golli

Yes, i think we should definitely pay more consideration to how our democratic system works on a more mechanical level, and not just specific opinions. Glad to hear i am not alone in this and i imagine that other suggestions like e.g. the use of ranked choice voting would be much less controversial than this one.

Now, we both agree that the age filter is imperfect. It’s a heuristic, a rule of thumb. You rightly point this out, and you interpret this fact as if there should be absolutely no filters at all. For you, any filter would be imperfect or problematic.

I'd say the age filter is perfect. But it only filters for the one thing it measures: age.

My argument is that (here in Germany) when i go to vote there are 4 requirements asked of me:

• Citizenship (although in some more local elections i think this isn't even a requirement as e.g. other EU residents are for example also allowed to vote). Which is a binary classifier, one either has it or does not. I've had it since birth

• That i am currently not stripped of my voting rights. Something that (rightfully) is done extremely rarely and on an individual basis, e.g. for high treason or bribing officials. Here in Germany it's also always a temporary measure for a maximum of 5 years.

• There are some limitations based on residence. For example federal elections seem to require that you've lived at least 3 months in Germany during the past 25 years (with exceptions for some professions).

• Age, currently being over 18 in federal elections, 16 in some state and regional ones. Again a binary classifier, once you pass the threshold it becomes irrelevant.

The last aspect of course is that it is done so by ones own free will.

Now this i think is what you are going for, but i don't think it has anything to do with the age requirement. It's required from anyone that votes regardless of age. And in fact we already have a system in place that we deem sufficient enough to decide it, since we already have citizens where it might be in question like e.g. someone with an intelectual disability which can voice their wish to vote and sometimes receive help in doing so. Similarly if you have physical issues and are e.g. blind or can't read you can get support to allow you to vote. Prisoners who are not able to control a lot of their circumstances are able to vote. Notably we do not care about whether or not you vote "badly", for the wrong reasons, or for someone we disagree with.

The filter for this imo would be the same as for anyone else. A declaration that you want to vote and that you do so free of duress. This filter could imo be fulfilled by a child stating their wish to vote just the same. However as stated somewhere in another comment above i'd be fine with having an additional requirement here that the first vote would need to be either in person or that one would need to actively apply for it (and if not the automatic registration comes at a certain age), in which case we'd probably need to give children some options on where to do this, e.g. in school.

I'm reading your post and it reads just the same as what applies to many adults.

I know that I would have voted for a liar with a corrupt past, because of facebook ads of their party I assume. “oh look, they are apologizing and they regret it! they look so honest!”

I can't even get started how many politicians have a corrupt past here in Germany and got plenty of votes.

nowadays? they just post a tiktok video that they’ll give money to all below 20 if they are elected

Here in Germany parties actively ran on the promise of raising and fixing the pension levels in an already unsustainable system. Alongside other gifts to certain voter bases. The one left out (I assume partially because they are not able to vote): The youth.

I also think you vastly overestimate the amount of influence underage voters would yield. Especially in our demographic structures and based on the fact that a significantly lower share of them would actually make use of it. They certainly wouldn't have the power to introduce sweeping changes against the better judgement of other voting blocks. But you are right that they might influence smaller changes.

To take one of your examples i could see that for something like the smartphone ban. But would that be so bad? It might be a good thing, but i don't think this is conclusively proven. In return it is probably something being pushed by a large majority that might not even use a smartphone on a daily basis or at the least is very far removed from the current level of technology. And it also wouldn't all need to be negative. Take for example the stop killing games petition that is quite popular on this site. That one might suddenly gain some more supporters, which are actually affected by it.

However i'd also see a need for more studies. And i probably wouldn't just make a major shift like that instantaneously, but rather in a gradual way and maybe lead with changes to smaller more local elections first. Which might give opportunities for such studies.

The episodes aren't even 30-minutes. Take a look at the episode length on TMDB, only the last episode is 34min long. Others are as short as 23min and i think you still need to substract the intro from that. And factor in that you waste additional time since you want to ease in and out of each episode, which you wouldn't with less episodes or if the whole thing was a movie.

My guess would be that it is a proxy for income. As far as i am aware credit bureaus do not have access to information about how much a person earns. However if you are paying off a $2k mortgage each month, then the assumption is made that you have either enough funds or income to afford it. Once you pay off your loan it becomes a black box again, as there'd be no way of telling whether or not this is still the case.

just the right amount of run time.

The overall amount of runtime might have been ok, but imo the short episode duration paired with a weekly release schedule imo was terrible.

Besides that (as a book reader) i felt a bit underwhelmed. Somehow i just didn't click with the cast. Although i wasn't as irritated as expected by the fact that murderbot was depicted as male. In the books the gender and appearance is never specified and i somehow had a female mental image, a bit more in the sarcastic direction like glados from the portal games.

you can’t ignore the fact that even more propaganda would directly target them, taking advantage of very effective data mining based profiling. they should be able to experience more of life before advertisers starts to dictate their agenda, otherwise they’ll easily think that advertisers are speaking the truth.

Yes, this is indeed an argument that shouldn't just be ignored. And honestly this should simply never be the case, regardless of age.

I'd break it up into two parts. Official election material and just general advertisements/media. The first one typically is already quite regulated and arguably for the benefit of all should already follow standards that are not harmful to children. The second one seems like the problematic one. However I'd argue that even children are already to some degree getting confronted with what's going on in the world. Anecdotally i can say that even at elementary school age children seem to be (to varying degrees) at least rudimentally aware of many things. To give a recent example like when Israel bombed Iran.

We have things like cigarettes and alcohol where we impose age limits, but those are directly harmful things. Hard to argue that voting in a democracy is harmful. Sometimes there might be anti democratic parties (like the afd here in germany for example), but in those cases you'd think about banning those, not taking away the ability to vote. Maybe you or someone else could give me an example of something positive being banned based on age because the state/society can't provide protection from something secondary.

I would also add that advertisement to a young voting base wouldn't exclusively need to be a bad thing. Take free school lunches for example. If as a politician you run a campaign on that for example you are banking on gaining favor from a voter base that only indirectly is affected by it. The people directly benefiting from it can't vote for you.

they have a voice. It’s not like people can only vote if they are in their last decade. turning 18, just 2 years, anyone can vote, and I would say even 30 and 40 years olds are largely affected by these issues.

They have a voice, but no vote, which is what matters for the politicians in charge. Also "just 2 years" falls flat since my argument is not about the lowering to 16, but abolishing it in general. So for the sake of argument for example an 8 year old, which would make it a full decade. In practice even longer, since elections aren't every year and you aren't guaranteed to have one in the year you turn 18.

And you are right that even 30 and 40 year olds are affected by these issues, but i don't see how that would be an argument against it. If anything i'd see it as an argument that children should also have a say. We also don't have an upper limit after which you aren't allowed to vote anymore. And for obvious reasons it would e.g. be impossible to have a rule that says x years before you die you aren't allowed to vote anymore, since you won't suffer all the consequences.

Yes, but we are not filtering for maturity and capability in adults. So if this is the argument then imo it is flawed, since we'd filter for something just to stop filtering for it after a certain age.

If one wants to filter for these things then it should be applied across the board. However we are not doing so for good reasons (I can provide some if needed).

Babies and toddlers don't know shit, plus parents have an extreme amount of coercion over their children until they're teenagers.

Like I said we don't make this a prequisite for adults. There are plenty of disabled or old people fully dependent on others.

Also allowing children to vote will result in more political propaganda targeted at children.

That is an interesting point definitely worth debating. Propaganda would definitely be an issue, but this is the case not just in children, but adults alike. On the other hand with children becoming a voting block it might shift the focus slightly on topics benefiting them.

They deserve to enjoy childhood without worrying about the clusterfuck.

True, although I think children pick up a lot regardless. And importantly obliviousness of issues doesn't change how it affects them. Climate change and unfair pension systems for example will affect them regardless, this way they'd at least have a voice.

I think "teenager" is probably as low as you want to go for the foreseeable future.

I can for sure see how opinions can differ on the topic and I'd totally be ok with compromises and accepting some degree of hypocrisy. But nonetheless it's imo worth looking at the issue from the extreme.

As far as compromises go I think another way to go about it would be to have staggered voting with lower limits in more local votes. I could see how it might be more acceptable there for some.

Edit: also regarding babies and toddlers i'd think that they would need to express a desire to vote in some form, which would probably make it so you don't have literal 1 year olds voting (unless they are like an extreme genius, at which point they might aswell and it would only be a single vote of millions). Maybe one compromise would be to require some more active component below a certain age threshold, like having to vote in person for the first time or at least having to register somewhere (which if not done prior would happen automatically at a certain age).

Controversial opinion: I don't see a justification for ANY voting age.

For adults we (rightfully) don't make voting dependent on mental or physical capacity, being dependent on other people, and there also is no upper age limit.

So i wouldn't be opposed to allowing anyone elegible for voting to do so when he/she expresses the wish to do so.

Yeah that sometimes happens. Not every show clicks with everyone.

White Lotus had me wanting to know more about what those people were up to.

To be fair in a way Andor isn't this kind of show anyways, since from before it even started we know how it'll end in Rouge One.

Exactly. And also i think it's hard to see those superhero movies aimed at establishing a franchise as something standalone.

[...] Superman is just the first step,” he added. “Over the next year alone, DC Studios will introduce the films Supergirl and Clayface in theaters and the series Lanterns on HBO Max, all part of a bold ten-year plan.

This excerpt from the article really says it all.

My line of thought is that yes the end goal is shareholder value/money, but the method varies. You can go for quality or quantity, or for long vs short term profits. And those steps in-between matter.

In this case with WB and Superman the amount of money an occasional Superman movie can make is not enough, they want that sweet franchise model. But you can't just will that into place, as they've demonstrated with their failure to do so so far.

There has to be some substance at the start before you can roll out even lesser IP and make bank like marvel. Which is why in this instance they probably don't care as much about the profit from this movie, but try to optimize it more for audience and critic appeal.