Posts by Yamis
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I think the reason why those under 20 year olds are kept away from the "adults" is more to do with how those over 20 treat those under 20. NOT because the under 20s feel they deserve special treatment or aren't "responsible" enough to deal with adult prison conditions.
The greatest worry I have as a teacher is the distraction every three years as schools potentially turn into mini political battle fields while we are trying to get the kids their bloody credits.
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I can only assume it's because there are about 3 people in these forums who know anything about Fay and Richwhite or care to comment on them.
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It's 16 and 17 year olds getting the vote not everybody over the age of 17 NOT being allowed to vote.
The percentage of 16 and 17 year olds who would vote would probably be under 50%. Not sure what that would work out at in terms of total numbers.
I remember being in the 7th form in 1993 and all my classmates being able to vote in the elections that were coming up and I couldn't cos I was still 17. Felt well pissed off.
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As a teacher of 13-18 year olds....
There are many of them in the 16-17 age range who wouldn't have a freakin clue who to vote for or why somebody should or shouldn't get their vote.
But then again as somebody alluded to earlier they wouldn't vote so there's no big deal.
The only ones who would vote would be those who are intelligent enough to get themselves enrolled, learn a little about what the parties stand for and then get motivated enough on election day to head to the polling booth.
So on those grounds I'm comfortable with 16 years olds being allowed to vote as I know that I'd have one or two out of a class of 20 odd voting.
+ there are so many bigoted dickheads out there who get to vote and nobody stops them. They might be 'old enough' to make an informed decision only problem is they still don't make an informed decision. Unless being informed is disliking how a few leaders look and hating large sections of society, or hanging round fellow bigots who repeat what each other said so much they all actually believe it to be fact.
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Somebody (from NZ I presume) changed the first person on the list to Theresa Gattung !!!!!
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That's some freaky shit jon.
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At fifteen you are not considered prepared or responsible enough to make decisions about your own body. You can't have sex. You can't smoke. You can't drink.
yeah you can. Your'e just not allowed by law ;)
On the carrying shopping thing, do you live alone or just shop for yourself?
If I tried to carry a couple of days groceries home to our house I think I'd still be walking a week later. Bit harder doing it for a family.
We wouldn't trust a fifteen-year-old with a job in air traffic control, or in a key role in a medical environment,
That's never going to happen because they can't leave school until they are 16 and then would have to undergo years of tertiary education before being qualified enough to perform those tasks.
I think though having argued on the side of giving the kids a break that we should consider raising the age to 16 simply because one of the big arguments for it being 15 was that many young people had left school and needed to get to work. Since the leaving age has been raised to 16 maybe the driving age could follow suit. I don't think I got my full license until I was 18 cos I was a wuss.
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Of course horse-ownership in the middle ages wasn't as widespread (for some parts of Europe at least) as car-ownership nowadays, but as I recall there were various incidents then that showed how useful* widespread horse-ownership by up-to-no-good youths (especially along with bows and arrows) could be...
John Wayne drove a pretty mean horse. Not sure what the legal blood alcohol levels were back then though for riding the nags. Probably a minimum of 4 shots of whisky with no maximum.
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Ben you can add to your argument that most formula one racing drivers and all professional racing car drivers started out in the cart racing competitions when they were kids and progressed through the ranks. They didn't learn to drive when they were 20 and suddenly realised how awesome they were and turned pro.
Practice makes perfect.
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Kids can leave school and get a job at 15 and you're limiting their options even more than they have already done themselves by not allowing them to drive.
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That would be 16 these days. We took away some of their rights a few years ago to do what they want and decided we should torture them a bit longer.
On the argument about whether or not 15 year olds need to be able to drive and can get by if they have to wait another year or two... well yeah of course they can in the same way that most of us would get by if somebody amputated both of our legs. It wouldn't kill us but it would be bloody inconvenient.
Also I just keep coming back to the stats in RB's original post about the accident rates for 15-19 year olds actually coming DOWN.
If we go purely by them we should throw a party and congratulate young people on being more responsible on the roads than previous generations. Especially considering the higher levels of car ownership by younger people as costs have come down.
I just made that last sentence up because I'm too lazy to go check.