Young Canadians launch legal challenge to lower voting age

[CitizenVectron]

Young Canadians launch court challenge to lower federal voting age from 18 | CBC News

WWW.CBC.CA

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Thirteen young people from across the country, ranging in age from 12 to 18, are going to court to argue that the section of the Canada Elections Act which bars Canadians under 18 from voting in federal elections is unconstitutional.

 

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On Tuesday, 13 young people from across the country, ranging in age from 12 to 18, filed an application at the Ontario Superior Court of Justice arguing that the section of the Canada Elections Act which bars Canadians under 18 from voting in federal elections is unconstitutional.

 

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The group is making the argument that the rule violates two sections of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms: Section 3, which states that "every citizen of Canada" has the right to vote in an election for members of the House of Commons or a legislative assembly; and Section 15, which states that "every individual is equal before and under the law."

 

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Though the group has not suggested an appropriate minimum voting age, it noted that several other countries — such as Germany, Brazil and Austria — have lowered their voting ages to 16, while four major federal parties — the Liberals, Conservatives, New Democrats and Greens — already allow Canadians under 18 to vote in party leadership contests.

 

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The federal voting age was last changed in 1970, when it was lowered from 21 to 18.

 

An interesting legal challenge. In Canada, the voting age is not set constitutionally, and can be changed by a simple act of Parliament. The current Supreme Court (if they can get that far) is pretty progressive, and has already been very liberal on their rulings on restrictions in voting. I am curious to see how this goes, and if they can get the voting age lowered to 16.

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

nah

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

The human brain doesn't really reach "maturity" until around the age of 25.

 

If anything, we should be RAISING the age for many, many things.

[Bacon]

The younger you are the more likely you are to vote as a joke. 

[AbsolutSurgen]

I agree with @Commissar SFLUFAN If anything, we should INCREASE the voting age.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Just now, AbsolutSurgen said:

I agree with @Commissar SFLUFAN If anything, we should INCREASE the voting age.

 

Voting Age

Drinking Age

Driving Age

Military Service Age

Etc.

 

All of these (and more) should be increased to better reflect human psychological/physiological development.  The notion that someone is an "adult" when they reach the age of 18 is absolutely ludicrous.

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

voting age should be the age of legal adulthood, nothing else

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Just now, b_m_b_m_b_m said:

voting age should be the age of legal adulthood, nothing else

 

And that should NOT be 18.

[AbsolutSurgen]

1 minute ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

Voting Age

Drinking Age

Driving Age

Military Service Age

Etc.

 

All of these (and more) should be increased to better reflect human psychological/physiological development.  The notion that someone is an "adult" when they reach the age of 18 is absolutely ludicrous.

I do think that some of these should be at different ages.

Driving and drinking(separately, of course) are things that can be handled earlier.

IMHO, military service, voting and "adulthood" is something that people aren't quite ready for until sometime in their 20s.

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

i'd only agree if it comes with mandatory schooling until 25. otherwise leaving legal minors adrift for 7 years is bad news

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Just now, AbsolutSurgen said:

Driving and drinking(separately, of course) are things that can be handled earlier.

 

I absolutely disagree with this.

 

Alcohol consumption and driving are inherently risk-based assessment activities and our brains really aren't equipped to make effective risk-based decisions until our 20s.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

2 minutes ago, b_m_b_m_b_m said:

i'd only agree if it comes with mandatory schooling until 25. otherwise leaving legal minors adrift for 7 years is bad news

 

25 doesn't necessarily need to be the "magic" age - it could be 21 or 22.

 

But I'm goddamned sure that it ain't 18!

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

1 minute ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

25 doesn't necessarily need to be the "magic" age - it could be 21 or 22.

 

But I'm goddamned sure that it ain't 18!

I mean the same point applies. Legal minorhood for whatever purpose but without the required structure of schooling or working (if you can't drive in this country you effectively can't work) will lead to the worst possible outcomes.

[AbsolutSurgen]

2 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

I absolutely disagree with this.

 

Alcohol consumption and driving are inherently risk-based assessment activities and our brains really aren't equipped to make effective risk-based decisions until our 20s.

We'll have to agree to disagree.

Moderate alcohol consumption for people in their late teens has been commonplace in the world for a long period of time.  I have seen some reports (not recently) that this results in less binge drinking than in places where it is banned.  IMHO, binge drinking can be problematic, moderate drinking much less so.

I think driving is more complicated - young males make bad decisions and are responsible for a lot of the deaths from driving.  However, the access to opportunities (work, etc.) that driving enables are something I think are hard to deny younger folks.

 

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

Just now, AbsolutSurgen said:

the access to opportunities (work, etc.) that driving enables are something I think are hard to deny younger folks.

there is a third way here but it would require re-engineering the built environment away from the nearly universal requirement to drive.

 

and since we're already entertaining the idea of raising the age of legal adulthood this should be on the table too! and for far better reasons than "your brain is still squishy at 18"

[mclumber1]

12 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

Voting Age

Drinking Age

Driving Age

Military Service Age

Etc.

 

All of these (and more) should be increased to better reflect human psychological/physiological development.  The notion that someone is an "adult" when they reach the age of 18 is absolutely ludicrous.

 

I would only agree to all of this as long as those under the age of 25 are actually treated as minors when they break the law - no serious jail (juvenile detention only), along with wiping clean of their criminal record once they become an adult at 25.  

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

3 minutes ago, mclumber1 said:

 

I would only agree to all of this as long as those under the age of 25 are actually treated as minors when they break the law - no serious jail (juvenile detention only), along with wiping clean of their criminal record once they become an adult at 25.  

 

No objections on my end to that at all.

[AbsolutSurgen]

2 minutes ago, b_m_b_m_b_m said:

there is a third way here but it would require re-engineering the built environment away from the nearly universal requirement to drive.

 

and since we're already entertaining the idea of raising the age of legal adulthood this should be on the table too! and for far better reasons than "your brain is still squishy at 18"

Unless you completely remove people from rural environments, it's impossible to remove that need.

My wife didn't learn to drive until she was 27 (and I have lots of friends who don't own cars) -- there are places today you can live and not need a car.

 

18 is an arbitrary age -- and was developed when people lived for a much shorter time, and we didn't understand brain development.  

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

1 minute ago, AbsolutSurgen said:

Unless you completely remove people from rural environments, it's impossible to remove that need.

My wife didn't learn to drive until she was 27 (and I have lots of friends who don't own cars) -- there are places today you can live and not need a car.

 

18 is an arbitrary age -- and was developed when people lived for a much shorter time, and we didn't understand brain development.  

most people in 'rural' areas live in and very near small towns which can easily be navigated without a car if we allow it to happen.

 

but most people do not live in these places anyway; they live in cities and suburbs. and in the US these places have a nearly universal requirement to drive. those places where you don't need a car to drive were engineered around non-car mobility, whereas the US has spent the last 70 years making driving a requirement and actively undermining our cities. this is not so much the case in Canada which is more urban than the US and with a higher transit modal share

[AbsolutSurgen]

3 minutes ago, b_m_b_m_b_m said:

most people in 'rural' areas live in and very near small towns which can easily be navigated without a car if we allow it to happen.

 

but most people do not live in these places anyway; they live in cities and suburbs. and in the US these places have a nearly universal requirement to drive. those places where you don't need a car to drive were engineered around non-car mobility, whereas the US has spent the last 70 years making driving a requirement and actively undermining our cities. this is not so much the case in Canada which is more urban than the US and with a higher transit modal share

I wasn't suggesting that most people live in rural areas.  I was suggesting that you can't ignore them when creating driving laws.  

[brucoe]

As someone who actually studies elections, the real problem with any age limitation on voting is that even older voters tend to be massively uninformed about practically everything politically. We'd probably get better election results by just having a lottery, but we're so predisposed to believe that elections are better just because we've never actually participated in a lottery other than high odds games that involve money payouts. Adams was a strong proponent of lotteries and wanted to integrate them into our system, but the other founders vetoed him (by voting for something else, ironically).

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

1 minute ago, AbsolutSurgen said:

I wasn't suggesting that most people live in rural areas.  I was suggesting that you can't ignore them when creating driving laws.  

I never do, I grew up in a small town in rural Appalachia and it's what I always keep in mind. But acting like rural areas can't make it without the ability to drive is asinine. They require the ability to drive because we built these rural areas to require the ability to drive.  To say nothing of the rest of the planet where most people don't have cars

[mclumber1]

Yeah, but why would I decide to take the bus to work, which could be a long ordeal, an hour or more with multiple bus changes, versus just driving to work, which would take 20 minutes? 

[Jason]

50 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

 

I absolutely disagree with this.

 

Alcohol consumption and driving are inherently risk-based assessment activities and our brains really aren't equipped to make effective risk-based decisions until our 20s.

 

Alcohol should come before driving. Get a few years of figuring out what alcohol does to you before letting you drive, instead of letting you drive for a few years before suddenly saying okay, you can drink now, good luck! 

[Anathema-]

1 hour ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

The human brain doesn't really reach "maturity" until around the age of 25.

 

If anything, we should be RAISING the age for many, many things.

 

but then how does the MIC justify throwing the bodies of children into the meat grinder

[Jason]

As to the actual article, maaaaayyyyyybe 16, definitely not 12.

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

13 minutes ago, mclumber1 said:

Yeah, but why would I decide to take the bus to work, which could be a long ordeal, an hour or more with multiple bus changes, versus just driving to work, which would take 20 minutes? 

this is what transit use looks like with suburban land use planning combined with an insufficiently funded transit system

[Keyser_Soze]

1 hour ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

The human brain doesn't really reach "maturity" until around the age of 25.

 

If anything, we should be RAISING the age for many, many things.

 

And for some people 25 is not old enough to stop someone from throwing out an idiotic vote or eating horse paste.

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Just now, Keyser_Soze said:

 

And for some people 25 is not old enough to stop someone from throwing out an idiotic vote or eating horse paste.

 

You're absolutely correct, but at the very least, the psychological/physiological basis for making "rational" decisions is present.

[unogueen]

We need voters who have the piss and vinegar of the infirm denied but with the unrepresented energy of loan age college students. It's clear the old guard and social structure do too much to repress an honest hope for change. Let the kids fuck up the world for once.

[CitizenVectron]

Let's just draw some numbers out of hats for each election. Sometimes only 16, 29, and 73-year-olds are allowed to vote, other times it's 25, 30, and 45-year-olds.

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

only 69 year olds 

[Jason]

5 minutes ago, b_m_b_m_b_m said:

only 69 year olds 

 

also 42

[Keyser_Soze]

If you can satisfy @Commissar SFLUFAN intellectually you can vote no matter the age.

[LazyPiranha]

Why is thirteen kids doing something news?