Ok Arbiter, I decided to open up a new thread on the topic so we can stop hijacking the other thread. Hopefully we can also get more opinions on the issue from others besides you, drug_tito, and myself ... it's rather refreshing to argue about something other than the usual doldrum.

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If we truly value liberty, the burden of proof must be on the side of the restriction. If you want to deprive a person of his or her rights, you have to show why that person cannot be given those rights. Age alone is not sufficient evidence to make such a restriction. So, while we can commit the insane to a mental institution once we have demonstrated their incapacity to make decisions, we cannot deprive children of their rights unless we can demonstrate that the child, as an individual, does not have that capacity.

I agree to a certain extent, but I think that the burden of proof has been sufficientely met to have some restrictions based upon age. It's clear that certain responsibilities cannot be handled by individuals until they reach a certain level of maturity that comes with age and experience. It also a preventative, temporary restriction that has been decided by society. If we completely follow through with your argument that society cannot impose its will on any indviduals then how can society impose its own interpretations of who is sane and who is insane in committing an individual? How can society pass judgement on what constitutes a mental handicap that demands intervention and special needs as opposed to a mental handicap that does not? In a similar fashion society has deemed that children below a certain age demand special attention and protection.

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No, it is not. I'd be interested to hear what the terrible consequences you think would be were children give the right to vote. I highly suspect they are a slippery slope.

As I mentioned before the danger is is that their votes would stand significantly less of a chance of representing THEIR actual opinions but would more or less reflect the opinions and manipulations by others. Additionally where would you cap it? Age 15? Age 11? Age 2??? With approximately 80 million people in the US, or approximately 29% of society, being under the age of 19 the potential ramifications of abolishing age restrictions on voting would make the 2000 election look like a complete joke! Not to mention there would be an immense skew in voting representation to favor large families over single people! Those are the terrible consequnces I envision ....

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Yeah, and it would be great if we could have a system where leaders were "voted on" by the people, but such a system is infeasible and impractical. Imagine the length of the regulations that would have to be imposed on voting procedure, the sheer cost of collecting and counting votes - it's a logistical nightmare! So, while in a perfect world it would be nice to have democratically elected leaders, it's only practical to have a system where all political decisions are made by one supreme ruler who rules for life and passes it on to his heirs.

So why not implement a COMPLETELY democratic system rather than a representative democracy? I mean hell we might as well implement a system where EVERYBODY votes on EVERYTHING. Would you advocate the implementiion of such a system given the expense? I think there's a reason why pure democracies died out 2000 years ago. So you would advocate implementing a nation wide system of tests that take into account maturity, intelligence, and experience to all minors, every 6 months or whatever, to determine what rights they are capable of handling when they would likely inherent such rights in a year or two anyway??? That's assuming that most minorities would even qualify for rights before the already established age restriction.

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Whew, if there were building that stood for logical integrity, that argument would be the airplane that slammed into it. It's refreshing to see that you've achieved a degree of intellectual independence, but just because it happened to occur for you around the time you were given voting rights doesn't really mean anything. Personally, I can't remember a time when my views were similar to my parents, or when my parents were similar to each others' for that matter. I can remember having political arguments with them as early as second grade. The vast majority of people, evidence suggests, are the opposite extreme - they never achieve intellectual independence (hence the continued existence of organized religion).

Haha well the point I was getting at, is that I think that a large part of intellectual independance is inherited after a certain amount of time, and experience has passed. Additionally perhaps you should start up another thread or explain briefly how participation in organized religion conotates a lack of intellectual indepenance.

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As for your rather comical suggestion that basing our elections off of the 30 year old and above generation is consistent with my argument, well, not only is that idea not consistent with my argument, it most certainly is consistent with yours. Suppose we did base our elections off of the 30 year old and above generation because of the fact that most people just vote the same way their parents do. What would we be doing? We would be disenfranchising people based upon generalizations and assumptions about them because of their age. Now, which side of this argument does that sound like to you? You have constructed a very silly looking straw man in order to refute my position, only to discover that the straw man you created is your argument.

Thanks for calling my arguments silly. It's somewhat reassuring that I didn't resort to ridicule when I first percieved your arguments to be ludicrous bordering on the insane. At any rate, I wasn't saying we should disenfrachise those under 30 due to the fact that we are likely to stick to the same beliefs as our parents. I was trying to dispute your rational that it's ok if children's votes can be easily manipulated by parents since even when they turn 18, they are likely to be manipulated by growing up under the belief system of their parents. The difference I perceive is that even though an 18 year old may stick to the belief system they grow up under, they have greater ability to arrive at an independant belief system. More so than a minor who may be subject to undue manipulation caused by a lack of financial or mental independance.

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I speak for truth, justice, and honor. You seem to be speaking for convenience. Considering the human species didn't die out before age-based laws were even invented, you're clearly on a slippery slope.

Ummmmm ok. How can I possibly compete against truth, justice, and honor? Especially since I speak for convenience! Well argument over ... you win, good has prevailed.

Orrrrr I could be so bold to as to claim that I speak for the greater good of society and human rights (I won't though because that seems somewhat arrogant). At any rate, I don't dispute the fact that many of my beliefs are grounded in reality of which factors such as cost, and overall societal implications as a whole are taken into consideration. No the human species didn't die out before age-based laws AND protections were invented however, one can argue that the lives of children are now certainly a lot less brutish are darwinian in nature. I wonder how many children would proclaim "Give me the liberty to drive before 16 or give me death!"

At any rate by saying you speak for truth, justice, and honor, you imply that I don't. I could possibly see myself not speaking for justice according to your beliefs, but how did you determine from my arguments for age based laws and protections that I am not speaking for truth and honor? That seems a little condescending ...

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You misunderstand. I wasn't suggesting that would be the best solution, I was only suggesting it would be better than a purely age-based system, because any one could obtain their rights at any time, simply by demonstrating some given level of competency in certain areas. A truly good system would have to be more complex and dynamic. But I don't think it's wrong to withold people's rights because of their ineptitude. I only think it's wrong to assume their ineptitude because of their age.

What about those who are classified as being too stupid to ever receive their rights? Are they doomed to a lifetime of being a second class citizen? Age restrictions and protections are similiar to an apprenticeship of sorts. They provide a growing, maturing individual with the protections and development that they need to become a fully, functional member of society. Once they have surpassed a certain age they have completed their apprenticeship and are able to embrace the responsibilities and liberties of society for better or for worse. By abolishing this apprenticeship you not only abolish age restrictions but age protections as well If we do modify them to be based on maturity, think of how exceedingly difficult, if feasible, system that would entail. For example, would an adult be guilty of statutory rape of a child whom he thought was mature enough to be afforded the freedom to make the choice to have sex??? Can children, a bastion of unpredictability be seemingly mature in one area yet exceedingly irrational, and emotionally incapable of dealing with other scenarios?? It would be like giving a psychiatric examination to every single child to determine emotional and mental maturity. Additionally given a child that is deemed "mature" and all their protections are hereby removed and liberties enstated, then there are no obligations to to ensure the continuance of education. If I'm mature at age 14 I'm essentially on my own in the eyes of the state and I could be forced to look for a job and find an apartment before I even complete the 9th grade. That was what I was trying to get at with my "flaccid" attempts at being a devil's advocate.

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Actually, I think you do have that obligation, regardless of the children's rights. That's an entirely new topic, though, and I don't want to disrupt this argument by presenting what could only be a very lengthy explanation of why.

It's tied into this issue ... do I have an obligation to provide housing and food for a fellow adult? No. If age laws and protections are abolished do I have an obligation to provide housing and food to a kid ... no. NO discrimination based on age.

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Why learn to hunt or grow crops when we can eat the best smelling pile of shit?

Lost again. Our legal system is a JOKE correct? A joke meaning a laughable perversion compared to others. So what almighty legal system should we emulate?

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To an extent, yes, I do agree very much so. Most of what they say is philosophically sound. That they advocate the things they do only so they can exploit the opportunities those changes would provide is not logically relevant to the truth of their assertions. You seem to fancy the guilt by association version of argumentum ad hominem, but I wonder if you could even refute their position?

Well to be honest I don't know much about Nambla or their political agendas asides from their desires for children to have consentual sex with adults. I briefly went to their website and they seem to lack any kind of discussion as to how they would protect children from coercion or abuse so I'm going to use that as a platform to refute their position. Could be wrong ... the whole concept of nambla is disgusting to me since it is a sex based group rather than a civil rights based group so I didn't want to spend time going over their literature.

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To an extent, yes, I do agree very much so. Most of what they say is philosophically sound.

So, that's why you think children should have all the rights adults have. You damn pervert.

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I remember hearing someone on tv saying: My son can fight for our country at 18 but he cant drink....(USA)
But i mean theres always gonna be injustices and ppl are always gonna wine...but i mean you have to put limits in societies. If there was no age limit for drinking i would have been partying at 15....Some are ridiculous some are good.

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Arguing on the internet is like running in the special olympics.
Even if you win, you're still retarded.

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I remember hearing someone on tv saying: My son can fight for our country at 18 but he cant drink....(USA) But i mean theres always gonna be injustices and ppl are always gonna wine...but i mean you have to put limits in societies. If there was no age limit for drinking i would have been partying at 15....Some are ridiculous some are good.

exactly, i think there should be some sort of consistancy across the board when it comes to these things

where i live, you are legally allowed to drive a vehicle without supervision at age 17, whereas the legal age for drinking and voting etc is 18.
the responsibility of driving a vehicle on the road amongst other motorists surely warrants enough responsibility to be able to vote. so if it is socially accepted that a person is responsible at age 17 to drive, why doesnt society believe a person isnt responsible enough to vote at age 17? in fact voting, and being able to purchase and consume alcohol, are nothing compared to the responsibilies of driving on the road.


to answer the topic, i think age limits are good. in a perfect world there would be a universal age limit so that there werent so many inconsistancies. i think 21 is excessive, i believe 18 is better, but i think 17 is more appropriate. however, cultures and societies differ in their beliefs of life and living from one another, so it would be near impossible to obtain a universally accepted age limit.

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Last edited by sifntj0r on Apr-29-2003 at 13:39

Yes I think that the alcohol drinking laws in the US are retarded. There should definetely be a reform of age limitation laws, but I think that they serve a necessary role in society.

One particular issue that I feel strongly about is driving. At the VERY least, if there are no age restrictions on driving, then I think that one of the conditions on getting a liscence is complete financial independance. I think that only when you start to pay your own insurance/pay for the upkeep of your own vehicle, do you realize some of the ramifications of your actions if you get a speeding ticket or get into an accident. Of course I still don't see this as being feasible because parents would likely give money to their children anyway such that they wouldn't really bear the brunt of the responsibility.

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Retro ...

Not willing to go through this whole thing, but I have some comments intersperced...

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Originally posted by occrider As I mentioned before the danger is is that their votes would stand significantly less of a chance of representing THEIR actual opinions but would more or less reflect the opinions and manipulations by others. Additionally where would you cap it? Age 15? Age 11? Age 2??? With approximately 80 million people in the US, or approximately 29% of society, being under the age of 19 the potential ramifications of abolishing age restrictions on voting would make the 2000 election look like a complete joke! Not to mention there would be an immense skew in voting representation to favor large families over single people! Those are the terrible consequnces I envision ....

You make two points here, one is sound, one isn't.

I agree with you that the age restrictions on voting are necessary, not because people are going to gain intellectual independence at some predetermined time in their life, but because of the power that voting can represent in a non-corrupt system and the increased possibility of coercion when you're dealing with younger people in vulnerable positions.

The point about large families having too much of a say is ludicrous to me though, how else are you going to do democracy? 1 vote per familiy 'unit'?

As I'll get to in a bit, I completely agree with Arbiter that many people never gain intellectual independence from their parents, so in that regard the age limits wouldn't really make a bit of difference in anything other than *when* the children can begin to vote for the 'company line'.

I fail to see any viable alternatives to 1 vote per person...

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So why not implement a COMPLETELY democratic system rather than a representative democracy? I mean hell we might as well implement a system where EVERYBODY votes on EVERYTHING. Would you advocate the implementiion of such a system given the expense? I think there's a reason why pure democracies died out 2000 years ago.

Logistics are what make pure democracy impossible, logistics and apathy.

I think even if you went to the trouble of implementing an electronic direct democracy system, with all the issues laid out, people from both sides presenting their cases, and so on, that the normal person still wouldn't be interested in taking the time to look things over.

To me, these points bring up the weakness of democracy in general more than illustrate the strength of representative democracy.

The point of representative democracy is supposedly to have the people represented by:

A) people that they trust to make their decisions for them
B) who are acting in the best interest of the country
C) who aren't influenced by anything other than their conscience

At least I'd assume that's what people think when they think of democracy in an idealistic way, but I think we all know the reality is far, far from this ideal.

So then you come to the question, is there a way to fix what we have now to get it more in line with the idealized vision, or do we need to start considering alternatives?

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Haha well the point I was getting at, is that I think that a large part of intellectual independance is inherited after a certain amount of time, and experience has passed.

Completely disagree with this, I think the gaining of intellectual independence has very little to do with time, and more to do with who you are or aren't as a person.

Average Joe who's not worried about politics, and doesn't fancy himself a philosopher is unlikely to actually spend much of his life thinking about *why* he feels a certain way, or why he follows a certain religion, he just goes along with what his parents taught him years ago.

Age isn't what makes these kinds of attitudes change, mental maturity and growth are, and those can come quickly for some people, slowly for others, and never for many.

*You* might have gained independence in this regard around the age of maturity, but that certainly doesn't make it the norm, I know I gained independence in this regard fairly early in life, probably around 15 years. Some people I know *still* don't bother to consider why they feel a certain way, their loss I s'pose.

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The difference I perceive is that even though an 18 year old may stick to the belief system they grow up under, they have greater ability to arrive at an independant belief system.

I just don't see where someone has a greater ability to arrive at an independent belief system simply because they're not living at home.

Perhaps in extreme cases where you have overly strict parents this is the case, but if anything I think kids initially going away to university are more likely to just substitute another group-think mentality, in this case, the 'let's get loaded and screw off' student mentality which isn't all that different from the 'let's be fine upstanding citizens who go to church on sunday' that many get at home, to me at least.

I'll say again, intellectual independence has nothing to do with how old you are chronologically.

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Additionally given a child that is deemed "mature" and all their protections are hereby removed and liberties enstated, then there are no obligations to to ensure the continuance of education. If I'm mature at age 14 I'm essentially on my own in the eyes of the state and I could be forced to look for a job and find an apartment before I even complete the 9th grade. That was what I was trying to get at with my "flaccid" attempts at being a devil's advocate.

I don't want to get overly involved in this highly philosophical, and hypothetical argument, but a point here:

You're dealing in the realm of the complete hypothetical here, so how do you know if you're hypothetically allowed to vote at 14 after successfully completing a test that you'd suddenly be considered an adult in every way?

You could easily have it set so that kids had the opportunity to gain rights in that way without having other restrictions left in place, you're trying to say that if you give X then Y and Z have to result as well, and that's simply not the case.

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It's tied into this issue ... do I have an obligation to provide housing and food for a fellow adult? No. If age laws and protections are abolished do I have an obligation to provide housing and food to a kid ... no. NO discrimination based on age.

Age laws aren't necessarily tied to this though, if society deems it proper and neccessary to allow kids to stay at home until they complete High School, regardless of their other rights, then that will be the case.

As it stands now in the States kids have the right to drop out of high school at 16 and go off to the world of work. Just because they have this right, and are considered adults in regards to being able to choose whether or not they attend HS doesn't mean that the average kid *does* drop out, or that the family assumes that they have no obligations to them anymore in regards to schooling after they hit 16.

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Originally posted by CortexBomb Not willing to go through this whole thing, but I have some comments intersperced... You make two points here, one is sound, one isn't. I agree with you that the age restrictions on voting are necessary, not because people are going to gain intellectual independence at some predetermined time in their life, but because of the power that voting can represent in a non-corrupt system and the increased possibility of coercion when you're dealing with younger people in vulnerable positions. The point about large families having too much of a say is ludicrous to me though, how else are you going to do democracy? 1 vote per familiy 'unit'? As I'll get to in a bit, I completely agree with Arbiter that many people never gain intellectual independence from their parents, so in that regard the age limits wouldn't really make a bit of difference in anything other than *when* the children can begin to vote for the 'company line'. I fail to see any viable alternatives to 1 vote per person...

Hehe maybe I should rephrase what I was trying to say. I'm not saying that we should alter the 1 vote 1 person approach. I'm saying that in a situation where age restrictions were abolished for voting rights, we would see a skew in voter representation to favor larger families. For instance, if I have a family of 10 kids aged 3-15 don't you think that I could eaily manipulate (Now Billy daddy knows what's right so just vote for so and so) or coerce (If you don't vote for so and so I'm taking away your allowance and sending you to military school) my children into voting for whoever I wish. Thus tack on those 30 million new votes into families and you see an overrepresentation of sorts of family votes. I guess I'm not banking my argument on intellectual independance (it would be impossible to determine that for every person) but rather that once societal independance has been achieved, an individual stands to be far less likely to be influenced by intellectual coersion or manipulation (what are my parents going to do ... throw me out of my own house?)

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Logistics are what make pure democracy impossible, logistics and apathy. I think even if you went to the trouble of implementing an electronic direct democracy system, with all the issues laid out, people from both sides presenting their cases, and so on, that the normal person still wouldn't be interested in taking the time to look things over. To me, these points bring up the weakness of democracy in general more than illustrate the strength of representative democracy. The point of representative democracy is supposedly to have the people represented by: A) people that they trust to make their decisions for them B) who are acting in the best interest of the country C) who aren't influenced by anything other than their conscience At least I'd assume that's what people think when they think of democracy in an idealistic way, but I think we all know the reality is far, far from this ideal. So then you come to the question, is there a way to fix what we have now to get it more in line with the idealized vision, or do we need to start considering alternatives?

Well that's what I'm trying to ask arbiter ... like I said in a perfect world I would happily grant voter rights, the ability to drink, whatever the hell they want to minors once they take the magic cognitive competancy and maturity test for driving/voting/drinking/etc. I'm describing such a system as being unfeasible and for that my arguments are being labelled as an argument of "convenience". Well that's one way to look at it I suppose, I look at it as realism.

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Completely disagree with this, I think the gaining of intellectual independence has very little to do with time, and more to do with who you are or aren't as a person. Average Joe who's not worried about politics, and doesn't fancy himself a philosopher is unlikely to actually spend much of his life thinking about *why* he feels a certain way, or why he follows a certain religion, he just goes along with what his parents taught him years ago. Age isn't what makes these kinds of attitudes change, mental maturity and growth are, and those can come quickly for some people, slowly for others, and never for many. *You* might have gained independence in this regard around the age of maturity, but that certainly doesn't make it the norm, I know I gained independence in this regard fairly early in life, probably around 15 years. Some people I know *still* don't bother to consider why they feel a certain way, their loss I s'pose.

I'm not saying children follow a detailed path to maturity that is dictated by age.

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I just don't see where someone has a greater ability to arrive at an independent belief system simply because they're not living at home. Perhaps in extreme cases where you have overly strict parents this is the case, but if anything I think kids initially going away to university are more likely to just substitute another group-think mentality, in this case, the 'let's get loaded and screw off' student mentality which isn't all that different from the 'let's be fine upstanding citizens who go to church on sunday' that many get at home, to me at least. I'll say again, intellectual independence has nothing to do with how old you are chronologically.

But I would say that children are less likely to be subjected to manipulation and coercion when they are not living at home. And intellectual independance does have some correlation to age in most instances because maturity and development are roughly correlated with age.

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I don't want to get overly involved in this highly philosophical, and hypothetical argument, but a point here: You're dealing in the realm of the complete hypothetical here, so how do you know if you're hypothetically allowed to vote at 14 after successfully completing a test that you'd suddenly be considered an adult in every way? You could easily have it set so that kids had the opportunity to gain rights in that way without having other restrictions left in place, you're trying to say that if you give X then Y and Z have to result as well, and that's simply not the case.

Well if you look into the other thread where this argument originated from, Arbiter and myself were sparring about age discrimination as a whole. He stated that age discriminations AND protections such as statutory rape, juevenille system, etc. should be removed. To continue with that line of argument a giving of X DOES imply a removal of Y and Z.

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Age laws aren't necessarily tied to this though, if society deems it proper and neccessary to allow kids to stay at home until they complete High School, regardless of their other rights, then that will be the case. As it stands now in the States kids have the right to drop out of high school at 16 and go off to the world of work. Just because they have this right, and are considered adults in regards to being able to choose whether or not they attend HS doesn't mean that the average kid *does* drop out, or that the family assumes that they have no obligations to them anymore in regards to schooling after they hit 16.

Yes they have the right to drop out and work at 16 and the parents STILL have an obligation to care for the kid because of our age laws. If we remove all age discriminations, why don't I have the right to be a protected ward of the state, not work, be fed, clothed, housed, and go to school? I'll sue because they're discriminating against ME because of my age.

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Retro ...

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Originally posted by occrider Hehe maybe I should rephrase what I was trying to say. I'm not saying that we should alter the 1 vote 1 person approach. I'm saying that in a situation where age restrictions were abolished for voting rights, we would see a skew in voter representation to favor larger families. For instance, if I have a family of 10 kids aged 3-15 don't you think that I could eaily manipulate (Now Billy daddy knows what's right so just vote for so and so) or coerce (If you don't vote for so and so I'm taking away your allowance and sending you to military school) my children into voting for whoever I wish. Thus tack on those 30 million new votes into families and you see an overrepresentation of sorts of family votes. I guess I'm not banking my argument on intellectual independance (it would be impossible to determine that for every person) but rather that once societal independance has been achieved, an individual stands to be far less likely to be influenced by intellectual coersion or manipulation (what are my parents going to do ... throw me out of my own house?)

To play the devil's advocate for a second though, assuming you have anonymous voting booths, then is outright coercion neccessarily a big concern?

I mean, certainly you can have Dad being vehement about the family voting a certain way, but that can really go a few ways, you could end up with compliance, or you could end up with rebellious votes the other way just to 'get back at him'.

I do agree though, voting is better kept at it's current limit if only because the average kid is even less likely than the average adult to know anything about the issues, or to give a rat's ass.

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Well that's what I'm trying to ask arbiter ... like I said in a perfect world I would happily grant voter rights, the ability to drink, whatever the hell they want to minors once they take the magic cognitive competancy and maturity test for driving/voting/drinking/etc. I'm describing such a system as being unfeasible and for that my arguments are being labelled as an argument of "convenience". Well that's one way to look at it I suppose, I look at it as realism.

I'd be inclined to agree on this point. It'd be extremely difficult to have a fair test, fair as in not culturally biased, and administered by people that are completely competent and trustworthy.

It's a shame too, because there *are* a lot of kids who are more mature than adults, and who deserve more responsibility. I don't really see a feasible solution to it though.

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But I would say that children are less likely to be subjected to manipulation and coercion when they are not living at home. And intellectual independance does have some correlation to age in most instances because maturity and development are roughly correlated with age.

Sort of, I'd say calling what you get at home manipulation as being a bit overly dramatic. People feel a certain away, and many of them want their kids to end up being carbon copies of them in terms of values, attitudes, etc, but it's not as though they're outright manipulating them in most cases.

I think once you're living at say, a university you're more likely to run into people like you see on here, people with views outside the norm in one way or another, but that can easily happen before university as well.

I credit my early intellectual independence as being a result of my parent's liberalism in regards to what I think, and my own willingness to seek out alternative points of view, and new groups of people. I was hanging out in coffee houses from a young age, and ended up being exposed to new things much earlier than others of my chronological age.

So the possibility for running into more different viewpoints is likely higher outside the home, sure, but I still don't think that's a strong case, because many people, even in the face of new viewpoints, don't actually consider them; instead they blindly fall back on what their parent's told them (whether consciously or unconsciously) and never mature in the least.

If anything, I think this is making the case for people letting their kids grow up in urban and/or liberal environments where they'll be exposed to more points of view from an earlier period of time, and have more opportunities to have what they believe challenged, and thus grow more as individuals in the process.

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Well if you look into the other thread where this argument originated from, Arbiter and myself were sparring about age discrimination as a whole. He stated that age discriminations AND protections such as statutory rape, juevenille system, etc. should be removed. To continue with that line of argument a giving of X DOES imply a removal of Y and Z.

I'm not going to get involved in that then...in general I think some of the age discriminations are ridiculous (drinking age, statutory rape in some cases) but I'm certainly not a proponent of the outright removal of all age based barriers in society.

I think you can definitely consider the possibility of giving some additional rights to worthy people of younger than average age, but if you do protections most definitely have to be kept in place to give the family and society the obligation to 'take care' of the kid until they're out of HS at the least.

Great idea opening up a new thread. Sorry I've been away for a few days, I'll get around to a response later tonight if I'm not too tired.