One of the main reasons young people aren't voting is because they don't believe their vote matters or will have an impact. Interestingly, however, many of the students in attendance said they and those they know are politically involved and would be willing to engage in things like canvasing or making phone calls for candidates or issues on the ballot. Issues that were discussed as important to young voters were immigration, health care and the structure of voting in national elections (necessity of the electoral college).
The discussion on the importance of one vote ties nicely into Tolkien. We've discussed much about how Tolkien highlighted the significance of the insignificant in his works. Well, voting is just that. One single vote has the ability to help influence a nation's course. So go exercise your democratic right and vote!
Please do educate yourself first though. Some resources:
-Nmjpec.org (Judge performance reports)
-Nmvote.org (Secretary of State website, voter registration info)
-Ballotpedia.org (Info on candidates and issues nation wide)
-Votesmart.org (Info on candidates)
-NMLedge.gov (State legislature website)
3 comments:
Hi Vaire, I really enjoyed the fact that you likened voting to the significance of the insignificant in Tolkien's works. I was also at last Tuesday's lecture and I really appreciated the fact that Dr. Shepherd wasn't trying to influence anyone's voting choices. The important thing is not who you vote for, it's about showing up to the polls. Our generation gets a bad rap for not caring about this country, but I don't believe that is true. Many of us volunteer our time and limited resources around the community and speak up about issues that are important to us. However, many of us feel like our vote doesn't mean as much as the work that we put into our surroundings. This has led to extremely lower voter turnouts for millennials. In this great time of need, we must scour our shire not by force, but by getting our generation to the polls.
Estë
I love this. Voting is so important but so many people are comfortable not voting and remain indifferent until it's too late like Rohan or the Ents and end up upset with the results of their actions. However when Rohan and the Ent's are pushed to act it flips the tables in favor of the good guys, similarly if more people cared to vote the majority would be represented more accurately.
Vaire,
Thank you for posting about the significance of this. Here's another example of the significance of insignificance (jeez how many times can I use the same word in one comment): no one knew almost anything about the Hobbits (except for weirdly the Rohan) until they made themselves heard. If any one of the members of the Fellowship hadn't been there, Sauron would have won. If the Rohan, the Ents, all the warriors of Gondor, the Ghost army hadn't done what they did, hell, even if Bilbo hadn't stolen the ring in the first place, Sauron would have won.
This doesn't just happen in stories in order to advance the plot: it happens in life when we get out to vote. Personally, I am tired of older people telling us that we don't care and aren't engaged, and I would like to prove a lot of people wrong.
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