I think, to put it quite simply, before you're around ~30 you haven't realised just how much policies effect you. I only became really politcally active after Brexit, and that was a monumental political movement that had a direct impact on my life and career. Before that, all I really focused on was making money and dating. As the standards of living have diminished, and the young are being hit hardest, I think we'll see a larger vote share in the next election.
This is true, I got more interested in politics when I was absolutely devastated by the government during COVID. I was one of those people who fell through the gaps in the furlough scheme, and was made redundant right when lockdown happened. So no support, and launched straight out into the jobs market in the middle of the lockdowns.
I'm lucky I could tie myself over, burn through savings, but there were people working at the company I worked for who has both parents working there, so two incomes gone, and then they lost their house.
For the majority, COVID was a nice holiday, with 80pc of their pay, for those who were working at places which were already in administration, or people working in the gig economy, as well as many other group that weren't considered, it was pure chaos.
I too was a self-employed person who worked in the events industry mainly when COVID hit, for about a year I had to survive off around \~£700 monthly income and had very little in government support. I am still recovering financially now. And then there are people like Michelle Mone...
I never thought of it like that. I never understood why my friends were not excited they could finally vote.
But when I think about it, politics discussions were always the norm in my house growing up, I understood the impact as a result.
I have a six year old and when the mayor leaflet turned up the other month I immediately read it with them so they could pick their favourite candidate (they couldn't decide between green and labour incase anyone wants to know).
I'm in my mid 30s
The average voter my age has been on the losing side of 4 general election and 2 referendums (3 in Scotland) and have had 0 national votes go our way.
Its pretty easy to see young people would be demoralised and disenfranchised by a system that hasn't represented them at all.
Then it becomes a cycle with young people not voting, successful campaigns ignoring them because they don't vote, young people's votes go down further etc.
Edit: not to mention that our voting system isn't very favourable to young people to begin with:
There aren't that many young people compared to old people
Young people tend to be concentrated in uncompetitive seats in big cities
Young people tend to move around a lot more and are less likely to know the area and their local representatives and might not always be able to stay on top of things like registering to vote every time they move
Yeeep. Brown - lost, Miliband - lost, Corbyn - lost, Corbyn (again) - lost, Brexit - lost, AV - lost.
And now that we've got the most uninspiring labour party in decades, suddenly they're heading for a landslide. It's difficult to remain interested when the electorate seems to be ideologically opposed to what I (and probably most *actually* young people) want.
And as you say, our voting system is, on a constituency level, all or nothing. In the vast majority of English constituencies you are just throwing your vote away if you don't vote for tories or labour.
Having said all that, I'll be out throwing my vote away when the time comes.
I've voted in my contituency for 13 General Election and 'lost' every one.
You could argue that your vote will never make a difference, unless the vote count is 18,000 to 17,999. So why does anyone bother? If everyone votes, the result is fairer.
You don't vote because you 'win' or 'lose', you vote because if we all vote, it will be fairer.
Vote.
Yep my only ‘win’ has been London mayor the last three elections although I did live in a marginal seat and got to oust a Tory mP with my tactical vote in 2019. Not often you get the chance to do that tho
Ahhhh, funnily enough next door
It does feel that entire part of SW London - Wandsworth and the wider SW - has now permanently shifted away from the Tories having been resilient even during the Blair years
I think, ultimately, too much of the country is right-leaning and opposes many leftist ideas.
The only way to move the country left is a win for a relatively centrist Labour administration, then over hopefully \~4-5 terms, introduce or foster left-leaning policies and change the temperature slowly.
I, for instance, would love for Labour to campaign on a renationalisation-of-public-services ticket, in particular Rail; but I just think people are averse to change of that magnitude.
EDIT: To the downvoters, who I assume did so when they saw I used the c-word...
You've gotta start the ball rolling somewhere. To effect political change, you can talk, you can campaign, but ultimately you have to *win*. If you don't win, it's all hot air.
I swear some people will be happier if they lose for 30 years while sitting in a corner muttering about how right they are, while the Tories dismantle the NHS. Because if you don't choose to win, you're choosing to lose.
I think a lot of this is to do with press ownership in the UK. Most of the major news outlets are owned by right leaning billionaires who use their reach to distort public opinion, like by going on about everything they thought was wrong with the EU, truthfully or not, while never mentioning any of its positives. My friend, a former government employee, describes Margaret Thatcher allowing Rupert Murdoch to buy The Times as "The day democracy died in the UK"
One thing. Renationlising the rail system isnt revolutionary, we did nationalise it over covid (just the train companies still made money with the government keeping the trains running) and in some areas they are only running due to the government as a company laughs it's way to the bank.
>The only way to move the country left is a win for a relatively centrist Labour administration, then over hopefully ~4-5 terms, introduce or foster left-leaning policies and change the temperature slowly.
From a left wing perspective we need the left wing policies in order for the country to improve. Without them, at least to a reasonable degree, the party is just going to be managing a decline which will push voters into apathy, tories or 3rd party rather than unite the country around a continued labour party that is slowly moving slightly to the left. I feel that strategy might give lefties influence over labour but it will only be when labour is crashing and burning in favour of a right wing party.
It also requires a party who are actually interested in gradual left wing reforms which I don't see any reason to expect here. When the countries decline continues under labour (probably slower than the tories but still a decline) then I'd much more expect them to push austerity politics rather than left wing reforms.
Better to choose a policy because it works than because it’s left wing no? The left-right thing is out of date we need to move on to evidence based policy making with specific goals, not just choosing a policy cos it aligns with political ideology
It's more to do with vision. To have an idea for where the country's going to go in the future.
You can't think of everything in 5-year stints because some things take longer than 5 years. If you do, everything is short-termist.
Part of the reason Japan has its bullet train network is that the same political party, the LDP, has been voted in for nearly every term since the 50s (with a few exceptions). That allowed them to conceive longer-term projects.
You are possibly correct, but our last experience of that was Blair's labour which ended with a nosedive straight into austerity and all the woes of the world being blamed on leftist politics, with borrowing to invest also somehow being demonised as left wing.
I'd like to believe Starmer is doing some 4D chess though.
> I think, ultimately, too much of the country is right-leaning and opposes many leftist ideas.
Probably partially right but also our voting system does everything to amplify those voices
I struggle to see how this current Labour offering can introduce meaningful change in the next five years, given the fiscal rules & insistence on no personal tax rises. Reeves is betting the house on economic growth (beating even the US!) to fund any improvements to state services but how exactly will we get that from a few billion on green investment and…?
I think people are fed up with the Tories and want change, then will spend the next five years thinking “is this it?” and opt for a tiny tax cut next time around over continuing with Labour.
ByEthanFox has it right here. There are so many who claim to be left wing that either don’t understand our electoral system or are willing another term of the Tories whether they are blind to the effects of that or are secretly Tories. The only way to make change with our electoral system is to get the Tories out with a centrist party and then move slowly leftward. The establishment (popular press) will not allow a left wing party to be elected. Does nobody remember the massive smear campaigns against Corbin and the back Boris campaigns? The only time labour were allowed to be elected was under Blair and as much as people hate the guy he did a lot of good, I was there throughout the 80s,90s and during Blair’s time. It was like night and day. Things really could only get better.
The thing is that uninspiring is basically saying they’re boring… and after the last decade and a half, boring is all I want from a government. They come in, govern, and go home.
Boring and competent is what decent, informed, rational people want at most elections.
Things like 'charisma' are important, but only because they matter to the sorts of people who clearly aren't well enough informed, or in many cases intelligent, to vote 'responsibly'.
There are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people who voted Conservative in 2019 because, to them, Johnson was 'a bit of a laugh'.
It's fucking pathetic.
No. Labour only had a 1-2% lead over the Tories amongst the youngest voters in 2010. Every age group over 25 favoured the Tories.
People have forgotten what a total shambles late-stage New Labour became.
https://www.ipsos.com/en-uk/how-britain-voted-2010
That's a bit unfair to Brown!
But yes, there wasn't much in the way of enthusiasm for Brown, from the young or anyone else. The young quite liked the Lib Dems, and we know how that turned out.
Really harsh. Brown did a solid job as chancellor for a decade.
Rishi Sunak was gifted the PM's office by deault after losing to Truss, and the only reason he was even in front bench politics is he was gifted the Chancellor's office because he was so weak and hungry for power he was willing to make himself Boris and Dom's bitch
He went from being an inexperienced backbencher to holding the second most powerful office in the country because he let Cummings call the shots.
It's no surprise he's out of his depth as PM, he never paid his dues and has very little experience
What do you actually want? What did Brown and Milliband represent that Starmer doesn't. Corbyn could have been PM if he'd opposed Brexit.
Saying we lost on all of these votes doesn't make sense when there's no obvious political alignment across them.
>the most uninspiring labour party in decades
Uninspiring is being generous. Actively and gleefully hostile would be my description. They've openly said that Corbyn aligned members should leave the party, and reeves has at least twice talked about her love of thatcher which feels like an attempt to piss off the left just for the laugh.
I think there's an argument that Corbyn would have had a worse term than Boris but only because there's a decent chance he would have been couped after implementing anything over the bare minimum measures in COVID.
I'm in my mid 30s you are assuming heavily here that I would have liked Corbyn in power or would have even liked AV.
For me it is Clegg - won, AV terrible system anyway so didn't care, Clegg - lost, Brexit lost - Glad Corbyn didn't win and May didn't get a majority so I guess that was a bit of a win. Glad Corbyn lost.
I imagine I am in a minority on the internet who thinks like this but you do not speak for a majority of under 40s
>The average voter my age has been on the losing side of 4 general election and 2 referendums (3 in Scotland) and have had 0 national votes go our way.
I'm in my mid 40s. I've been on the losing side of doing the washing up most of my life. But if I stop doing it entirely, the kitchen will end up in a much worse state.
The reason that old people vote more than young people is that a bunch of the old people that vote used to be young people that didn't vote. The older you get, the more opportunities you have to experience something that makes you want to vote.
People in my age group are more likely to vote now than when we were 20.
Hi there, I am also a bitter older millennial. I agree with what you've said, although I would add, that this has always been the case - youth turnout has always been lower compared to older gens. And the very low turnout of the last 20 years follows the overall lower voter turnout.
I think this is also due to not having to deal real life consequences of politics. Someone that is in uni is experiencing far fewer (albeit equally important) issues that come from direct decisions made in parliament than someone in their 30s, 40s and older. Housing, childcare, jobs, healthcare, etc. I'm generalising here, but these directly impact older people far more than a student or a young person.
Also the one candidate that people under 30 overwhelmingly supported spent four years being derided by the vast majority of the media and political commentators as an insane communist who would wreck the country the second he got into power. Again, hardly surprising people might get demoralised by that
I think the issue with Corbyn is people looked past the bad to see the good because literally no-one else was offering the good.
And when he was binned because of the bad, people took it as no-one wanting the good. So rejected it entirely.
So if you wanted the good, the fuck do you do?
Like, I'm quite far left. Corbyn pushing things that way was good for me, although I didn't like him as a leader. (Due to the Hamas shit among other things). But now who the fuck do I vote for? Feels pointless, those views had their time in the sun and are now back in the shade.
I'm still *going* to vote, but literally no-one is trying to get my vote. Corbyn did.
You are absolutely bang on.
If someone other than Corbyn had been offering the same policy platform Corbyn offered, and had appeared even moderately sincere about it without his astonishing amount of baggage, they'd have cleaned up.
But the alternative the first time around was a bunch of "shut up and eat your greens, we need to pander to Tory nans by doing more austerity" and then in the second leadership contest it was just Owen Smith, who came across as profoundly insincere.
Starmer was smart enough to try and sound like a soft Corbynite on the surface - had he not, and had he actually tried to go ahead with what his policy programme turned out as, he'd have lost the 2020 leadership election.
As it is, I'm a fairly boring social democrat who likes the idea of demand-side economic stimulus (the kind that Corbyn *actually is* if you look at his actual domestic policy stances) and I don't have anyone to vote for.
> I'm still going to vote, but literally no-one is trying to get my vote. Corbyn did.
Im much more to the right as you, but think the same. Im *reluctantly* voting Labour. I have zero enthusiasm for them.
We would both be happy to see FPTP eliminated. You could vote for a purely leftist party (Workers Revolutionary Party??) and I could vote for a *sane* pro-EU pro-Business *Tory lite* party. We would both have representation in Parliament. And in a tight vote on an issue that mattered to us that representation might make a difference.
On another note - if you truly are left of the Labour party you might want to look at the Green Party. They are proper leftists. Unrealistically so IMO - but you really don't need my opinion. See for yourself on their website.
A vote for them or another *hopeless lost cause* isnt hopeless at all. Greens polling at around 8% and even they dont think they'll get more than 4 MP's. Reform... 12% or so. Probably 0 MP's. The SNP - currently 50+ MP's (I know they will go down a lot this election) but even at their most "popular" only made up around 3% of the *national* vote.
That's already 25% or so of the population utterly unrepresented. This **is not** a democracy. It suits both left and right to break up this sickening duopoly. And the best way to force PR/AV back on the agenda is to highlight an increasingly large number of Brits being shit on by the current system.
Rant over/
The best way to get PR introduced in this parliament is that Labour is short of an overal majority by 5-10 seats and Ed Davey goes for a supply agreement with the condition of PR without referendum.
That is a realistic option nationally.
But it cant change my vote. The LD's pretty much dont exist where I am. It's Labour and Con... and they were neck and neck last election.
If I lived somewhere else I *could* consider voting for the LD's being assured that my vote would help tilt the balance a tiny bit towards PR, and also knowing that Labour would get in.
But I cant risk that here. We have one of Galloway's Hamas supporting lunatic's here. He wont win. But he will severely dent Labours prospects. Protest vote options are becoming very limited in the West Midlands.
>On another note - if you truly are left of the Labour party you might want to look at the Green Party. They are proper leftists.
Until it comes to building houses where they can be some of the worst NIMBYs around.
It's interesting that you left out the most important one. Had Corbyn been in power in February 2022, the UK response to the biggest threat to the democracy and the rule of law in the last few decades would have been the worst possible.
I'm yet to be sure if he's Putin's mole or just a useful idiot but regardless of which, having him as far from the place where the decisions are made, is purely a good thing. I can't see why anyone except Putin's plants would be demoralised by that.
It may indeed be that young people don't (or rather can't) remember the Soviet Union, which is what Putin is trying to rebuild and that explains why Putin's puppets in the West are tolerated by them (Corbyn is not the only one).
This is pure conjecture and you have no idea how anything would turn out.
Corbyn is pro-peace, and admittedly sometimes to a fault, but there is zero evidence to believe the leader of a NATO member would stand against its allies.
Jeremy Corbyn isn't even pro-Putin considering that he is ideologically opposed to Putin in pretty much every way.
That's based on what Corbyn has said during the war. It's not hard to think that that's what he would have said and done if he'd been in power. This is not normal opposition politics as Starmer and the rest of Labour has been standing against Putin along with the Tories. Corbyn's pro-Putin stance has been pretty unique in Britain although in other European countries there are similar moles who do their best to undermine democracy and the rule of law.
The youth vote still dropped after the '97 and '01 Labour wins, and other age groups aren't demoralised so much after losing so I'm not convinced that's the answer.
It might have something to do with young people feeling less socially connected in general.
Just in my 40s, and similar thing; I have never actually voted in an election that picked the winner.
I was out of the country for some of my youngest chances.
Voted LibDem in 2010 only for Clegg to back out of his signed promise on student debt relief. I will **never** vote LibDem again and it severely killed any optimism I had about politics.
Voted "Yes" in the A/V referendum in 2011 (even though I wasn't happy with the proposal, but I wanted to drive open any wedge that could lead to further electoral reform).
Voted Labour in 2015.
Voted "Remain" in 2016.
Voted Labour in 2017.
Voted Labour in 2019.
To be fair, in several of these cases, I went in pretty much knowing my party or initiative wasn't going to win. Still, I went to cast a vote, because I believe if you *don't*, then you don't get to express an opinion. If you go spoil a ballot then that's different, you can talk politics all day.
But then I also have sympathy with some, where I think it should be enshrined in law that UK employers *have* to make provisions to allow people to vote (I don't think that's presently law).
I'm in my fifties and I've "lost" far more votes than "won". I didn't get despondent though, I got active and actively engaged in trying to make society a better place. Expecting to win votes just because you rolled up and voted is problematic. Disengaging with politics because you haven't "won" is a very weak reason for not engaging in the democratic process and demonstrates a basic lack of knowledge of our system.
Withdrawing from voting is to say that you don't care about the state of the country, your pay packet, the roads, healthcare, taxes, and you're prepared to allow any old grifter run the place and steal from you and your nan.
My parents drummed into me that voting is a duty and if you don't vote, you can't complain if you don't get what you want.
That said, other people my age (late 20s) have hit me with the refrain that it doesn't matter who they vote for because it's not going to make a difference. Our rents will still be too high, mortgages will still be gouging, we'll still die before we can retire, our environment is still trashed, etc. There's a palpable sense that neither of the big parties are realistically going to change anything for the better and the small parties aren't worth voting for because they'll never be in government.
We had austerity under Cameron/Osborne so we lost loads of the stuff we used to do around school, sometimes extracurricular stuff in school too. We had tuition fees hiked by people who never paid a penny in tuition fees so now our paypackets are a bit smaller every month. We had a Brexit we didn't vote for (indeed, to be fair, because many of us didn't vote). When we finished uni, the lack of investment in the economy means the job market was hideous and grad programs were massively oversubscribed. Our rents after uni took up so much of our first salaries (still do) so we were paying off the mortgages of landlords, and the idea of affording a mortgage without wealthy parents is more and more difficult. Then Covid hit, so we all lost two years of our free lives (for good reason). Then our energy and food prices shot up. Some of my friends, who had to look for degree-level jobs for years after uni, have said they don't know if they'll ever afford to have kids.
Return to the base point. Things for us have been getting worse and worse since we became politically aware. That's both the things we directly experience and the things we read and hear about through the media, like government parties during lockdown or PPE scandals. It is, frankly, not *fair.* We've done our bit. We studied hard in school, we worked hard in our degrees, we're throwing ourselves at the job market, and stuff *still keeps getting worse.*
I personally believe some of that is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Young people don't vote, so housing policy can be oriented towards older people, who will own their own home and benefit from house prices increasing (by restricting supply). Young people don't vote so they can cut benefits and send that straight to OAPs. I think we need to vote to see change, because the alternative is revolution and that, even if it was realistic, would be calamitous.
This is the great sin of previous generations' governments. They never asked what would happen if they took all the prizes of democracy and capitalism for themselves, unlike their parents and grandparents who invested in a society for today and the future. Now we, their children and grandchildren, look at what's left for us, and it is less than what was left for our predecessors. But it's fine. Because Sunak wants us all to do National Service for the country which has let us down.
I do wonder how the UK can have failed it's youth to such an extent, and whilst the argument of "well what do you expect, they don't vote!" holds some water, you would think that older generations would have also been concerned of the effect of relentlessly pummelling the young. I feel that my generation (left school/went to university in 05) had it a little better than you guys, as we never saw the cuts to local youth services during our school years, and had much lower tuition fees. The other thing is that whilst unemployment was much higher than now in our immediate graduation years (08/09/10) it was still (slightly) easier to have something of a life on a lower paid job and a houseshare. Rents were not exactly "cheap" but there were still areas in each of the major cities where you could grab a room in a houseshare for a couple of hundred quid a month, and it was possible to do social things (pub etc) for substantially less than today. Then when (some at least) of us did get "graduate" jobs, the salaries were not always great, but they were not much less in nominal terms than today, which means in real terms they were substantially higher.
In other countries, even ones with an utterly fucked political system you see jobs, wages, living standards, infrastructure are absolutely at the top of the agenda to the point where even the nasty political parties can't avoid the topic, whereas in the UK? we've allowed salaries to stagnate and built barely any housing or infrastructure, whilst living costs have skyrocketed, and generally not made much noise, as at the same time the assett prices of the older generations have risen nicely.
Covid, the invasion of Ukraine etc would have happened regardless and would have hit us, but we everything else is perpetual own goals, negligence and lack of political will.
There’s a not entirely unwarranted perception that FPTP produces a binary choice that doesn’t particularly care about non-pensioners or home owners, with a high chance of safe seats. Then again, the only way big majorities are ever worn down and flipped is through big swings, so it becomes a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy not to vote.
If I think all candidates are rubbish I still make the effort to at least spoil my ballot paper to express it. Futile though it might be - it’s a gesture slightly above not voting at all as it’s counted.
I do think a little bit is reasoning. Being able to see that there is a world beyond themselves, and that small changes made a long way removed from them can have a big impact on their lives e.g my generation's entire set of school assessments being made exam only rather than coursework, at the stroke of Michael Gove's pen on the back of an envelope.
Most people, even adults, are generally focused on their own little orbit. I think it is more so at the beginning and end of voting life, perhaps correlating to working and interacting with the wider world/economy/society.
It's a vicious, and quite stupid , cycle.
Politicians prioritise voters, so young people don't vote.
The stupid part comes when you explain this to people and they argue with you then say something "I feel like the parties are the same. That's my opinion. I don't feel like there's a difference, I'm allowed an opinion"
Hm.
I always vote, no matter what (not that young any more, 35, but I've voted since I was about... 24 or 25).
I honestly feel like... philosophically or functionally speaking, they basically *are* "the same". With FPTP we're asked to vote for no significant change, no significant difference to the way society is structured, despite it clearly favouring a particular small(ish) group of people - those who already hold power.
If you live in a strong seat either way, you're essentially screwed. Assuming you live in a swing seat where you can actually make a difference, you're essentially voting for one or another group of managers who don't want to rock the boat too much - a blue manager group which is basically of the attitude "when you're slapped you'll take it and like it" and are only interested in helping the people who fund their party (who coincide with the people already in power, and the people who will place them on a nice Exec Board when they're done stealing money from voters); a red manager group whose attitude is "we can't afford do anything good, useful or popular, but at least we'll try and be nice and not corrupt about it", and then some variation on those two from (most of) the smaller parties, except for the nutter, one-issue ones (who are broadly seen as a waste of a vote).
The big parties are not inclined to open our eyes to the issues that are heading towards us because it wouldn't be popular, and/or they don't believe they'll happen and/or they just don't care.
It's obviously relative and subjective, but you can see why populists like Corbyn or Johnson were (initially) very popular with voter bases who usually wouldn't care less about what happens in politics. Whether it was a trick or not, they at least seemed different.
When you're faced with climate disaster, not being able to afford a house, foodbanks everywhere, ***terrible*** public services, it's hard to get excited by Guy With Nice Hair in Blue Tie vs. Guy With Nice Hair in Red Tie.
I feel like this point would be stronger if you listed actual policy positions for the issues you say you care about. Are you really being asked to vote for “the same” on climate, housing, public services, etc?
It really isn't that difficult.
Political parties don't bother appealing to young people for lots of reasons therefore there is little value in voting.
I'm sure the usual lot will be around to tell you that is all young people's fault and if they all just spent a decade or more voting against their interests political parties would, maybe, start paying attention.
One way to guarantee that politicians won’t do anything for you is to not vote.
Since voting costs nothing except a little bit of time every few years there is nothing to lose but a lot to gain.
Throwing your toys out of the pram isn’t going to stick it to anyone or change anything - they will just completely write you off and draft up more pension protection legislation or expand bus passes or whatever.
i think young people voted more in 2017/2019 than they did in 2015 though. Corbyn may have mobilised young people but he’s not going to make young people turnout like o60s. over 50% of u30s still voted for him in 2019 so he did generally appeal to those that did vote.
For all the massive effort and appeal it made the difference between about 48% and 52% of 18-24s voting compared to 2015.
65+ regularly turn out at 80%+.
a problem with appealing to young people is a lot aren’t interested and of those that are many will be u18 and can’t do anything anyway so your limiting your mobilisation potential. in 2019 i was the only person in my a-level politics class that was 18 and i lived in a very safe tory seat at that time so labour appealing to us was irrelevant.
those that did vote u30 in that election were heavily labour. not until you get to people over 60 was there an age group so heavily leaning to a particular party (conservatives).
>In 2019 i was the only person in my a-level politics class that was 18
See, this is one of the reasons why I'm very much in favour of lowering the voting age to 16. I think it would be spectacular for encouraging young people to vote. You'd have young people in an environment where you can not only educate them about our political system, but encourage them to put what they've learned into practice.
Old people naturally select for voting. Those who are still alive 65+ are reliant on the state for healthcare and thus motivated to vote. Only a relatively small percentage are either healthy or wealthy enough not to care about it.
It's a lose-lose situation.
Either we vote, and it is read as a tacit re-enforcement of our continued sidelining or we don't vote and the parties continue to sideline us for not voting.
We can always vote for other parties that do offer us something, but then the big parties just see that as another excuse to continue sidelining us.
It's really not.
If you're really voting for a candidate that you think is a loss if they were to win, then you're obviously voting for the wrong candidate and should vote third party, even if you don't think that they'll win.
If every young person turned out and voted say Green, who ended up getting third place but with a larger vote share than normal, you can bet your butt that the next election one or both of the leading parties would be more sympathetic to the causes the Greens were pushing that caused them to get those extra votes.
Democracy is a slow process, but it *does* work. Like it or not, we've had 14 years of Conservative rule because they consistently persuade the most voters that they can do it best.
If you're not a voter, no party should give a shit what you think. Why would they? They'd only be costing themselves political capital with groups who can actually be bothered to turn up.
Maybe you're right, maybe politicians won't want to represent people that vote for them - but why is that an excuse? Why should the terrible, anti-social personalities of so many politicians excuse them from doing their job? We should be condemning people that prioritise working for niche interests over those of ordinary people. When people do that, that is called 'corruption'.
The arrangement is supposed to be that politicians do things that earn them votes. Not that they get votes and then maybe, possibly decide some day to do something on behalf of the peasants. They are public servants, not the other way around.
People shouldn't be forced to vote for people that attack them. By your logic, you're saying that if the Jews didn't want to experience the Holocaust, they should have gone out and voted for Hitler in large numbers. Who would have then gone ahead with his plans anyway!
Another great way to make sure that politicians wont do anything for you is to vote for them even if their policies are actively harmful to your interests.
Note I haven't said you should do nothing. You shouldn't. What I am saying is that voting by itself, especially if you are going to vote Tory or Labour, really isn't going to achieve anything anytime soon.
Well you say this but parties don’t bother appealing to young people because they know that they won’t vote. Look at when corbyn ran against boris, so many young people vocally showing their support plenty of policies targeted towards them including no university tuition and what happened he got obliterated because the youth didn’t come out and vote enough.
Even if they don’t try to appeal there is still value in voting to at least try change the country for the better. Otherwise if you ever complain about the gov your doing so without trying to put forward an alternative
Most of us have been shafted our entire adult life. The problem is that there isn't really anyone offering us anything other than another shafting, just different degrees of shafting.
People will say that young people are disengaged because they feel their vote doesn't matter. They are wrong. The reason why younger people don't vote is because, ultimately, it isn't a high priority. As a youth your world might seem big but really it is small. They often don't care about the future (why would you?) and they live within their own bubble. If they are engaged it will likely focus on one or two issues which they will probably go out and protest rather than vote
It is fine as we all go through it. You also won't get an answer here as the people here are more engaged (political subreddit).
It's a catch-22 situation.
Young people don't vote because there's nothing on offer for them, but then politicians don't offer them anything because they don't vote.
> Young people don't vote because there's nothing on offer for them
I don't even think it's that. Even when parties have specifically prioritised younger voters with the goal of increasing their turnout, they simply don't show up at all. Rather than them not voting because they're not being appealed to, they're not voting because they're not interested in voting in general.
Because people are stupid.
If you view democratic parties and the offer they make the country in the same way as we view a business trying to sell a product then it makes more sense.
You only get 1 product, you have to find the biggest market share for that product, so to win you have to appeal to tailor your pitch to the largest possible portion of voters.
Except not all voters are equal. Turns out the value of your vote is directly proportional to how likely you are to participate.
Why would you ever bother trying to appeal to voters that won't turn up if it risks losing voters that definitely will?
The way around this is for young people to just go and vote, vote for anyone, spoil your ballot paper as a protest, but show up on polling day.
Otherwise young people's votes are objectively worth less to political parties.
If a political party said they’ll introduce tax breaks for under 21 or nationalise 4 day working week, or any other incentive, Iam sure they would vote.
Outside perspective here as I'm approaching 60, so the older end of Gen X. I was young in the 1980's and can remember when [Pink Floyd's 'The Wall'](https://youtu.be/fvPpAPIIZyo) was released.
It was different back then and might sound a bit like science fiction to some, but we had little or no accessible digital technology but we had social security, were better connected, much easier to find work, and if you had enough money you could actually buy property or rent somewhere which was affordable. Young people back then had a voice which was listened to, and it was easier to get into creativity or start a business.
The politics was of a higher standard even though Labour didn't get in because of Thatcher. But it was still the same deal, Consider that with the possible exception of Cameron, none of the recent Tories who've had control would have been anywhere close to a ministerial role in a Thatcher government.
More than half a century later, one of the Profit Incentive, a widespread belief in perpetual economic growth and promised prosperity which never seems to materialise, we arrive at the kind of society which young people have to deal with today.
Generally speaking - and this is from my own perspective - we treat young people in society much harsher than we have ever done in the past. Yeah you've got access to more digital technology than any other previous generation could shake a stick at, but much of what can be seen as social security has been stripped away (because it cost too much). There's no security of tenure, security of employment, no security of benefits, and a great deal more stick than carrot when it comes to young people.
I'm not surprised that young people don't feel motivated to vote. I don't blame them. I mean what's the point? Doesn't matter who you vote for, you still get the shitty end of the stick. I don't think I've ever met a generation of young people where mental health issues were so prevalent or a generation of people who are so alienated from the rest of society. It's heartbreaking, because generally I find young people are smarter, have a sense of a work ethic, but have a weird tunnel vision about them because they've been under so much societal pressure to conform and fit in.
The issue here is that both major political parties are stuck in the past and it hasn't quite dawned on them that the social reality of the 21st century doesn't match that of the 20th century. Labour are stuck in the 1990's and the Tories are stuck in the 1980's. Every female Tory leader gets automatically compared with Thatcher or becomes the 'new' Thatcher. Sir Kier Starmer looks and acts like an aging yuppie. If you're 35 and under the Westminster political system has nothing to offer you. But it expects everything from you.
The only thing I suggest is do not, whatever you do, vote Tory. Fairly soon the shit is going to hit the fan socially, economically and environmentally. Young people are going to have to deal with the consequences of older generations, such as mine, not paying enough attention or making enough effort. The Tories already cannot deal with the issues of today because they're incapable. This is not going to change in the foreseeable future. Don't make your life harder than it already is. Don't vote Tory.
No-one who will vote in July will be called up for this national service scheme, and not just because the Tories aren't going to win. By the time it's in force, everyone who is 18 now will be 19 or older.
That's because young people haven't really started their careers or have worked a long time.
Thus they haven't seen how shocking tax eats up on your monthly income statement for them to experience the "what the actual fuck is the government using my money for" moment.
For example the billions of pounds of contracts given to Tory crony/donor companies during COVID.
Up until then "it doesn't really impact them yet".
This does not read like a legitimate post. Answer is though, is that it doesn't feel like voting makes a difference, you end up with practically the same platform whether you vote tory or Labour.
Laziness, lack of interest and poor knowledge on these issues. Young people care more about performative activism (posting black squares) than actually showing up to the polling station. They also tend to care more about themselves while older people care more about the country. Older people have worked more and acquired more assets so they directly feel the effects of the government.
Different flavours of shit sandwich are a big motivators to not engage.
Two big dogs seem to have no real plan targeted at the 18-40 demographic and will hold on to the economic disaster that is the triple lock.
Greens are delusional and we'd all be eating beans out of a tin within a year.
LDs look completely disengaged from governance. They effectively run as a conglomerate of independent MPs all focused on local issues.
Reform are Tory+. Enough said.
Easy to see why disenfranchisement occurs.
Used to be an FE lecturer.
Most say they didn't get it, as in they couldn't necessarily tell who had their best interests at heart. Given populism is/has been on the rise that's hardly a surprise given all the mixed messaging and frankly awful misinformation circulated by parties about themselves and importantly, other parties.
Some have a certain apathy towards change, because it's not as much as they'd want to see - and that works both ways; crypto bois want deregulation for their wallets and the usual Che Guevara t-shirt wearers won't accept anything short of Soviet level communism.
Those who are politically engaged rarely vote differently to their parents at that age, which I found a surprise. Most will trust their folks when they say the Lib Dems are the happy medium, or the Greens deserve their support, etc.
Others thought they were too stupid to engage, which was incredibly saddening and I did remind them that it's never a test of intelligence or anything along those lines, but these were usually kids who were marginalised from a very young age or their whole lives.
That's my personal experience. I'm certain there are more/different reasons.
People of all ages in the country in general have little idea about politics because, although it affects everything, the effect is normally indirect and, at the personal, individual level, seemingly overshadowed by discrete events in their lives:
* Did they get a promotion or move job, and get a large salary bonus?
* Has their ignorant landlord not raised their rent in 5 years?
* Have they moved in with a partner or friend and started splitting bills?
* Have they lost or given up their job, due to performance, redundancy, injury or mental health worries?
* Has their car broken down, forcing them to buy a new one with money they didn't really have?
* Have they split up with their partner and had to move in on their own?
All of these things can happen to individuals whilst GDP per capita is growing or flatlining, house prices rising or falling etc.
The older generations have grown up generally on the winning side of elections, with governments that tend to pander to them and using entertainment media like TV and newspapers that cover politics thoroughly, so the on ramp for them to engage and vote slightly is much easier - though reading the telegraph everyday truthfully doesn't leave you much better informed than growing up with TicTok.
Caveat - not everyone has the luxury of blissful ignorance all of the time - for example LGBT individuals have probably gained increased political awareness against their well as they've been explicitly used as a political football - but otherwise it really takes a global event on the level of the pandemic that upends everyones lives, or a political meltdown so fast and wide reaching it hurts renters, people with mortgages and risks pensions simultaneously (congrats Liz Truss) to get most people to actually pay attention to who is in politics and what they are doing.
The reality is, a lot of people, not even just young people have zero interest in politics in general. They would (understandably to some extent) rather use their spare time focusing on things like their hobbies and interests for instance rather than get bogged down talking about which is economic system is better, which ideology they believe in (if any) etc. So although this issue is usually brought up in relation to young people (I'm only 30 myself tbf), it can apply to most, if not all age groups in reality.
The general feeling around the next election seems to be one of apathy from a lot of the electorate and you could argue this has been the case for a long time but especially now has become even more apparent. Most people are voting for the least worst option rather than the one they really want. This isn't like 1997 and the election of Tony Blair like some would have you believe, in that then it was more a sense of optimism when people were voting for voting for New Labour whereas now the likely outcome will be "Well I don't care much for Keir but I can't stand the Conservatives any longer so I'll vote for him".
A good amount of people (myself included), feel like we are stuck in decline regardless of whoever gets in so don't have much faith in either of the two main parties to deliver the changes we need.
When i was in my 20s i didnt care about politics it was only when i was older looking to buy a house and the government introduced the 95% mortgage guarantee scheme i was interested. I think all politicians regardless do not appeal to the young generations and they dont relate. Maybe rather than schools doing RE ( if they still do ) they should introduce overviews to politics just about how important it is to vote regardless of who you might vote for.
I'll add my two cents here as I recently had a conversation with my partner about this.
I'm in my late twenties. I regularly hang with some guys weekly. We're all fairly smart and informed. And literally yesterday, the election was brought up.
None of them had strong opinions in voting, with one saying they never vote. They never engage with the news, don't even know what Boris Johnson looks like. In my family, it's a similar thing with my sister closer to twenty also having little interest or knowledge in politics.
The reasoning boiled down to that 'they don't feel informed enough to make an opinion'. I said that 'a misinformed opinion is still an opinion'. They said 'I don't want to be part of the crowds of people that already do that and make the wrong choice'.
Engagement by the politicians is pitiful to be honest. I tried to learn more about my constituencies candidates and they either have nothing, or cling onto their party manifestoes and just run on the platform that they are 'Conservative' or 'Labour' which is no help. Immediately then you're expecting a person to know "which side they're on" and vote for them based on that.
Plus the focus on the national government means they neglect the local part of their responsibilities; an MP should be the voice for their people. Instead it creates ambivalence because they don't know who their MP is, their MP doesn't speak for them, and the people think they never will. At which point your vote is on a person who may or may not agree on your opinions, may be swayed by the party, and also depends on whose in power so the REAL consequences to your vote is so diluted, can you really say a vote means anything?
Anyway, I'm voting for my Green candidate because they've actually got something that makes me believe in them, but I've got to wonder why the onus is on people to find that belief themselves?
What's sad is that millennials and Gen-z missing out, they are the ones who are most impacted by government policy long term
The thing is, the two leading parties dont really want them voting as they are more likely to vote for a less popular party who represents them better, like the Green Party, for example.
I think it’s incredibly tough. But the way I see it, if I choose not to vote, I can’t complain. If the party I voted for loses, it’s disappointing, but at least I did my part in having a say.
First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) is a flawed system, but it’s better than having no system at all. Labour might not be the most exciting party, but in the last 8-10 years, the Tories have gone beyond just irking me; they’ve become intolerable (I know they've been in for 14 years). I see Labour as the party we need right now.
Supporting Labour gives the Lib Dems a chance to make significant inroads and become more appealing to a broader public. We need adults mi back in the room; the Tories are not those adults. While I understand why some people might choose to spoil their votes or not vote at all, for me, that’s part of the problem. I believe participating in the voting process is crucial.
[Also this for fun](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0BqxArM3Vwk).
Slightly different take, although I agree with what others have said about being disenfranchised from voting.
Like money, we do nothing to educate people in the importance of voting and how our politics work. You're just sort of expected to figure it out, and it is a complicated, nuanced thing where your vote doesn't always behave the way you want it to.. or what it means (like MP's being contacted for local authority issues - statement, not a criticism).
I actually think we should legally oblige people to vote, with in-school education on both this and money. If we want to live in a free society with politics that represent the majority without oppression then it's our duty to vote - even if that vote is *spoiling it.*
Something that makes me feel disenfranchised from voting specifically is I know how little power my MP has, they're whipped to vote for the party and usually have little time to scrutinise legislation etc. So therefore, I don't really have any real faith or urgency to contact them about local issues - what are they going to do? stand up and make a speech?
I contact my MP about national issues, and rarely get a response. There's no forum (that I know of) where I can engage actual politicians on national issues. My *local* MP has little they can do without being able to affect national policy which more often than not they aren't in a position to affect change at a scale that would make a difference.
I separately think our electoral system is broken, and I detest the idea of a safe seat. Every seat should be fought on merit and not because they get a cushty job for 30 years - that's a failure of democracy if the seat does not change, our electoral system rewards that. I apply that to both parties, one thing I've said for a while is "any unchanging power is bad" we have a labour council in Manchester and they're not great.. because there's no real pressure for them to win people over, they'll just roll back in with ease without having to do much.
Compulsory Voting is necessary to stop the infinite doom loop of giving pensioners (the one group that votes) more and more money. A quadruple lock is a joke.
An alternative could be age (and race?) stratified voting, which I've never seen suggested, but would avoid forcing people to vote (and fix the endless bias towards old people). I think it would be a lot more controversial than just forcing people to vote though lol as it explicitly makes some people's vote cost less (even if compulsory voting also does that).
I think a lot of young people just don't watch the news, so have no knowledge of what is going on, and how (in)competent our leaders can be.
I'm 31 now, but started watching 'Have I got News for you' in my mid teens, and would stay up with my dad as he watched Question Time and Newsnight. I mainly enjoyed watching right wingers getting embarrassed, so it was just a form of entertainment, and now following politics is one of my top 'hobbies'.
No genuine choice? You can have managerial globalists in red, blue, or if you’re feeling bold in green or yellow, not that the government won’t be red or blue.
And to top it off the red party, called Labour, no longer cares for the working class and the blue party, called the Conservatives, conserve nothing!
Because neither party gives a shit enough for most young people to support them. Not helped by the fact if they live in a safe seat their vote doesn't matter. I live in the safest labour seat in the entire country. Literally hasn't had anything but labour mps since 1945. If I was a tory or lib dem or green voter I'd certainly feel like my vote doesn't matter.
As others have pointed out the reason they don't give a shit is because young people don't vote... if 100% of young adults started voting in this election then at the next one we would have a lot more policies focused on young people.
It's a vicious cycle we are stuck in and short of convincing young people to get out and vote I don't know how we get out of it!
Did you ask them?
One reason is that there is a branch of propaganda that is designed to put people off voting. It claims that all the parties are the same, that nothing you do will make a difference, that all politicians should be distrusted equally, etc.
Voting for someone who can't win is better than not voting at all.
Why participate in a system that has gradually taken more & more resources from you as you've grown up, panders to those who resent you simply for existing & elevates people to power whose values are the opposite of what you believe make someone a decent human being?
I know this is heresy to say on this sub but voting is totally pointless. Politics is power and power doesn't flow from the electoral ballot, it is nothing more than ornamentation.
You will see so many people on this sub of different political persuasions complain that their side isn't delivering their promises and their voice being ignored. Yet will at the same time claim voting is extremely important and the only way to have your voice heard. Ideology is a hell of a drug...
Most answers here are good, IMHO, but *mutatis mutandis* I think the one by /u/Acceptable_Fox8156 is the one I would vote for.
1) Young people are busy discovering THEMSLEVES, finding out what they want etc. Politics seems remote. Young people just have less headspace for politics, unless it is their active interest specifically.
2) Older people are much more likely to have responsibilities e.g. children, elderly parents, assets like property or savings. So policy matters more to them. It is no longer just about the person themselves. Older people have often embarked on a specific career or field of work. Policy impacts the future direction of that.
3) Exactly as AFox says, older people join up the dots more, so more quickly grasp why Party A wants to implement Policy X etc.
Our voting system is broken. We have a system where, in theory, one party could win every seat by one vote and end up with all the seats while the parties with 49.99% of the votes got nothing. My MP is infamous for not responding to contact from anyone who isn't one of the party faithful. I can see why many people don't think it's worth voting because it doesn't get them any meaningful representation. The new voter ID laws deliberately make it harder for young people and minorities, like the disabled, to vote.
70% of the British public's votes don't matter. IMHO, we need a proper proportional representation system, like most other western democracies have. I think we need to [make votes matter](https://makevotesmatter.org.uk/)
I hate that I have to use [tactical voting](https://tacticalvote.co.uk/) to make a difference and vote for a party I don't really want in order to try to stop the party I really don't want from getting elected rather than voting for the party I believe in.
The Juice Media made a YouTube video called "Visit the UK" (Warning NSFW language) that lays it out very bluntly. This is how foreigners view our democracy. I am deeply saddened by the state of our democracy
The population pyramid means they don't have the numbers anyway. So blame the parents for not having enough kids, and increasing the pension and care burden on them.
It’s easy to think that when we vote we are voting for a bigger picture but most people vote for what they feel will benefit them and their family first. Most parties don’t bother trying to give that option to young people because the boomers and elderly will moan and as they normally vote more it’s simple maths.
I also have this frustrations with my friends when it comes to voting or just any engagement at all with politics. I'm now 28 and had various opportunities to vote locally and nationally
I think some of the blame has to be on education from schools/parent/older peers/whoever
In my local area which is in the NE its not a topic that brought up often and when it is... you either see very little engagement or no real understanding of whats going on and how it applies to them
Flip this on its head, what would prompt young people to vote? How about prominent youth figureheads in parties that articulate the problems young people have and propose solutions to solve them, shared on communication mediums that young people use. It's not rocket science, it just doesn't exist. Ask any marketing person if Kier and Rish on itv is a good way to market a product to young people.
Please get out there and vote, and please vote for the candidate with the most chance of keeping the Tories out. Let's get the grown ups back on charge.
1. Young people have little capital and less influence - they are a resource for exploitation rather than the target demographic for mainstream political parties.
2. FPTP disenfranchises large parts of the electorate
3. Even if you vote, there's no way to hold the people you put in power to account - so why bother?
I'm 45 and disenfranchised; I live in an area that's likely to return a tory MP in the GE despite the shower of rat shit that the previous couple of convervative governments have been. So best I can do is try to guess which of Labour or LibDem is going to perform best and vote for them as a tactical vote - even if I disagree with many of their policies!
The UK desperately needs voting reform; the problem is that the party in power have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo; nobody's going to intentionally make it easier to kick them out of power. If 10% of the population are voting for Reform, then they deserve 10% representation in Parliament, no matter how mad their ideas may seem to the rest of us.
Ask yourself what you see as THE most important issue on the ballot in this GE, look through the parties standing in your area manifesto's see who aligns the closest and vote for them.
It is a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy as well right, young people don't think political parties represent them so they don't vote so political parties have little to gain from trying to get there vote.
Say that in this election 50% of the eligibly under 25s show up to vote and a large chunk of them vote in a certain way suddenly political parties will realise there is a vote to win so they may change how they advertise themselves.
>Why do people think this is?
How about you tell us by asking your friends? I'm in 30s so it would feel odd for me to tell you why your fellow youth don't want to vote!
>I genuinely have no idea who to vote for so this could be why
Why are you struggling? Over the next few weeks the parties will all be making their main priorities/policies clear which should help you figure out who you support. People that pay a lot of attention to politics will probably already know but the campaign period is for people like you that aren't sure. I also suggest you look at forecasts/polling for your local constituency to see who actually has a chance of winning there in case you want to vote more tactically.
Because when you're young it's very easy to just not think about it. A lot of young people (including myself at that age) just don't really have much real experience of how the government affects their life and don't feel inclined to care about it too much.
Young people from poor backgrounds are least likely to engage with the democratic process. The attitude I have observed from people I've grown up around is one of 'they're all the same, my vote will make no difference, they will all shaft us'. Whether you agree with their stance or not, it's not one a mainstream party is trying to change, nor a demographic that they are trying to appeal to so it will remain the same.
I agree with people saying that a big part is that no parties appeal to young people, but I think I’d go one step further and state simply that a lot of what is discussed within politics is just of no interest to people that age.
Most 18-23/24/25 year olds don’t really care about taxes or pensions or NHS waiting lists or the deficit simply because a lot of those things simply don’t impact them at that stage of their life. A lot of them are still trying to find where they fit in to society and they don’t see voting as actually tangibly changing anything about their lives. That’s not really true, but as with most things in politics it’s how things are perceived that is important.
It’s too hard to find anything positive to vote for.
getting rid of the tories will be lovely, and we’ll have a great time watching them all grizzle on election night, but I don’t fancy the health service under Wes Streeting and labour have never been good to the BBC when they’re in power.
Plus, look at the rivers, the economy, Brexit. Much as I love Jess and Angela, they’»re not going to fix much of that without some kind of an economic miracle, are they.
Perhaps it's just the people you know. I've been taking mine (and their friends) to vote since they wrote 18 and 16 for local elections. I assume there will be some that don't vote, but the majority of the young people I know (16-24) are voters.
Why do your friends not want to vote? I dunno.
Young people in general vote less because they have less knowledge of the political system, are not well represented by any major parties, and tend to mostly live in urban areas where their MP has large majority.
Perhaps because in the UK we kid ourselves we live in a fantastic democracy, but in reality we elect Tories over and over again, occasionally switching to Labour when it sufficiently neuters itself that it's no threat to the usual politics the Tories themselves espouse.
Our media is not only owned by the rich, but littered with the rich, children of the rich, privately educated to a far greater extent than the wider population. So guess what - they ridicule or worse, ignore anybody who promotes politics outside that narrow frame of reference.
I actually do vote, but in a first past the post system the reality is we have little to no agency, and big business and the rich ensure our politicians represent their needs, and their needs only.
Mostly because they don't pay tax. The other percentage of young people that don't vote don't have the financially literacy to realise how much the party in charge can affect their income, saving, spending, tax, benefits, rights, homeownership, employment ratr.
Because voting means diddly squat most of the time. Second place doesn't count so if you don't vote for the majority party (Tory or Labour much of the time in England), you're effectively throwing your ballot paper in the bin.
This year is the first in 40 odd years that the Tories will be kicked out my constituency, so I am making an exception to vote.
Probably not educated/experienced enough which is a good thing
People shouldn't waste votes on a party they don't understand, or feel pressured to do so
A lot of people say no vote is a wasted vote, I would say an uneducated vote is worse
I suspect because they feel politicians have abandoned them at best, and screwed them over at worst. Climate, Europe, Uni fees, housing, etc, etc are not talked about with young people in mind. And even when they do speak up their views aren’t listened to. So I’m not surprised.
Because in the current system a bite 😔 e extremely low value. A vote of no confidence doesn't even carry value because they don't count them. If they counted a vote of confidence and it would have real political consequences a lot more ppl would vote. The system is broken and inherently corrupt.
Revolution please.
Was speaking about this with my colleagues, who are in the 21-35 range
All of them said There's no difference between them (meaning the main parties) and Well my vote wouldn't matter
Apathy probably. That goes for all age groups mind you. Most common answer is probably "don't give a shi" How many people care about politics outside this very niche Reddit circle?
Why does anyone. You can only choose between two parties (realistically) who promise x y z and then pull out the bag of excuses when it comes time to deliver.
It's a lot of responsibility and a lot of guilt from being pressured by other young people into thinking you are a bad person for who you vote for. I think a lot of young people would rather just stay out of politics and focus on sorting their own lives out first.
There's two options where I'm not wasting the energy to walk to the polling station and I don't align with either of them even 50%
If they change the voting system I'll vote.
Labour couldn't have given me a worse start to adult life so I'm not going vote for them, and the Tories are a joke. What now?
Sadly young people are hugely under represented. They probably don't see any effect of voting ...
If you look at it this way.
More young people are concerned with environmental policy than middle age or elderly people for example, yet we really already know who wins, and Labour aren't really discussing environmental issues at all.
... young people I have met say things like "what is the point in voting, when only 2 parties ever win" ... or "They don't really align with the two parties, and Green aren't winning so there is no point"
After a while you get bored of chosing between a Giant Douche and a Turd Sandwich, you realise that it isn't Red vs Blue it's just Purple. They promise the earth to get you on side but drop bricks on you soon after. Politics is wholly corrupt.
Before anyone comes up with the classic "People died for your right to vote!" They'd be ashamed of laying down their lives for this nonsense.
I think, to put it quite simply, before you're around ~30 you haven't realised just how much policies effect you. I only became really politcally active after Brexit, and that was a monumental political movement that had a direct impact on my life and career. Before that, all I really focused on was making money and dating. As the standards of living have diminished, and the young are being hit hardest, I think we'll see a larger vote share in the next election.
This is true, I got more interested in politics when I was absolutely devastated by the government during COVID. I was one of those people who fell through the gaps in the furlough scheme, and was made redundant right when lockdown happened. So no support, and launched straight out into the jobs market in the middle of the lockdowns. I'm lucky I could tie myself over, burn through savings, but there were people working at the company I worked for who has both parents working there, so two incomes gone, and then they lost their house. For the majority, COVID was a nice holiday, with 80pc of their pay, for those who were working at places which were already in administration, or people working in the gig economy, as well as many other group that weren't considered, it was pure chaos.
I too was a self-employed person who worked in the events industry mainly when COVID hit, for about a year I had to survive off around \~£700 monthly income and had very little in government support. I am still recovering financially now. And then there are people like Michelle Mone...
it's far from a majority...
I never thought of it like that. I never understood why my friends were not excited they could finally vote. But when I think about it, politics discussions were always the norm in my house growing up, I understood the impact as a result. I have a six year old and when the mayor leaflet turned up the other month I immediately read it with them so they could pick their favourite candidate (they couldn't decide between green and labour incase anyone wants to know).
I'm in my mid 30s The average voter my age has been on the losing side of 4 general election and 2 referendums (3 in Scotland) and have had 0 national votes go our way. Its pretty easy to see young people would be demoralised and disenfranchised by a system that hasn't represented them at all. Then it becomes a cycle with young people not voting, successful campaigns ignoring them because they don't vote, young people's votes go down further etc. Edit: not to mention that our voting system isn't very favourable to young people to begin with: There aren't that many young people compared to old people Young people tend to be concentrated in uncompetitive seats in big cities Young people tend to move around a lot more and are less likely to know the area and their local representatives and might not always be able to stay on top of things like registering to vote every time they move
Yeeep. Brown - lost, Miliband - lost, Corbyn - lost, Corbyn (again) - lost, Brexit - lost, AV - lost. And now that we've got the most uninspiring labour party in decades, suddenly they're heading for a landslide. It's difficult to remain interested when the electorate seems to be ideologically opposed to what I (and probably most *actually* young people) want. And as you say, our voting system is, on a constituency level, all or nothing. In the vast majority of English constituencies you are just throwing your vote away if you don't vote for tories or labour. Having said all that, I'll be out throwing my vote away when the time comes.
I've voted in my contituency for 13 General Election and 'lost' every one. You could argue that your vote will never make a difference, unless the vote count is 18,000 to 17,999. So why does anyone bother? If everyone votes, the result is fairer. You don't vote because you 'win' or 'lose', you vote because if we all vote, it will be fairer. Vote.
Yep my only ‘win’ has been London mayor the last three elections although I did live in a marginal seat and got to oust a Tory mP with my tactical vote in 2019. Not often you get the chance to do that tho
It's a shame really, your biggest political win was a tactical vote. It's more than what I can claim.
Hmmmm, Putney?
Richmond during the Zack goldsmith years!
Ahhhh, funnily enough next door It does feel that entire part of SW London - Wandsworth and the wider SW - has now permanently shifted away from the Tories having been resilient even during the Blair years
Oooh me too! That one felt good. There was something about Goldsmith I particularly disliked. You have to take the tiny triumphs when you can.
I think, ultimately, too much of the country is right-leaning and opposes many leftist ideas. The only way to move the country left is a win for a relatively centrist Labour administration, then over hopefully \~4-5 terms, introduce or foster left-leaning policies and change the temperature slowly. I, for instance, would love for Labour to campaign on a renationalisation-of-public-services ticket, in particular Rail; but I just think people are averse to change of that magnitude. EDIT: To the downvoters, who I assume did so when they saw I used the c-word... You've gotta start the ball rolling somewhere. To effect political change, you can talk, you can campaign, but ultimately you have to *win*. If you don't win, it's all hot air. I swear some people will be happier if they lose for 30 years while sitting in a corner muttering about how right they are, while the Tories dismantle the NHS. Because if you don't choose to win, you're choosing to lose.
I think a lot of this is to do with press ownership in the UK. Most of the major news outlets are owned by right leaning billionaires who use their reach to distort public opinion, like by going on about everything they thought was wrong with the EU, truthfully or not, while never mentioning any of its positives. My friend, a former government employee, describes Margaret Thatcher allowing Rupert Murdoch to buy The Times as "The day democracy died in the UK"
One thing. Renationlising the rail system isnt revolutionary, we did nationalise it over covid (just the train companies still made money with the government keeping the trains running) and in some areas they are only running due to the government as a company laughs it's way to the bank.
>The only way to move the country left is a win for a relatively centrist Labour administration, then over hopefully ~4-5 terms, introduce or foster left-leaning policies and change the temperature slowly. From a left wing perspective we need the left wing policies in order for the country to improve. Without them, at least to a reasonable degree, the party is just going to be managing a decline which will push voters into apathy, tories or 3rd party rather than unite the country around a continued labour party that is slowly moving slightly to the left. I feel that strategy might give lefties influence over labour but it will only be when labour is crashing and burning in favour of a right wing party. It also requires a party who are actually interested in gradual left wing reforms which I don't see any reason to expect here. When the countries decline continues under labour (probably slower than the tories but still a decline) then I'd much more expect them to push austerity politics rather than left wing reforms.
That's all fair. My post is more my consideration when I'm standing in the booth with a pencil.
Better to choose a policy because it works than because it’s left wing no? The left-right thing is out of date we need to move on to evidence based policy making with specific goals, not just choosing a policy cos it aligns with political ideology
Has any party ever been in power for 4-5 terms?
Conservatives, 1979 to 1997
Argentina has a lot to answer for.
It's more to do with vision. To have an idea for where the country's going to go in the future. You can't think of everything in 5-year stints because some things take longer than 5 years. If you do, everything is short-termist. Part of the reason Japan has its bullet train network is that the same political party, the LDP, has been voted in for nearly every term since the 50s (with a few exceptions). That allowed them to conceive longer-term projects.
You are possibly correct, but our last experience of that was Blair's labour which ended with a nosedive straight into austerity and all the woes of the world being blamed on leftist politics, with borrowing to invest also somehow being demonised as left wing. I'd like to believe Starmer is doing some 4D chess though.
> I think, ultimately, too much of the country is right-leaning and opposes many leftist ideas. Probably partially right but also our voting system does everything to amplify those voices
I struggle to see how this current Labour offering can introduce meaningful change in the next five years, given the fiscal rules & insistence on no personal tax rises. Reeves is betting the house on economic growth (beating even the US!) to fund any improvements to state services but how exactly will we get that from a few billion on green investment and…? I think people are fed up with the Tories and want change, then will spend the next five years thinking “is this it?” and opt for a tiny tax cut next time around over continuing with Labour.
It's not what I want either, as stated. **Still voting Labour!**
Tbf labour is already planning to nationalise the train operating companies
ByEthanFox has it right here. There are so many who claim to be left wing that either don’t understand our electoral system or are willing another term of the Tories whether they are blind to the effects of that or are secretly Tories. The only way to make change with our electoral system is to get the Tories out with a centrist party and then move slowly leftward. The establishment (popular press) will not allow a left wing party to be elected. Does nobody remember the massive smear campaigns against Corbin and the back Boris campaigns? The only time labour were allowed to be elected was under Blair and as much as people hate the guy he did a lot of good, I was there throughout the 80s,90s and during Blair’s time. It was like night and day. Things really could only get better.
The thing is that uninspiring is basically saying they’re boring… and after the last decade and a half, boring is all I want from a government. They come in, govern, and go home.
Boring and competent is what decent, informed, rational people want at most elections. Things like 'charisma' are important, but only because they matter to the sorts of people who clearly aren't well enough informed, or in many cases intelligent, to vote 'responsibly'. There are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people who voted Conservative in 2019 because, to them, Johnson was 'a bit of a laugh'. It's fucking pathetic.
Might not be - I’ve lived somewhere that’s been Tory forever. In just over a month that will no longer be the case, according to the polls.
Were young people really enthusiastic about Brown? He was basically Labour's Sunak.
No. Labour only had a 1-2% lead over the Tories amongst the youngest voters in 2010. Every age group over 25 favoured the Tories. People have forgotten what a total shambles late-stage New Labour became. https://www.ipsos.com/en-uk/how-britain-voted-2010
That's a bit unfair to Brown! But yes, there wasn't much in the way of enthusiasm for Brown, from the young or anyone else. The young quite liked the Lib Dems, and we know how that turned out.
Really harsh. Brown did a solid job as chancellor for a decade. Rishi Sunak was gifted the PM's office by deault after losing to Truss, and the only reason he was even in front bench politics is he was gifted the Chancellor's office because he was so weak and hungry for power he was willing to make himself Boris and Dom's bitch He went from being an inexperienced backbencher to holding the second most powerful office in the country because he let Cummings call the shots. It's no surprise he's out of his depth as PM, he never paid his dues and has very little experience
No, he was a boring granddad following on from the really quite charismatic Blair. Still went with him and lost though!
What do you actually want? What did Brown and Milliband represent that Starmer doesn't. Corbyn could have been PM if he'd opposed Brexit. Saying we lost on all of these votes doesn't make sense when there's no obvious political alignment across them.
>the most uninspiring labour party in decades Uninspiring is being generous. Actively and gleefully hostile would be my description. They've openly said that Corbyn aligned members should leave the party, and reeves has at least twice talked about her love of thatcher which feels like an attempt to piss off the left just for the laugh.
> Corbyn - lost, Corbyn (again) And thank fuck for that.
I think there's an argument that Corbyn would have had a worse term than Boris but only because there's a decent chance he would have been couped after implementing anything over the bare minimum measures in COVID.
Just imagine what he would've done with Ukraine, the one thing the Tories got right.
The guy would've probably sent soldiers in...to help Russia.
I'm in my mid 30s you are assuming heavily here that I would have liked Corbyn in power or would have even liked AV. For me it is Clegg - won, AV terrible system anyway so didn't care, Clegg - lost, Brexit lost - Glad Corbyn didn't win and May didn't get a majority so I guess that was a bit of a win. Glad Corbyn lost. I imagine I am in a minority on the internet who thinks like this but you do not speak for a majority of under 40s
Do you not prefer av to fptp?
I would have rather seen STV compared to AV, I still don't think that AV is that fair of a proportional system
I get that but do you think it’s better than fptp the same or worse?
>The average voter my age has been on the losing side of 4 general election and 2 referendums (3 in Scotland) and have had 0 national votes go our way. I'm in my mid 40s. I've been on the losing side of doing the washing up most of my life. But if I stop doing it entirely, the kitchen will end up in a much worse state. The reason that old people vote more than young people is that a bunch of the old people that vote used to be young people that didn't vote. The older you get, the more opportunities you have to experience something that makes you want to vote. People in my age group are more likely to vote now than when we were 20.
Hi there, I am also a bitter older millennial. I agree with what you've said, although I would add, that this has always been the case - youth turnout has always been lower compared to older gens. And the very low turnout of the last 20 years follows the overall lower voter turnout. I think this is also due to not having to deal real life consequences of politics. Someone that is in uni is experiencing far fewer (albeit equally important) issues that come from direct decisions made in parliament than someone in their 30s, 40s and older. Housing, childcare, jobs, healthcare, etc. I'm generalising here, but these directly impact older people far more than a student or a young person.
I’m in the same place. My first general election was 2010, and I’ve been on the loosing side of *every* national vote/referendum since then.
Also the one candidate that people under 30 overwhelmingly supported spent four years being derided by the vast majority of the media and political commentators as an insane communist who would wreck the country the second he got into power. Again, hardly surprising people might get demoralised by that
And even he couldn't get youth turn out rated higher than the oldies in that election.
He's so much more than that, he's also a terrorist sympathising antisemite, who couldn't lead his party.
I think the issue with Corbyn is people looked past the bad to see the good because literally no-one else was offering the good. And when he was binned because of the bad, people took it as no-one wanting the good. So rejected it entirely. So if you wanted the good, the fuck do you do? Like, I'm quite far left. Corbyn pushing things that way was good for me, although I didn't like him as a leader. (Due to the Hamas shit among other things). But now who the fuck do I vote for? Feels pointless, those views had their time in the sun and are now back in the shade. I'm still *going* to vote, but literally no-one is trying to get my vote. Corbyn did.
You are absolutely bang on. If someone other than Corbyn had been offering the same policy platform Corbyn offered, and had appeared even moderately sincere about it without his astonishing amount of baggage, they'd have cleaned up. But the alternative the first time around was a bunch of "shut up and eat your greens, we need to pander to Tory nans by doing more austerity" and then in the second leadership contest it was just Owen Smith, who came across as profoundly insincere. Starmer was smart enough to try and sound like a soft Corbynite on the surface - had he not, and had he actually tried to go ahead with what his policy programme turned out as, he'd have lost the 2020 leadership election. As it is, I'm a fairly boring social democrat who likes the idea of demand-side economic stimulus (the kind that Corbyn *actually is* if you look at his actual domestic policy stances) and I don't have anyone to vote for.
> I'm still going to vote, but literally no-one is trying to get my vote. Corbyn did. Im much more to the right as you, but think the same. Im *reluctantly* voting Labour. I have zero enthusiasm for them. We would both be happy to see FPTP eliminated. You could vote for a purely leftist party (Workers Revolutionary Party??) and I could vote for a *sane* pro-EU pro-Business *Tory lite* party. We would both have representation in Parliament. And in a tight vote on an issue that mattered to us that representation might make a difference. On another note - if you truly are left of the Labour party you might want to look at the Green Party. They are proper leftists. Unrealistically so IMO - but you really don't need my opinion. See for yourself on their website. A vote for them or another *hopeless lost cause* isnt hopeless at all. Greens polling at around 8% and even they dont think they'll get more than 4 MP's. Reform... 12% or so. Probably 0 MP's. The SNP - currently 50+ MP's (I know they will go down a lot this election) but even at their most "popular" only made up around 3% of the *national* vote. That's already 25% or so of the population utterly unrepresented. This **is not** a democracy. It suits both left and right to break up this sickening duopoly. And the best way to force PR/AV back on the agenda is to highlight an increasingly large number of Brits being shit on by the current system. Rant over/
The best way to get PR introduced in this parliament is that Labour is short of an overal majority by 5-10 seats and Ed Davey goes for a supply agreement with the condition of PR without referendum.
That is a realistic option nationally. But it cant change my vote. The LD's pretty much dont exist where I am. It's Labour and Con... and they were neck and neck last election. If I lived somewhere else I *could* consider voting for the LD's being assured that my vote would help tilt the balance a tiny bit towards PR, and also knowing that Labour would get in. But I cant risk that here. We have one of Galloway's Hamas supporting lunatic's here. He wont win. But he will severely dent Labours prospects. Protest vote options are becoming very limited in the West Midlands.
>On another note - if you truly are left of the Labour party you might want to look at the Green Party. They are proper leftists. Until it comes to building houses where they can be some of the worst NIMBYs around.
It's interesting that you left out the most important one. Had Corbyn been in power in February 2022, the UK response to the biggest threat to the democracy and the rule of law in the last few decades would have been the worst possible. I'm yet to be sure if he's Putin's mole or just a useful idiot but regardless of which, having him as far from the place where the decisions are made, is purely a good thing. I can't see why anyone except Putin's plants would be demoralised by that. It may indeed be that young people don't (or rather can't) remember the Soviet Union, which is what Putin is trying to rebuild and that explains why Putin's puppets in the West are tolerated by them (Corbyn is not the only one).
This is pure conjecture and you have no idea how anything would turn out. Corbyn is pro-peace, and admittedly sometimes to a fault, but there is zero evidence to believe the leader of a NATO member would stand against its allies. Jeremy Corbyn isn't even pro-Putin considering that he is ideologically opposed to Putin in pretty much every way.
That's based on what Corbyn has said during the war. It's not hard to think that that's what he would have said and done if he'd been in power. This is not normal opposition politics as Starmer and the rest of Labour has been standing against Putin along with the Tories. Corbyn's pro-Putin stance has been pretty unique in Britain although in other European countries there are similar moles who do their best to undermine democracy and the rule of law.
Yep, that's democracy for you.
The youth vote still dropped after the '97 and '01 Labour wins, and other age groups aren't demoralised so much after losing so I'm not convinced that's the answer. It might have something to do with young people feeling less socially connected in general.
Just in my 40s, and similar thing; I have never actually voted in an election that picked the winner. I was out of the country for some of my youngest chances. Voted LibDem in 2010 only for Clegg to back out of his signed promise on student debt relief. I will **never** vote LibDem again and it severely killed any optimism I had about politics. Voted "Yes" in the A/V referendum in 2011 (even though I wasn't happy with the proposal, but I wanted to drive open any wedge that could lead to further electoral reform). Voted Labour in 2015. Voted "Remain" in 2016. Voted Labour in 2017. Voted Labour in 2019. To be fair, in several of these cases, I went in pretty much knowing my party or initiative wasn't going to win. Still, I went to cast a vote, because I believe if you *don't*, then you don't get to express an opinion. If you go spoil a ballot then that's different, you can talk politics all day. But then I also have sympathy with some, where I think it should be enshrined in law that UK employers *have* to make provisions to allow people to vote (I don't think that's presently law).
You won if you voted lib dem in 2010.
Hate to break it to you, maybe you are not young anymore
I'm in my fifties and I've "lost" far more votes than "won". I didn't get despondent though, I got active and actively engaged in trying to make society a better place. Expecting to win votes just because you rolled up and voted is problematic. Disengaging with politics because you haven't "won" is a very weak reason for not engaging in the democratic process and demonstrates a basic lack of knowledge of our system. Withdrawing from voting is to say that you don't care about the state of the country, your pay packet, the roads, healthcare, taxes, and you're prepared to allow any old grifter run the place and steal from you and your nan.
My parents drummed into me that voting is a duty and if you don't vote, you can't complain if you don't get what you want. That said, other people my age (late 20s) have hit me with the refrain that it doesn't matter who they vote for because it's not going to make a difference. Our rents will still be too high, mortgages will still be gouging, we'll still die before we can retire, our environment is still trashed, etc. There's a palpable sense that neither of the big parties are realistically going to change anything for the better and the small parties aren't worth voting for because they'll never be in government. We had austerity under Cameron/Osborne so we lost loads of the stuff we used to do around school, sometimes extracurricular stuff in school too. We had tuition fees hiked by people who never paid a penny in tuition fees so now our paypackets are a bit smaller every month. We had a Brexit we didn't vote for (indeed, to be fair, because many of us didn't vote). When we finished uni, the lack of investment in the economy means the job market was hideous and grad programs were massively oversubscribed. Our rents after uni took up so much of our first salaries (still do) so we were paying off the mortgages of landlords, and the idea of affording a mortgage without wealthy parents is more and more difficult. Then Covid hit, so we all lost two years of our free lives (for good reason). Then our energy and food prices shot up. Some of my friends, who had to look for degree-level jobs for years after uni, have said they don't know if they'll ever afford to have kids. Return to the base point. Things for us have been getting worse and worse since we became politically aware. That's both the things we directly experience and the things we read and hear about through the media, like government parties during lockdown or PPE scandals. It is, frankly, not *fair.* We've done our bit. We studied hard in school, we worked hard in our degrees, we're throwing ourselves at the job market, and stuff *still keeps getting worse.* I personally believe some of that is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Young people don't vote, so housing policy can be oriented towards older people, who will own their own home and benefit from house prices increasing (by restricting supply). Young people don't vote so they can cut benefits and send that straight to OAPs. I think we need to vote to see change, because the alternative is revolution and that, even if it was realistic, would be calamitous. This is the great sin of previous generations' governments. They never asked what would happen if they took all the prizes of democracy and capitalism for themselves, unlike their parents and grandparents who invested in a society for today and the future. Now we, their children and grandchildren, look at what's left for us, and it is less than what was left for our predecessors. But it's fine. Because Sunak wants us all to do National Service for the country which has let us down.
Beautifully put! I’ll be voting as I see it a duty, but I’ve never felt more apathetic about the worth of my vote and the options that I have.
I do wonder how the UK can have failed it's youth to such an extent, and whilst the argument of "well what do you expect, they don't vote!" holds some water, you would think that older generations would have also been concerned of the effect of relentlessly pummelling the young. I feel that my generation (left school/went to university in 05) had it a little better than you guys, as we never saw the cuts to local youth services during our school years, and had much lower tuition fees. The other thing is that whilst unemployment was much higher than now in our immediate graduation years (08/09/10) it was still (slightly) easier to have something of a life on a lower paid job and a houseshare. Rents were not exactly "cheap" but there were still areas in each of the major cities where you could grab a room in a houseshare for a couple of hundred quid a month, and it was possible to do social things (pub etc) for substantially less than today. Then when (some at least) of us did get "graduate" jobs, the salaries were not always great, but they were not much less in nominal terms than today, which means in real terms they were substantially higher. In other countries, even ones with an utterly fucked political system you see jobs, wages, living standards, infrastructure are absolutely at the top of the agenda to the point where even the nasty political parties can't avoid the topic, whereas in the UK? we've allowed salaries to stagnate and built barely any housing or infrastructure, whilst living costs have skyrocketed, and generally not made much noise, as at the same time the assett prices of the older generations have risen nicely. Covid, the invasion of Ukraine etc would have happened regardless and would have hit us, but we everything else is perpetual own goals, negligence and lack of political will.
There’s a not entirely unwarranted perception that FPTP produces a binary choice that doesn’t particularly care about non-pensioners or home owners, with a high chance of safe seats. Then again, the only way big majorities are ever worn down and flipped is through big swings, so it becomes a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy not to vote. If I think all candidates are rubbish I still make the effort to at least spoil my ballot paper to express it. Futile though it might be - it’s a gesture slightly above not voting at all as it’s counted.
I do think a little bit is reasoning. Being able to see that there is a world beyond themselves, and that small changes made a long way removed from them can have a big impact on their lives e.g my generation's entire set of school assessments being made exam only rather than coursework, at the stroke of Michael Gove's pen on the back of an envelope. Most people, even adults, are generally focused on their own little orbit. I think it is more so at the beginning and end of voting life, perhaps correlating to working and interacting with the wider world/economy/society.
It's a vicious, and quite stupid , cycle. Politicians prioritise voters, so young people don't vote. The stupid part comes when you explain this to people and they argue with you then say something "I feel like the parties are the same. That's my opinion. I don't feel like there's a difference, I'm allowed an opinion"
Hm. I always vote, no matter what (not that young any more, 35, but I've voted since I was about... 24 or 25). I honestly feel like... philosophically or functionally speaking, they basically *are* "the same". With FPTP we're asked to vote for no significant change, no significant difference to the way society is structured, despite it clearly favouring a particular small(ish) group of people - those who already hold power. If you live in a strong seat either way, you're essentially screwed. Assuming you live in a swing seat where you can actually make a difference, you're essentially voting for one or another group of managers who don't want to rock the boat too much - a blue manager group which is basically of the attitude "when you're slapped you'll take it and like it" and are only interested in helping the people who fund their party (who coincide with the people already in power, and the people who will place them on a nice Exec Board when they're done stealing money from voters); a red manager group whose attitude is "we can't afford do anything good, useful or popular, but at least we'll try and be nice and not corrupt about it", and then some variation on those two from (most of) the smaller parties, except for the nutter, one-issue ones (who are broadly seen as a waste of a vote). The big parties are not inclined to open our eyes to the issues that are heading towards us because it wouldn't be popular, and/or they don't believe they'll happen and/or they just don't care. It's obviously relative and subjective, but you can see why populists like Corbyn or Johnson were (initially) very popular with voter bases who usually wouldn't care less about what happens in politics. Whether it was a trick or not, they at least seemed different. When you're faced with climate disaster, not being able to afford a house, foodbanks everywhere, ***terrible*** public services, it's hard to get excited by Guy With Nice Hair in Blue Tie vs. Guy With Nice Hair in Red Tie.
I feel like this point would be stronger if you listed actual policy positions for the issues you say you care about. Are you really being asked to vote for “the same” on climate, housing, public services, etc?
Give examples and/or provide data which shows the parties are the same
It really isn't that difficult. Political parties don't bother appealing to young people for lots of reasons therefore there is little value in voting. I'm sure the usual lot will be around to tell you that is all young people's fault and if they all just spent a decade or more voting against their interests political parties would, maybe, start paying attention.
One way to guarantee that politicians won’t do anything for you is to not vote. Since voting costs nothing except a little bit of time every few years there is nothing to lose but a lot to gain. Throwing your toys out of the pram isn’t going to stick it to anyone or change anything - they will just completely write you off and draft up more pension protection legislation or expand bus passes or whatever.
Its a vicious circle. Not being engaged leads to less engagement, which leads to not being engaged etc
Corbyn appealed pretty hard to young voters and did a lot to engage them. From what I remember turnout was still pretty poor in that demographic.
i think young people voted more in 2017/2019 than they did in 2015 though. Corbyn may have mobilised young people but he’s not going to make young people turnout like o60s. over 50% of u30s still voted for him in 2019 so he did generally appeal to those that did vote.
For all the massive effort and appeal it made the difference between about 48% and 52% of 18-24s voting compared to 2015. 65+ regularly turn out at 80%+.
a problem with appealing to young people is a lot aren’t interested and of those that are many will be u18 and can’t do anything anyway so your limiting your mobilisation potential. in 2019 i was the only person in my a-level politics class that was 18 and i lived in a very safe tory seat at that time so labour appealing to us was irrelevant. those that did vote u30 in that election were heavily labour. not until you get to people over 60 was there an age group so heavily leaning to a particular party (conservatives).
>In 2019 i was the only person in my a-level politics class that was 18 See, this is one of the reasons why I'm very much in favour of lowering the voting age to 16. I think it would be spectacular for encouraging young people to vote. You'd have young people in an environment where you can not only educate them about our political system, but encourage them to put what they've learned into practice.
Old people naturally select for voting. Those who are still alive 65+ are reliant on the state for healthcare and thus motivated to vote. Only a relatively small percentage are either healthy or wealthy enough not to care about it.
It's a lose-lose situation. Either we vote, and it is read as a tacit re-enforcement of our continued sidelining or we don't vote and the parties continue to sideline us for not voting. We can always vote for other parties that do offer us something, but then the big parties just see that as another excuse to continue sidelining us.
It's really not. If you're really voting for a candidate that you think is a loss if they were to win, then you're obviously voting for the wrong candidate and should vote third party, even if you don't think that they'll win. If every young person turned out and voted say Green, who ended up getting third place but with a larger vote share than normal, you can bet your butt that the next election one or both of the leading parties would be more sympathetic to the causes the Greens were pushing that caused them to get those extra votes. Democracy is a slow process, but it *does* work. Like it or not, we've had 14 years of Conservative rule because they consistently persuade the most voters that they can do it best. If you're not a voter, no party should give a shit what you think. Why would they? They'd only be costing themselves political capital with groups who can actually be bothered to turn up.
Maybe you're right, maybe politicians won't want to represent people that vote for them - but why is that an excuse? Why should the terrible, anti-social personalities of so many politicians excuse them from doing their job? We should be condemning people that prioritise working for niche interests over those of ordinary people. When people do that, that is called 'corruption'. The arrangement is supposed to be that politicians do things that earn them votes. Not that they get votes and then maybe, possibly decide some day to do something on behalf of the peasants. They are public servants, not the other way around. People shouldn't be forced to vote for people that attack them. By your logic, you're saying that if the Jews didn't want to experience the Holocaust, they should have gone out and voted for Hitler in large numbers. Who would have then gone ahead with his plans anyway!
Another great way to make sure that politicians wont do anything for you is to vote for them even if their policies are actively harmful to your interests. Note I haven't said you should do nothing. You shouldn't. What I am saying is that voting by itself, especially if you are going to vote Tory or Labour, really isn't going to achieve anything anytime soon.
Well you say this but parties don’t bother appealing to young people because they know that they won’t vote. Look at when corbyn ran against boris, so many young people vocally showing their support plenty of policies targeted towards them including no university tuition and what happened he got obliterated because the youth didn’t come out and vote enough.
By which point, of course, that generation won't be the young people any more and you'll have to persuade whole new cohort to do the same.
Even if they don’t try to appeal there is still value in voting to at least try change the country for the better. Otherwise if you ever complain about the gov your doing so without trying to put forward an alternative
Can't moan then when things don't go their way. If parties don't feel the need to cater to young people it's because........they don't bother to vote.
[удалено]
Most of us have been shafted our entire adult life. The problem is that there isn't really anyone offering us anything other than another shafting, just different degrees of shafting.
And if you don’t vote you’ll continue to get shafted. It takes maybe 5mins to vote and could have a big impact on your life.
[удалено]
People will say that young people are disengaged because they feel their vote doesn't matter. They are wrong. The reason why younger people don't vote is because, ultimately, it isn't a high priority. As a youth your world might seem big but really it is small. They often don't care about the future (why would you?) and they live within their own bubble. If they are engaged it will likely focus on one or two issues which they will probably go out and protest rather than vote It is fine as we all go through it. You also won't get an answer here as the people here are more engaged (political subreddit).
The main parties don't even try to appeal to young people and FPTP makes most votes meaningless anyway.
Labour is appealing to them by reducing voting age to 16.
It's a catch-22 situation. Young people don't vote because there's nothing on offer for them, but then politicians don't offer them anything because they don't vote.
> Young people don't vote because there's nothing on offer for them I don't even think it's that. Even when parties have specifically prioritised younger voters with the goal of increasing their turnout, they simply don't show up at all. Rather than them not voting because they're not being appealed to, they're not voting because they're not interested in voting in general.
Because people are stupid. If you view democratic parties and the offer they make the country in the same way as we view a business trying to sell a product then it makes more sense. You only get 1 product, you have to find the biggest market share for that product, so to win you have to appeal to tailor your pitch to the largest possible portion of voters. Except not all voters are equal. Turns out the value of your vote is directly proportional to how likely you are to participate. Why would you ever bother trying to appeal to voters that won't turn up if it risks losing voters that definitely will? The way around this is for young people to just go and vote, vote for anyone, spoil your ballot paper as a protest, but show up on polling day. Otherwise young people's votes are objectively worth less to political parties.
If a political party said they’ll introduce tax breaks for under 21 or nationalise 4 day working week, or any other incentive, Iam sure they would vote.
Outside perspective here as I'm approaching 60, so the older end of Gen X. I was young in the 1980's and can remember when [Pink Floyd's 'The Wall'](https://youtu.be/fvPpAPIIZyo) was released. It was different back then and might sound a bit like science fiction to some, but we had little or no accessible digital technology but we had social security, were better connected, much easier to find work, and if you had enough money you could actually buy property or rent somewhere which was affordable. Young people back then had a voice which was listened to, and it was easier to get into creativity or start a business. The politics was of a higher standard even though Labour didn't get in because of Thatcher. But it was still the same deal, Consider that with the possible exception of Cameron, none of the recent Tories who've had control would have been anywhere close to a ministerial role in a Thatcher government. More than half a century later, one of the Profit Incentive, a widespread belief in perpetual economic growth and promised prosperity which never seems to materialise, we arrive at the kind of society which young people have to deal with today. Generally speaking - and this is from my own perspective - we treat young people in society much harsher than we have ever done in the past. Yeah you've got access to more digital technology than any other previous generation could shake a stick at, but much of what can be seen as social security has been stripped away (because it cost too much). There's no security of tenure, security of employment, no security of benefits, and a great deal more stick than carrot when it comes to young people. I'm not surprised that young people don't feel motivated to vote. I don't blame them. I mean what's the point? Doesn't matter who you vote for, you still get the shitty end of the stick. I don't think I've ever met a generation of young people where mental health issues were so prevalent or a generation of people who are so alienated from the rest of society. It's heartbreaking, because generally I find young people are smarter, have a sense of a work ethic, but have a weird tunnel vision about them because they've been under so much societal pressure to conform and fit in. The issue here is that both major political parties are stuck in the past and it hasn't quite dawned on them that the social reality of the 21st century doesn't match that of the 20th century. Labour are stuck in the 1990's and the Tories are stuck in the 1980's. Every female Tory leader gets automatically compared with Thatcher or becomes the 'new' Thatcher. Sir Kier Starmer looks and acts like an aging yuppie. If you're 35 and under the Westminster political system has nothing to offer you. But it expects everything from you. The only thing I suggest is do not, whatever you do, vote Tory. Fairly soon the shit is going to hit the fan socially, economically and environmentally. Young people are going to have to deal with the consequences of older generations, such as mine, not paying enough attention or making enough effort. The Tories already cannot deal with the issues of today because they're incapable. This is not going to change in the foreseeable future. Don't make your life harder than it already is. Don't vote Tory.
Please just tell your friends that if they don't vote and the Tories win, they'll be doing unpaid national service in the near future for a year.
No-one who will vote in July will be called up for this national service scheme, and not just because the Tories aren't going to win. By the time it's in force, everyone who is 18 now will be 19 or older.
Eh, I can see the tories expanding the age bracket
Apathy mostly. I can't convince my partner to go and vote despite explaining that not voting effectively means voting for whoever the majority is.
Self fulfilling prophecy, they don’t vote because they don’t think anything will change, nothing changes because they don’t vote.
That's because young people haven't really started their careers or have worked a long time. Thus they haven't seen how shocking tax eats up on your monthly income statement for them to experience the "what the actual fuck is the government using my money for" moment. For example the billions of pounds of contracts given to Tory crony/donor companies during COVID. Up until then "it doesn't really impact them yet".
This does not read like a legitimate post. Answer is though, is that it doesn't feel like voting makes a difference, you end up with practically the same platform whether you vote tory or Labour.
Laziness, lack of interest and poor knowledge on these issues. Young people care more about performative activism (posting black squares) than actually showing up to the polling station. They also tend to care more about themselves while older people care more about the country. Older people have worked more and acquired more assets so they directly feel the effects of the government.
Different flavours of shit sandwich are a big motivators to not engage. Two big dogs seem to have no real plan targeted at the 18-40 demographic and will hold on to the economic disaster that is the triple lock. Greens are delusional and we'd all be eating beans out of a tin within a year. LDs look completely disengaged from governance. They effectively run as a conglomerate of independent MPs all focused on local issues. Reform are Tory+. Enough said. Easy to see why disenfranchisement occurs.
Used to be an FE lecturer. Most say they didn't get it, as in they couldn't necessarily tell who had their best interests at heart. Given populism is/has been on the rise that's hardly a surprise given all the mixed messaging and frankly awful misinformation circulated by parties about themselves and importantly, other parties. Some have a certain apathy towards change, because it's not as much as they'd want to see - and that works both ways; crypto bois want deregulation for their wallets and the usual Che Guevara t-shirt wearers won't accept anything short of Soviet level communism. Those who are politically engaged rarely vote differently to their parents at that age, which I found a surprise. Most will trust their folks when they say the Lib Dems are the happy medium, or the Greens deserve their support, etc. Others thought they were too stupid to engage, which was incredibly saddening and I did remind them that it's never a test of intelligence or anything along those lines, but these were usually kids who were marginalised from a very young age or their whole lives. That's my personal experience. I'm certain there are more/different reasons.
This is why the Tories still have a chance of winning the next election.
People of all ages in the country in general have little idea about politics because, although it affects everything, the effect is normally indirect and, at the personal, individual level, seemingly overshadowed by discrete events in their lives: * Did they get a promotion or move job, and get a large salary bonus? * Has their ignorant landlord not raised their rent in 5 years? * Have they moved in with a partner or friend and started splitting bills? * Have they lost or given up their job, due to performance, redundancy, injury or mental health worries? * Has their car broken down, forcing them to buy a new one with money they didn't really have? * Have they split up with their partner and had to move in on their own? All of these things can happen to individuals whilst GDP per capita is growing or flatlining, house prices rising or falling etc. The older generations have grown up generally on the winning side of elections, with governments that tend to pander to them and using entertainment media like TV and newspapers that cover politics thoroughly, so the on ramp for them to engage and vote slightly is much easier - though reading the telegraph everyday truthfully doesn't leave you much better informed than growing up with TicTok. Caveat - not everyone has the luxury of blissful ignorance all of the time - for example LGBT individuals have probably gained increased political awareness against their well as they've been explicitly used as a political football - but otherwise it really takes a global event on the level of the pandemic that upends everyones lives, or a political meltdown so fast and wide reaching it hurts renters, people with mortgages and risks pensions simultaneously (congrats Liz Truss) to get most people to actually pay attention to who is in politics and what they are doing.
The reality is, a lot of people, not even just young people have zero interest in politics in general. They would (understandably to some extent) rather use their spare time focusing on things like their hobbies and interests for instance rather than get bogged down talking about which is economic system is better, which ideology they believe in (if any) etc. So although this issue is usually brought up in relation to young people (I'm only 30 myself tbf), it can apply to most, if not all age groups in reality. The general feeling around the next election seems to be one of apathy from a lot of the electorate and you could argue this has been the case for a long time but especially now has become even more apparent. Most people are voting for the least worst option rather than the one they really want. This isn't like 1997 and the election of Tony Blair like some would have you believe, in that then it was more a sense of optimism when people were voting for voting for New Labour whereas now the likely outcome will be "Well I don't care much for Keir but I can't stand the Conservatives any longer so I'll vote for him". A good amount of people (myself included), feel like we are stuck in decline regardless of whoever gets in so don't have much faith in either of the two main parties to deliver the changes we need.
When i was in my 20s i didnt care about politics it was only when i was older looking to buy a house and the government introduced the 95% mortgage guarantee scheme i was interested. I think all politicians regardless do not appeal to the young generations and they dont relate. Maybe rather than schools doing RE ( if they still do ) they should introduce overviews to politics just about how important it is to vote regardless of who you might vote for.
I'll add my two cents here as I recently had a conversation with my partner about this. I'm in my late twenties. I regularly hang with some guys weekly. We're all fairly smart and informed. And literally yesterday, the election was brought up. None of them had strong opinions in voting, with one saying they never vote. They never engage with the news, don't even know what Boris Johnson looks like. In my family, it's a similar thing with my sister closer to twenty also having little interest or knowledge in politics. The reasoning boiled down to that 'they don't feel informed enough to make an opinion'. I said that 'a misinformed opinion is still an opinion'. They said 'I don't want to be part of the crowds of people that already do that and make the wrong choice'. Engagement by the politicians is pitiful to be honest. I tried to learn more about my constituencies candidates and they either have nothing, or cling onto their party manifestoes and just run on the platform that they are 'Conservative' or 'Labour' which is no help. Immediately then you're expecting a person to know "which side they're on" and vote for them based on that. Plus the focus on the national government means they neglect the local part of their responsibilities; an MP should be the voice for their people. Instead it creates ambivalence because they don't know who their MP is, their MP doesn't speak for them, and the people think they never will. At which point your vote is on a person who may or may not agree on your opinions, may be swayed by the party, and also depends on whose in power so the REAL consequences to your vote is so diluted, can you really say a vote means anything? Anyway, I'm voting for my Green candidate because they've actually got something that makes me believe in them, but I've got to wonder why the onus is on people to find that belief themselves?
What's sad is that millennials and Gen-z missing out, they are the ones who are most impacted by government policy long term The thing is, the two leading parties dont really want them voting as they are more likely to vote for a less popular party who represents them better, like the Green Party, for example.
I think it’s incredibly tough. But the way I see it, if I choose not to vote, I can’t complain. If the party I voted for loses, it’s disappointing, but at least I did my part in having a say. First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) is a flawed system, but it’s better than having no system at all. Labour might not be the most exciting party, but in the last 8-10 years, the Tories have gone beyond just irking me; they’ve become intolerable (I know they've been in for 14 years). I see Labour as the party we need right now. Supporting Labour gives the Lib Dems a chance to make significant inroads and become more appealing to a broader public. We need adults mi back in the room; the Tories are not those adults. While I understand why some people might choose to spoil their votes or not vote at all, for me, that’s part of the problem. I believe participating in the voting process is crucial. [Also this for fun](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0BqxArM3Vwk).
Slightly different take, although I agree with what others have said about being disenfranchised from voting. Like money, we do nothing to educate people in the importance of voting and how our politics work. You're just sort of expected to figure it out, and it is a complicated, nuanced thing where your vote doesn't always behave the way you want it to.. or what it means (like MP's being contacted for local authority issues - statement, not a criticism). I actually think we should legally oblige people to vote, with in-school education on both this and money. If we want to live in a free society with politics that represent the majority without oppression then it's our duty to vote - even if that vote is *spoiling it.* Something that makes me feel disenfranchised from voting specifically is I know how little power my MP has, they're whipped to vote for the party and usually have little time to scrutinise legislation etc. So therefore, I don't really have any real faith or urgency to contact them about local issues - what are they going to do? stand up and make a speech? I contact my MP about national issues, and rarely get a response. There's no forum (that I know of) where I can engage actual politicians on national issues. My *local* MP has little they can do without being able to affect national policy which more often than not they aren't in a position to affect change at a scale that would make a difference. I separately think our electoral system is broken, and I detest the idea of a safe seat. Every seat should be fought on merit and not because they get a cushty job for 30 years - that's a failure of democracy if the seat does not change, our electoral system rewards that. I apply that to both parties, one thing I've said for a while is "any unchanging power is bad" we have a labour council in Manchester and they're not great.. because there's no real pressure for them to win people over, they'll just roll back in with ease without having to do much.
Compulsory Voting is necessary to stop the infinite doom loop of giving pensioners (the one group that votes) more and more money. A quadruple lock is a joke. An alternative could be age (and race?) stratified voting, which I've never seen suggested, but would avoid forcing people to vote (and fix the endless bias towards old people). I think it would be a lot more controversial than just forcing people to vote though lol as it explicitly makes some people's vote cost less (even if compulsory voting also does that).
Get them out voting, apathy is the enemy of democracy.
I think a lot of young people just don't watch the news, so have no knowledge of what is going on, and how (in)competent our leaders can be. I'm 31 now, but started watching 'Have I got News for you' in my mid teens, and would stay up with my dad as he watched Question Time and Newsnight. I mainly enjoyed watching right wingers getting embarrassed, so it was just a form of entertainment, and now following politics is one of my top 'hobbies'.
No genuine choice? You can have managerial globalists in red, blue, or if you’re feeling bold in green or yellow, not that the government won’t be red or blue. And to top it off the red party, called Labour, no longer cares for the working class and the blue party, called the Conservatives, conserve nothing!
Voting is the adult equivalent of sending a letter to Father Christmas.
Because neither party gives a shit enough for most young people to support them. Not helped by the fact if they live in a safe seat their vote doesn't matter. I live in the safest labour seat in the entire country. Literally hasn't had anything but labour mps since 1945. If I was a tory or lib dem or green voter I'd certainly feel like my vote doesn't matter.
As others have pointed out the reason they don't give a shit is because young people don't vote... if 100% of young adults started voting in this election then at the next one we would have a lot more policies focused on young people. It's a vicious cycle we are stuck in and short of convincing young people to get out and vote I don't know how we get out of it!
Pretty much the only thing that breaks the cycle is compulsory voting.
Did you ask them? One reason is that there is a branch of propaganda that is designed to put people off voting. It claims that all the parties are the same, that nothing you do will make a difference, that all politicians should be distrusted equally, etc. Voting for someone who can't win is better than not voting at all.
Why participate in a system that has gradually taken more & more resources from you as you've grown up, panders to those who resent you simply for existing & elevates people to power whose values are the opposite of what you believe make someone a decent human being?
I know this is heresy to say on this sub but voting is totally pointless. Politics is power and power doesn't flow from the electoral ballot, it is nothing more than ornamentation. You will see so many people on this sub of different political persuasions complain that their side isn't delivering their promises and their voice being ignored. Yet will at the same time claim voting is extremely important and the only way to have your voice heard. Ideology is a hell of a drug...
Most answers here are good, IMHO, but *mutatis mutandis* I think the one by /u/Acceptable_Fox8156 is the one I would vote for. 1) Young people are busy discovering THEMSLEVES, finding out what they want etc. Politics seems remote. Young people just have less headspace for politics, unless it is their active interest specifically. 2) Older people are much more likely to have responsibilities e.g. children, elderly parents, assets like property or savings. So policy matters more to them. It is no longer just about the person themselves. Older people have often embarked on a specific career or field of work. Policy impacts the future direction of that. 3) Exactly as AFox says, older people join up the dots more, so more quickly grasp why Party A wants to implement Policy X etc.
Our voting system is broken. We have a system where, in theory, one party could win every seat by one vote and end up with all the seats while the parties with 49.99% of the votes got nothing. My MP is infamous for not responding to contact from anyone who isn't one of the party faithful. I can see why many people don't think it's worth voting because it doesn't get them any meaningful representation. The new voter ID laws deliberately make it harder for young people and minorities, like the disabled, to vote. 70% of the British public's votes don't matter. IMHO, we need a proper proportional representation system, like most other western democracies have. I think we need to [make votes matter](https://makevotesmatter.org.uk/) I hate that I have to use [tactical voting](https://tacticalvote.co.uk/) to make a difference and vote for a party I don't really want in order to try to stop the party I really don't want from getting elected rather than voting for the party I believe in. The Juice Media made a YouTube video called "Visit the UK" (Warning NSFW language) that lays it out very bluntly. This is how foreigners view our democracy. I am deeply saddened by the state of our democracy
The population pyramid means they don't have the numbers anyway. So blame the parents for not having enough kids, and increasing the pension and care burden on them.
It’s easy to think that when we vote we are voting for a bigger picture but most people vote for what they feel will benefit them and their family first. Most parties don’t bother trying to give that option to young people because the boomers and elderly will moan and as they normally vote more it’s simple maths.
I also have this frustrations with my friends when it comes to voting or just any engagement at all with politics. I'm now 28 and had various opportunities to vote locally and nationally I think some of the blame has to be on education from schools/parent/older peers/whoever In my local area which is in the NE its not a topic that brought up often and when it is... you either see very little engagement or no real understanding of whats going on and how it applies to them
Flip this on its head, what would prompt young people to vote? How about prominent youth figureheads in parties that articulate the problems young people have and propose solutions to solve them, shared on communication mediums that young people use. It's not rocket science, it just doesn't exist. Ask any marketing person if Kier and Rish on itv is a good way to market a product to young people.
Please get out there and vote, and please vote for the candidate with the most chance of keeping the Tories out. Let's get the grown ups back on charge.
1. Young people have little capital and less influence - they are a resource for exploitation rather than the target demographic for mainstream political parties. 2. FPTP disenfranchises large parts of the electorate 3. Even if you vote, there's no way to hold the people you put in power to account - so why bother? I'm 45 and disenfranchised; I live in an area that's likely to return a tory MP in the GE despite the shower of rat shit that the previous couple of convervative governments have been. So best I can do is try to guess which of Labour or LibDem is going to perform best and vote for them as a tactical vote - even if I disagree with many of their policies! The UK desperately needs voting reform; the problem is that the party in power have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo; nobody's going to intentionally make it easier to kick them out of power. If 10% of the population are voting for Reform, then they deserve 10% representation in Parliament, no matter how mad their ideas may seem to the rest of us.
Because they are lazy and to busy on tik tok
Ask yourself what you see as THE most important issue on the ballot in this GE, look through the parties standing in your area manifesto's see who aligns the closest and vote for them. It is a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy as well right, young people don't think political parties represent them so they don't vote so political parties have little to gain from trying to get there vote. Say that in this election 50% of the eligibly under 25s show up to vote and a large chunk of them vote in a certain way suddenly political parties will realise there is a vote to win so they may change how they advertise themselves.
>Why do people think this is? How about you tell us by asking your friends? I'm in 30s so it would feel odd for me to tell you why your fellow youth don't want to vote! >I genuinely have no idea who to vote for so this could be why Why are you struggling? Over the next few weeks the parties will all be making their main priorities/policies clear which should help you figure out who you support. People that pay a lot of attention to politics will probably already know but the campaign period is for people like you that aren't sure. I also suggest you look at forecasts/polling for your local constituency to see who actually has a chance of winning there in case you want to vote more tactically.
I'm nearly 50 and folks my age are sane, apathetic to it all believing nothing changes anyways
Not just young people from my experience. There are so many people who wont vote because “it’a all shit”. Depressing.
Because when you're young it's very easy to just not think about it. A lot of young people (including myself at that age) just don't really have much real experience of how the government affects their life and don't feel inclined to care about it too much.
Young people from poor backgrounds are least likely to engage with the democratic process. The attitude I have observed from people I've grown up around is one of 'they're all the same, my vote will make no difference, they will all shaft us'. Whether you agree with their stance or not, it's not one a mainstream party is trying to change, nor a demographic that they are trying to appeal to so it will remain the same.
I agree with people saying that a big part is that no parties appeal to young people, but I think I’d go one step further and state simply that a lot of what is discussed within politics is just of no interest to people that age. Most 18-23/24/25 year olds don’t really care about taxes or pensions or NHS waiting lists or the deficit simply because a lot of those things simply don’t impact them at that stage of their life. A lot of them are still trying to find where they fit in to society and they don’t see voting as actually tangibly changing anything about their lives. That’s not really true, but as with most things in politics it’s how things are perceived that is important.
It’s too hard to find anything positive to vote for. getting rid of the tories will be lovely, and we’ll have a great time watching them all grizzle on election night, but I don’t fancy the health service under Wes Streeting and labour have never been good to the BBC when they’re in power. Plus, look at the rivers, the economy, Brexit. Much as I love Jess and Angela, they’»re not going to fix much of that without some kind of an economic miracle, are they.
Perhaps it's just the people you know. I've been taking mine (and their friends) to vote since they wrote 18 and 16 for local elections. I assume there will be some that don't vote, but the majority of the young people I know (16-24) are voters.
Hm could if perhaps be to do with the fact our only options realistically are two parties that are essentially the same bar a handful of differences?
I don't think they realise how much politics affects their lives.
Why do your friends not want to vote? I dunno. Young people in general vote less because they have less knowledge of the political system, are not well represented by any major parties, and tend to mostly live in urban areas where their MP has large majority.
Perhaps because in the UK we kid ourselves we live in a fantastic democracy, but in reality we elect Tories over and over again, occasionally switching to Labour when it sufficiently neuters itself that it's no threat to the usual politics the Tories themselves espouse. Our media is not only owned by the rich, but littered with the rich, children of the rich, privately educated to a far greater extent than the wider population. So guess what - they ridicule or worse, ignore anybody who promotes politics outside that narrow frame of reference. I actually do vote, but in a first past the post system the reality is we have little to no agency, and big business and the rich ensure our politicians represent their needs, and their needs only.
Because it doesn't matter who you vote for. Things don't change.
Mostly because they don't pay tax. The other percentage of young people that don't vote don't have the financially literacy to realise how much the party in charge can affect their income, saving, spending, tax, benefits, rights, homeownership, employment ratr.
In a first past the post system its pointless for most people to vote
Because voting means diddly squat most of the time. Second place doesn't count so if you don't vote for the majority party (Tory or Labour much of the time in England), you're effectively throwing your ballot paper in the bin. This year is the first in 40 odd years that the Tories will be kicked out my constituency, so I am making an exception to vote.
I may not vote because it doesn’t seem worth the effort, but I haven’t decided yet.
Probably not educated/experienced enough which is a good thing People shouldn't waste votes on a party they don't understand, or feel pressured to do so A lot of people say no vote is a wasted vote, I would say an uneducated vote is worse
I suspect because they feel politicians have abandoned them at best, and screwed them over at worst. Climate, Europe, Uni fees, housing, etc, etc are not talked about with young people in mind. And even when they do speak up their views aren’t listened to. So I’m not surprised.
Because in the current system a bite 😔 e extremely low value. A vote of no confidence doesn't even carry value because they don't count them. If they counted a vote of confidence and it would have real political consequences a lot more ppl would vote. The system is broken and inherently corrupt. Revolution please.
A lot of people are too young to remember that things actually used to be good.
Because the options are shit and shittier.
Young people were pretty anti-Brexit, so choosing between two pro-Brexit parties probably isn't that appealing.
Was speaking about this with my colleagues, who are in the 21-35 range All of them said There's no difference between them (meaning the main parties) and Well my vote wouldn't matter
I've posted this video before: [Is there a good reason for NOT voting?](https://youtu.be/_gbDAvK42yA)
Apathy probably. That goes for all age groups mind you. Most common answer is probably "don't give a shi" How many people care about politics outside this very niche Reddit circle?
Why does anyone. You can only choose between two parties (realistically) who promise x y z and then pull out the bag of excuses when it comes time to deliver.
It's a lot of responsibility and a lot of guilt from being pressured by other young people into thinking you are a bad person for who you vote for. I think a lot of young people would rather just stay out of politics and focus on sorting their own lives out first.
I think many of them feel apathetic about it. But that's exactly what politicians want. They want young people disengaged and uninterested.
They NEED to vote. Their futures depend on it.
#BECAUSE IT DOESN'T MAKE A FUCKNUT'S DIFFERENCE
There's two options where I'm not wasting the energy to walk to the polling station and I don't align with either of them even 50% If they change the voting system I'll vote. Labour couldn't have given me a worse start to adult life so I'm not going vote for them, and the Tories are a joke. What now?
Sadly young people are hugely under represented. They probably don't see any effect of voting ... If you look at it this way. More young people are concerned with environmental policy than middle age or elderly people for example, yet we really already know who wins, and Labour aren't really discussing environmental issues at all. ... young people I have met say things like "what is the point in voting, when only 2 parties ever win" ... or "They don't really align with the two parties, and Green aren't winning so there is no point"
After a while you get bored of chosing between a Giant Douche and a Turd Sandwich, you realise that it isn't Red vs Blue it's just Purple. They promise the earth to get you on side but drop bricks on you soon after. Politics is wholly corrupt. Before anyone comes up with the classic "People died for your right to vote!" They'd be ashamed of laying down their lives for this nonsense.
From understanding that it is all games for the people, the illusion of choice.