T Nation

Political Views of the Youth

Politics and World Issues
#1

Do you think young people don’t care about Politics or does need to find another way to get the youth interested in Politics?

Any opinons and expressions are wanted.

Mine: I think there is a good majority of kids that care, but I think they may not look at both sides. For example, Obama.
Plenty of kids like Obama because he’s not Bush and he’s not Republican. But they don’t focus on his lack of experience. Obama is the popular vote and has been for a while. McCain is too old and too republican to capture the youth.

#2

Damn Wol, your avatar is incredible. Where did you find her? You need some music to go with that…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTI2xX5ttkQ&eurl=http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=dj+assault&hl=en&sitesearch=

Where was I, oh yeah. They need to encourage young kids in school to study current events and have some civil debate. It is up to us elders to encourage them to be engaged and not neccessarily agree with us.

#3

It’s called PIG, and it’s a NY requirement for all High School grads. If it weren’t for the hilariously biased classrooms, that’d do it.

#4

[quote]Sifu wrote:
Damn Wol, your avatar is incredible. Where did you find her? You need some music to go with that…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTI2xX5ttkQ&eurl=http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=dj+assault&hl=en&sitesearch=

Where was I, oh yeah. They need to encourage young kids in school to study current events and have some civil debate. It is up to us elders to encourage them to be engaged and not neccessarily agree with us.

[/quote]

The music goes with great with the avatar. Good stuff, Sifu.

#5

[quote]Beowolf wrote:
It’s called PIG, and it’s a NY requirement for all High School grads. If it weren’t for the hilariously biased classrooms, that’d do it.[/quote]

I didn’t have that when I was school. But I’m from NC.

#6

PIG = Participation in Government. The students have to attend town council meetings and are all registered to vote.

I took AP US Government and Politics instead.

The teacher, while I do like her a lot, is incredibly left slanted. She honestly tries to be impartial but it leaks through in a lot of ways.

The looks I got in class when I suggested that I might be voting Republican was priceless. The looks following my thought out explanation and Obama-bashing were even more so.

=D

#7

[quote]Beowolf wrote:
PIG = Participation in Government. The students have to attend town council meetings and are all registered to vote.

I took AP US Government and Politics instead.

The teacher, while I do like her a lot, is incredibly left slanted. She honestly tries to be impartial but it leaks through in a lot of ways.

The looks I got in class when I suggested that I might be voting Republican was priceless. The looks following my thought out explanation and Obama-bashing were even more so.

=D[/quote]

Since you’re against Obama, who would be the better candidate? McCain is just too fucking old.

#8

[quote]WolBarret wrote:
Beowolf wrote:
PIG = Participation in Government. The students have to attend town council meetings and are all registered to vote.

I took AP US Government and Politics instead.

The teacher, while I do like her a lot, is incredibly left slanted. She honestly tries to be impartial but it leaks through in a lot of ways.

The looks I got in class when I suggested that I might be voting Republican was priceless. The looks following my thought out explanation and Obama-bashing were even more so.

=D

Since you’re against Obama, who would be the better candidate? McCain is just too fucking old.[/quote]

Why is age a consideration to you?

Do you think his taste in music or whatever is important?

#9

[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
WolBarret wrote:
Beowolf wrote:
PIG = Participation in Government. The students have to attend town council meetings and are all registered to vote.

I took AP US Government and Politics instead.

The teacher, while I do like her a lot, is incredibly left slanted. She honestly tries to be impartial but it leaks through in a lot of ways.

The looks I got in class when I suggested that I might be voting Republican was priceless. The looks following my thought out explanation and Obama-bashing were even more so.

=D

Since you’re against Obama, who would be the better candidate? McCain is just too fucking old.

Why is age a consideration to you?

Do you think his taste in music or whatever is important?

[/quote]

No, his age just worries me. Looks like he’ll die any minute. I can’t see him living through his entire presidency. And this isn’t a crack on him, just how I feel.

#10

[quote]WolBarret wrote:
…
No, his age just worries me. Looks like he’ll die any minute. I can’t see him living through his entire presidency. And this isn’t a crack on him, just how I feel.[/quote]

An old man with the best medical care in the world vs. a black man as president. Even Hillary alluded to someone taking a shot at Obama.

#11

[quote]

An old man with the best medical care in the world vs. a black man as president. Even Hillary alluded to someone taking a shot at Obama.[/quote]

Not a shot at anyone but I think this comment does a good job of summing up why many young people do not care about politics. It isn’t that there are two sides that differ in approach and philosophy, it’s that there’s a good side and a pure evil side.

#12

[quote]905Patrick wrote:

An old man with the best medical care in the world vs. a black man as president. Even Hillary alluded to someone taking a shot at Obama.

Not a shot at anyone but I think this comment does a good job of summing up why many young people do not care about politics. It isn’t that there are two sides that differ in approach and philosophy, it’s that there’s a good side and a pure evil side. [/quote]

Who is pure evil? McCain wouldn’t take the shot at Obama and I doubt McCain will get much support from those that would. Paul supporters on the other hand…

#13

I would think that most elections aren’t really decided on the issues, but on the sympathy and emotional bond voters have with their candidates.

That’s why Bill Clinton and George W. Bush even got re-elected and Bush Senior and Al Gore didn’t.

I woulnd’t worry about the ‘young people’ - since days of yore people thought that the younger generations were uninterested, had no manners and no ideas, and still they managed to move societies forward. I’d have some faith in them.

Makkun

#14

[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
Who is pure evil? McCain wouldn’t take the shot at Obama and I doubt McCain will get much support from those that would. Paul supporters on the other hand…[/quote]

The other side tends to view or present their rivals as pure evil.

#15

[quote]905Patrick wrote:
The other side tends to view or present their rivals as pure evil.[/quote]

This isn’t a youth problem. This is a people problem.

#16

[quote]WolBarret wrote:
Plenty of kids like Obama because he’s not Bush and he’s not Republican. But they don’t focus on his lack of experience. Obama is the popular vote and has been for a while. McCain is too old and too republican to capture the youth.
[/quote]

Young people like Obama because he appeals to EMOTION. The things he talks about and the way that he talks about them are inspirational, feel-good, optimistic – almost revolutionary in a sense. His followers really are convinced they’re part of a NEWNESS, a step forward, an evolved political candidate.

Combine this with the fact that they haven’t been around long enough to have had similar pie-in-the-sky promises made and broken, and you’ve got a helluva great guy on your hands – at least until reality shows up.

#17

[quote]Beowolf wrote:
PIG = Participation in Government. The students have to attend town council meetings and are all registered to vote.

I took AP US Government and Politics instead.

The teacher, while I do like her a lot, is incredibly left slanted. She honestly tries to be impartial but it leaks through in a lot of ways.

The looks I got in class when I suggested that I might be voting Republican was priceless. The looks following my thought out explanation and Obama-bashing were even more so.

=D[/quote]

At what age is this going on? Consider this. An 18 year old voting this November was 11-12 when 9/11 happened and 12-13 when the invasion of Iraq happened. It would be an exceptional kid who at those ages who would have known enough about world events to understand the paradigm change that occurred on 9/11.

It also would have been an exceptional kid who would have watched President Bush’s speech to the UN where Bush clearly spelled out the new paradigm that 9/11 created. In that speech Bush spelled out why we could no longer continue with the old paradigm of taking dangerous people like Sadaam for granted.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/...20020912-1.html

A lot of these kids who are supporting Obama do not realize that the change Obama is calling is merely a return to the old pre 9/11 paradigm of not taking threats seriously until after thousands have died.

#18

Yeah man! Like, politics is like, totally RAD! Like, Obama and McCain and like, the White House and stuff is all like, yeah! Way cool! Like, I learned on Wikipedia that like, you know, like stuff happens in like, Washington DC and stuff!

Me and my homies were all like, you know, like talking about like, Bush and stuff, and like he goes “yeah man, like Bush started a war and stuff to get oil and like, make a police state”

And I go “like dude, like, I’m voting for Obama cuz he’s like, a democrat and he wants to stop Bush and the war and stuff” and he goes all “well, dude, like, Obama is like, so cool cuz he is like all for hope and change and stuff, and only racists won’t vote for him” and I go “like I’m not racist, and I hate Bush and Cheney and Hitler and stuff, so I’ll vote for like, Obama.”

Then we got stoned and watched Half Baked for like the bazillionth time!

#19

[quote]skaz05 wrote:
Yeah man! Like, politics is like, totally RAD! Like, Obama and McCain and like, the White House and stuff is all like, yeah! Way cool! Like, I learned on Wikipedia that like, you know, like stuff happens in like, Washington DC and stuff!

Me and my homies were all like, you know, like talking about like, Bush and stuff, and like he goes “yeah man, like Bush started a war and stuff to get oil and like, make a police state”

And I go “like dude, like, I’m voting for Obama cuz he’s like, a democrat and he wants to stop Bush and the war and stuff” and he goes all “well, dude, like, Obama is like, so cool cuz he is like all for hope and change and stuff, and only racists won’t vote for him” and I go “like I’m not racist, and I hate Bush and Cheney and Hitler and stuff, so I’ll vote for like, Obama.”

Then we got stoned and watched Half Baked for like the bazillionth time![/quote]

Bill O Reily has a point.

#20

[quote]WolBarret wrote:
Do you think young people don’t care about Politics or does need to find another way to get the youth interested in Politics?

Any opinons and expressions are wanted.

Mine: I think there is a good majority of kids that care, but I think they may not look at both sides. For example, Obama.

Plenty of kids like Obama because he’s not Bush and he’s not Republican. But they don’t focus on his lack of experience. Obama is the popular vote and has been for a while. McCain is too old and too republican to capture the youth.
[/quote]

In 1920s Germany, the major parties ignored young people and became just like the current crop of political major parties here today. The government became ineffectual. This drove young people to the fringe parties when the economy headed south in the late 20s — Germany had borrowed a lot from the USA and had a false prosperity based on borrowed money.

When the house of cards fell (as it always will), Hitler stepped up with promises and women fainting at his rallies.

Wow, sounds a lot like today.

“Germany’s unforgivable crime before the second world war,” Churchill said," was her attempt to extricate her economic power from the world’s trading system and to create her own exchange mechanism which would deny world finance its opportunity to profit." (Churchill to Lord Robert Boothby, quoted in the Foreword, 2nd Ed. Sydney Rogerson, Propaganda in the Next War
2001, orig. 1938.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdM8PDu6VMg&feature=related

The future…