Proposition 18, Voting for 17-year-olds: No

This is an interesting idea. It is also unnecessary.

Don’t get me wrong, we absolutely need to encourage, not discourage, voting. And let’s be clear here, the opposition to this chose a message that if outright offensive, saying that teenagers nearing 18 are still “children” and that they are a “captive audience” because they are still at home.

As if the 38-year-old Qanon troll living in his parents’ basement isn’t still a child (at least mentally) and is a “captive audience.” And they are “not fully biologically developed?” Really? Plenty of 17-year-olds think and reason far better than many so-called adults.

Yet after all that, after all the ridiculousness of the opposition and the reasonableness of supporters, what this really comes down to is a randomly defined idea of fairness. The random birth lottery put you in the minority of spots where you’re not able to vote in a primary but you can vote in the general election. It’s just not fair!!

Well guess what, life’s not fair. And sometimes, the best path is to simply play the hand you’re dealt. You can’t vote in one year’s primaries? Well, you will have many more decades to. One time isn’t going to kill you.

I get it. 18 is a completely arbitrary number. Plenty of people are mature and well-developed before then. Others don’t get there until well afterward. But y’know, let’s just live with the stake in the sand we’ve established. This is not necessary, and a waste of precious resources to have on the ballot. The choice here is No.