ago, swansont said:

Parents generally want to protect their children (and other relatives) and leave a better world for them.

But protect them from what? The bogeyman that was embedded within their consciousness 50 years ago by a xenophobic, misogynistic, anti-trades-union media when they were young adults?

Not saying that applied to everyone by any means. My own politics stemmed more from a visit to Bergen-Belsen and learning about the IR absorption of CO₂ in a Combustion Engineering course module.

I believe my political views remain valid half a century later. But I am aware that save for some minor pragmatic trimming, they're pretty much unchanged.

But what about the mobs my age who I witnessed first hand lobbing bricks at the homes of immigrants in the late '70s. Have their beliefs changed since? Are they appropriate to the existential threats we face today? Or have they happily settled into the new home of recycled and carefully curated racial hatred offered by Reform?

2 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

I believe my political views remain valid half a century later. But I am aware that save for some minor pragmatic trimming, they're pretty much unchanged.

But what about the mobs my age who I witnessed first hand lobbing bricks at the homes of immigrants in the late '70s. Have their beliefs changed since? Are they appropriate to the existential threats we face today?

This raises tough questions of how much life trajectories vary between people. I would hazard a guess there is a lot of variation. Some brick throwers repent and become sympathetic towards their brick targets. Some ossify in their bigotries. Some have transformative experiences and some avoid them. My views have shifted some - partly because I just started paying more attention to politics and ideologies, and noticing rotten spots...or areas where I'd been clueless. What I'm getting at is that so many ethical matters fall back upon the dignity and worth of the indivdual and not the statistical aggregate of social behavior.

13 hours ago, sethoflagos said:

I believe my political views remain valid half a century later. But I am aware that save for some minor pragmatic trimming, they're pretty much unchanged.

But what about the mobs my age who I witnessed first hand lobbing bricks at the homes of immigrants in the late '70s. Have their beliefs changed since? Are they appropriate to the existential threats we face today? Or have they happily settled into the new home of recycled and carefully curated racial hatred offered by Reform?

Like I've already mentioned everyone thinks their political views are valid, but they're always shaped by the society in which we live; we're all capable of becoming the brick thrower, given the right circumstances, it's arrogant to assume that your above all that.

The brick throwers are just another political ying/yang, they're like societies antibodies, they're a product of a deceased body.

11 hours ago, TheVat said:

What I'm getting at is that so many ethical matters fall back upon the dignity and worth of the indivdual and not the statistical aggregate of social behavior.

I've tried a few times to get my head around what you're trying to say here. Best I can muster is the Star Trek dichotomy: Kirk's deontological 'The good of the one outweighs the good of the many' as opposed to Spock's utilitarian 'The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few'. Ie. whether or not one prioritises the individual over the collective. If so, then it doesn't cross the Atlantic too well.

Kirk and Spock were only good together, either one, in isolation, was insufferable.
In any society, the 'good of the many' has to be finely balanced with the 'good of the few ( or one )'.
Getting that balance right is very tricky; we ( as a society ) seem to swing from either extreme to the other.