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by Desire
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I'm afraid I have to disagree here - I took 5 A levels, none of which required me to read a newspaper. I never attended a single lesson for General Studies and still came out with a B

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Nothing about school makes me more angry at school than General Studies. At the beginning of last year we were told that we took General Studies because it would give us a wider scope of knowledge and ideas and teach us new skills. I thought this was brilliant, we were finally getting something that would teach us more about the world and how it works. I am obviously very gullible. We spent a term discussing modern art - fair enough, but surely under the title 'art and culture', we should look at other cultures? Then a term of god knows what under 'Science and Maths'. One lesson we spent building paper bridges and another pretending to be farmers discussing out of date scientific ideas. Then anyone who wanted to take the exam had to take extra maths lessons. I didn't even bother showing up for the politics lessons in the final term, but I know that no one came out of it with any new knowledge or ideas. I know I'm expecting a lot, but when I'm told that a subject is going to make me 'well-rounded', I expect to learn something important or some kind of new skill. Not build paper bridges or spend a lesson with an idiot teacher trying to explain powerpoint (which we've all known how to use since we were 12) when doesn't even know how to open the damn thing.

Well I am a lot older than 16 and have no taxable income and am able to vote, as am a full time student again, will be again next year too.

Also at 16 I knew a lot about politics and was a lot more into politics then than now. Was doing work for the Liberal Democrats at the time.

I did fail GCSE politics twice however (D both times). But that was becasue I messed up all my GCSE's, but I was politically active.

So they should be allowed to vote, in my experience you become jaded with politics and less interested in it as you get older. Its not something that interests you more as you get older.

I'm a 17 year old out of work student, but the fact remains that if i were in work I would pay the same level of taxes as anyone over the age of 18, have a lower minimum wage and not be able to vote. I'm sorry but if a friend asked to borrrow some money off you it wouldn't be unreasonable to ask what for, so why do we not have a say in what our taxes are used for, also if we have a lower minimum wage then why not lower taxes.

As a final point referring to further up in the topic 16y/o have to have parents permission to marry? Sorry but if my parents trued to exert control of who i was to marry, well the response wouldn't be complimentary.

(Edited by Havoc 07/08/2003 12:22)

However, Havoc, if they did refuse you would not be able to get a marriage license in this country. But then again, there's always the Gretna Green option. They do things different t'other side of the border.

At my old High School, we had mock elections the day before the real thing where every pupil was entitled to vote. This raised a lot of interest, especially considering we had to vote in our own time (breaks and lunchtime) so there wasn't the motivation of skipping lessons

The results were rather different to the real thing too. Green party won followed closely by Lib Dems. In my area, Lib Dems are currently favoured. The Green party's success is hardly surprising as the idealism of youth means you don't really consider all the practicalities and as people grow up, they think more in terms of what effects them rather than the entire world. Or maybe thats me just waffling.

Anyway, as to 16 year olds getting the vote I think there would be a lot of enthusiasm at first but apathy would soon set in just as it has for those after the age was lowered from 21 to 18. Also, I wouldn't trust a lot of the 16 year olds I know to even bother to be remotely informed before voting, despite personally being interested in politics. Oh well thats my two pence!