Off Topic Politics Thread

I find young people more engaged with issues and less clouded by tabloid bitterness. Also, this just brings us inline with Wales and Scotland. Not really a kneejerk.

if 16-17 year olds could vote the old could never have destroyed the nation’s interests with Brexit.

 

Anything that shakes the current political system should be welcome. Having a younger democratic will shake things up with all sorts of issues and not just the environment. I can see female rights being significantly enhanced as well as a less rigid and old fashioned approach to gender. There will be much less hostility towards immigration and people will get more engaged with issues such as employment and defence expenditure.

The youngsters should be allowed to vote. They are not the ones to worry about. It is the 55 + who have caused the issues. I.e my generation. You are more likely to get a measured and considered reaction from your average 16 /17 year old that your typical gammon. Glad Starmer has confidence in the younger generation.

Getting people engaged in politics earlier will generate more informed voters. They can genuinely shape their futures for the first time.


My only nagging doubt is thinking that it may produce the next William Hague but probably unlikely as there cannot be anyone under the age of 60 who would seriously give the Conservatives their vote.

This is probably the best thing Starmer has done in the last 12 weeks.

 

The argument that 16-17 year olds aren't "mature" enough doesn't really ring true. My younger cousins are very much aware of what's going on around them (and the world). A 16 year old has the rest of their life to live, whereas someone who is 80 doesn't. It feels fairer to me.

 

Quite shocked by her appearance on TV. Dianne looks really unwell and it appeared she need support. I hope she is OK.

 

Maybe I am in a minority, but reading Abbot's comments, I really can't see how it offends. I don't see it as anti Semitic at all. She is just stating the truth, you see a black or Asian person in the street, you don't necessarily see a Jewish person. They will experience prejudice, but it is different. Not better or worse, but different.
One of the guys under me at work is Jewish, I have been his boss for 8 months and only found out he was Jewish when he told me. Lol I think he told me when we had a production issue and I said that what we were doing was a bit of a Hail Mary, and he said well I'm Jewish so let's hope for something else. I pointed out that I am an atheist so we have no hope with it working!

 

I don’t have an issue with the vote at 16, but it needs to go hand in hand with the kids being taught about politics before they are 16.
They need to learn the difference between Socialism and Communism and Capitalism etc and they also need to learn what the political parties stand for with examples of how each party thinks.
Another positive is that, at that age, they won’t come into contact with right wing newspapers unless they have a paper round.

 

But, keeping with impartiality, they won't either have come into contact with the left wing ones either

 

There’s only two of them though, iirc.
Mirror and Guardian, so much less likely to see them.

 

We absolutely should not allow 16 year olds to buy alcohol.

 

On the last point arguably some social media will cause more harm than the daily mail etc.

 

In 2023 what she was doing, as one of the very few things she does well, was playing to her black constituents. She has made a career out of race baiting and this was another example. But by feeding black people's perception that any hardship that comes their way is a result of racism, she made the mistake of implying that Jews didn't experience racism but more of a prejudice and because of that black people had it worse. That has always been her style, but because the labour party were twitchy about antisemitism she paid the price.

As a result she gave a profuse apology, see below.

This time around when asked if she regretted what she said in 2023 she answered "no not at all". This has been taken as going back on her apology in 2023. She then tried explain that what she said back then was what you quoted above about obvious differences in appearance, which isn't strictly true.

This is what Abbott said in 2023;

Abbott, 69, was responding to a writer's claims that Irish, Jewish and Traveller people suffered racism. She said that their experiences were similar to racism but that there were differences.
"They undoubtedly experience prejudice. This is similar to racism and the two words are often used as if they are interchangeable," she wrote.
"It is true that many types of white people with points of difference, such as redheads, can experience this prejudice," she said in the letter. "But they are not all their lives subject to racism."

Abbott, who has been a lawmaker since 1987, was the first Black woman to be elected to parliament in Britain, and is a close ally of Corbyn for whom she served as the party's spokesperson for home affairs.
In her letter to the Observer, Abbott said that "in pre-civil rights America, Irish people, Jewish people and Travellers were not required to sit at the back of the bus. In apartheid South Africa, these groups were allowed to vote. And at the height of slavery, there were no white-seeming people manacled on the slave ships."
She later apologised "unreservedly" and withdrew her remarks.
"The errors arose in an initial draft being sent," she said in a message posted on Twitter. "But there is no excuse, and I wish to apologise for any anguish caused."

https://www.reuters.com/world/europ...s-experience-prejudice-not-racism-2023-04-23/

As an MP, Abbott has the platform to encourage unity and improve race relations. Black people will listen to her and she can influence thinking but for all the time that I've been aware of her she has had nothing positive to say, ever. In fact quite the opposite. IMO she and some of the other black MP's are responsible for a lot of unrest and feelings of persecution among our black community.

She may not have meant to sound antisemitic in 2023, but in her eagerness to apportion racism, her lack of awareness regarding Jews saw her downfall. Her job is to represent all races, all colours but as far as I see it, she doesn't. I'm glad the labour party have dumped her, it's been a long time coming.

 

There was I thinking that labour giving 16 and 17 year olds the vote was, given that age group were more likely to vote labour, a blatant ruse to sway an election result in their favour. I also thought that those voicing their approval were doing so because not only did they see a chance of saving their sinking ship but could personally benefit by using the kids influence to push through some changes that they have been banging on about themselves. Brexit , the environment , freedom for Palestine , and all that stuff.

But after reading some very sincere posts on here I can now see that altruism is behind it. It's all about giving those young people a say on their future. Sorry for any misunderstanding as Diane Abbott might say.

 

You really do post what you want to think is real. lol. Most of the 16/17 year olds are not going to be voting for Tory or Labour. They will split between Farage, Corbyn's lot and Greens. There is a section of "yoof" that, like in the US is voting for right wing. Wanting it not to be true is just ignoring the way things are atm in the Western World but Farage is way more popular with "yoof" than people want to believe. The TikTok generation is way more to the extremes (both directions) than the general populace.

Its typical modern politician, so out of touch and awful timing. Sunak called a GE just before "good news" was due to come out so made sure Tories got even more of a trouncing than if he had waited 6 months. And Kier Starmer's timing ha been a disaster all the way so far.

He has announced this.........just as Corbyn/Sultana announced their "further to the left" party so where this would most likely have benefitted Labour a year ago........It now weakens them adding more to Greens/Collective?/reform!!

 

While what she says is pretty logical, you can't go around suggesting there is some sort of league table of racism where one group "suffers" more than others. The whole ethos of fighting things like racism is "racism is racism" and dealing with it as a whole, not assessing who suffers more discrimination than others.

I have no problem with what she is saying in reality. Its quite obviously true however a politician saying it, especially as she is in the group she is saying suffers more just sends out the completely wrong message translating to some people as "my group deserves more focus than other groups."

I did say this in January!! People underestimating just how many right wing social media folks there are with huge followings!! Still believing young people vote left. A large chunk lean right and most of both camps are not looking at the main 2 parties!

The reality people need to come to terms with atm is the only way to stop Farage being the next PM (barring a massive collapse) is to bring in PR now. Allowing the vote to 16/17 year olds at this point in time has just made the threat to his left bigger, not given him more of a share to beat Farage! Another own goal as both Reform and Corbyn's lot are (on current polling) going to pull votes from Labour.

People still banging on about Daily Mail this, GB News that blah, blah are missing what is happening online which is by far outweighing any influence of the legacy "bad boys / good boys" where most of the voters that follow legacy media are more likely to continue voting the way they would anyway.

Me: January 13th this year:

 

What lost that vote for us remainers is those idle bastards who couldn't be arsed to vote many of whom were young voters so please stop perpetuating the myth thar it was old people like me that took us out of Europe. Amongst my older friends and family very few voted to leave

 

We should restrict voting to the over 75s. That’s the only way the Tories will ever win another election.

 

Bbc news suggesting that a YouTube poll shows 18 to 24 year olds favour....


Labour ....28%

Greens .....26%

Libs 20%
Con.....9%


Reform.....8%

It also noted that Reform has a TikTok following amongst young males but is unpopular with girls.

16 to 17 year olds represent 2.8% of the population and therefore little overall impact.

It is expected that Jeremy's new party will be popular with the youth.

 

Have you not encountered tiktok, Insta, Whatsapp, Discord, Telegram, snapchat and the like? The language on there makes 4chan seem sensible! People are in for an awakening if they think all these bright young things aren't "coming into contact with right wing" because the language they are using is language even the "right wing newspapers" do not and have not used for at least 20 years, if not longer!
"right wing newspapers" spouted nonsense based on current UK values, so over time it is a little bit like self censored and what was OK in the 60s 70s is not printed today. Social media is global and a lot of countries and their young folks do not share current "UK values" so kids are very very exposed to a lot of stuff that we, in this country, would like to think is in the past!

 

In my view if you're old enough to earn a wage and pay taxes and contribute to society then you're old enough to have a vote on what happens to the country.

 

Absolutely agree with you.
I should have put the last bit in blue, as it was a tongue in cheek comment, referencing their age, but it seems to have gone over some heads.