Very wishful thinking, but could this be an impetus for quality political education at a younger age? E.g. how to reason about issues, think critically, fact check, verify past outcomes, etc. That could have positive effects on all age groups.
I'm sure I don't speak for everyone, but people consider me reasonably worldly and reasonably intelligent but at 18 when I was first given the power to vote I voted for:
* UKIP for EU Parliament
* Lib Dems for UK Parliament
I don't necessarily regret the LibDem one, but seeing how absolutely hoodwinked I was by UKIP has left me really jaded.
I saw them misrepresent issues and put things to the EU parliament for debate that they would then go back to the UK media and scream about how there was a topic up for debate that went against british values: despite them being the ones to propose it!
I saw the leader of the party get put in charge of the fisheries committee and then proceed to tell the UK public that the EU was taking control of our waters and fishing... when he was the man in charge.
I saw grandstanding and burning of our political capital inside the EU parliament for soundbites.
and I only saw this: because I was not afraid of digging into the truth of things; something I was not prepared or willing to do as a teenager, as that sounded like the kind of mundane schoolwork I was attempting to avoid - I was much more interested in how I felt about particular people, and UKIP gave me the warm fuzzies about my country and a convenient scapegoat for the decline in living standards in my lifetime.
Many eons ago I took a "General Studies" A level that had a solid chunk of political education, just googled and was disappointed to find out it doesn't exist any more.
Even still, I'd say younger people are still more politically aware (mostly via history classes that are still present in their memory) than most people of the current voting age.
Genuinely curious, does education really matter? No one man has the time nor intellect to effectively evaluate all the facts. Most of the lies today are lies of omission / framing. Details left out, stories not covered, etc.
The only rational position is figuring out how to scale trust. Ironically enough, the historic ways of doing that (race, religion, nation) are all more or less “evil” in modern society.
After going through US public schooling and then reading actual source material from various topics covered many years later, it’s hard to see it as anything other than propaganda. “History was written by the victors” doesn’t magically exclude our current regime.
Yeah. Let's face it: more realistically, they want to cut pensions without getting thrown out of parliament. And getting every 16 year old in the UK a free PS5 (is it still PS5? I guess maybe PS6) on their birthday is far cheaper than pensions ...
