Why is it that young people don't care about about politics?

Isn't it important to have an interest in politics? Politicians are given power. Therefor that power should be monitored. If the young people (18-30) don't care about politics in order to be informed about how the government wants to run their lives; then this country is ultimately screwed. Not like it already isn't..

This is completely anecdotal, but, from what I can tell as a 17 year old: most young people don't give a shit about things that don't directly affect them. Attempts to bring up discussion of politics, religion, space exploration, or philosophy are immediately shot down by the majority of my peers. It's not just politics that young people are apathetic toward: pretty much everything people should have opinions on (beyond choice of entertainment) are ignored.

Because it's fucking boring

@Fallen189 said:

Because it's fucking boring

Not if you have influence. And Influence = power = wealth

I think they do, it's just that a lot of them are probably afraid to speak up in this age of the two major affiliations becoming more and more like childish clubs that exist only to put the other side down. It can be intimidating to get into a subject that can turn otherwise decent people into screaming bundles of misguided rage.

I just don't think politics is an interesting subject, to be frank, I think it's dull as hell. You can say that I should care about it since it affects me and everyone else, and maybe I should, but I'm perfectly fine with just knowing the basics and then be informed by a family member or a friend when needed.

Imagine people not having the same interests, crazy right?

As a younger person I will say it's very easy to be disillusioned. Older people are in power and there is little chance in changing that and these older people are often out of touch with my sensibilities and issues of importance. Knowledge of the political system makes my ability to act seem inconsequential and futile, in regards to how votes are counted and in the importance of lobbyists in modern government.

It's easy to not give a fuck.

Because politics sucks now.

Everyone involved is an opinionated idiot who has no regard for what is best for the country and only cares about pushing their party's outdated policies.

So yeah, I'm disillusioned with politics because no one in politics has done anything to earn my respect.

Fuck politics.

It's the futility of it all. No matter who wins the elections, nothing fucking changes. Politicians try to differentiate themselves during the elections, but once they're in the parliament they'll either drop the pretense or quickly realize they can't change anything by themselves and settle for making meaningless objections in media to prove that they're still trying. And presidents are fairly useless in my country (they're just the PR/international relations person), so who fills that position rarely matters either.

Politicians get nice salary and they do barely any work. More often that not, it's the same people getting voted in every four years and rather than trying to change anything, they're more interested in preserving the status quo. Nobody wants to rock the boat. Those that do, rarely achieve anything and probably won't get re-elected.

So yeah - it's rather hard to care about politics.

Because us young people are too self-indulged with their own lives and don't care about the world around them to any surmountable degree! Now if you don't mind, I have to watch some tv for hours on end so I can go out of my way to not be informed!

Remember kids, there's a difference between caring about who gets elected every 4 years, and also knowing what kind of legislation is passed! Just because you prefer to ignore doesn't make it go away!

Because the political system is completely fucked and there isn't a damn thing they can do to fix it. No matter how many people want to change things for the better they are outnumbered by the legions of drooling morons out there that wouldn't know a good idea if they were clubbed to death with it.

So, in the US at least, we're left with two parties whose primary concerns are their own self interest. When your choices are between a guy you don't want elected and a guy that you really don't want elected it's hard to give a shit.

because after years of hearing politicians say one thing and then do something completely different you tend to not give a shit anymore. I voted the first two times i could, but won't vote anymore. I don't pay attention to what they say cause it's just a lie. They get to where they are because of money and nothing else. The people that could actually help the country will never get the chance until everyone is on equal ground, which will never happen.

For me (22 years old), it's because when I was old enough to start understanding politics, and decided to try to follow them, it was horrible. I couldn't get past how badly the country is split with the 2 main parties, and from my experience and what I have seen, the two parties will do whatever it takes to block the other, even if the thing they object to is good for Americans. Also being military, and getting to work more alongside our government, some of the going on's that are wrong in civil court, yet run rampart in the government/military sector, is just plain disturbing.

I also think it's largely because I have not lived through what I (or some others) would deem a "good" president (I know good is subjective). Bush will always be tied to 9/11 and the Middle East, Obama is a president elected because he is black and because he opponent was a horrible choice, and my first memory of a president from my lifetime is Clinton getting accused of his sexual misconduct.

I'm not registered to vote, and with what 2012 will boil down to, I plan to stay that way. Maybe 2016 will inspire me to want to actually vote, time will tell.

I don't understand how people can hate the status quo and then take a stand by doing nothing.

"Mr. President I hate you so much that I won't even VOTE. BALL'S IN YOUR COURT, O-BA-MA."

Because no matter who is in charge they don't care about the people. Fuck em.

I'm 20 and have zero interest in politics, never have and I'm not sure I will. It seems whoever is in charge people still complain, so it dosn't matter who is in charge as long as its not Hitlers long lost son's brother.

I don't trust politicians. I also don't want to spend the time it takes to get to know each group enough to know which I should vote for, and frankly I don't think I can completely agree with any of them from what I already know.

I'm also not very pleased with what my country spends tax money on, like certain luxuries, it's beyond ridiculous. I don't know what to do about that, either - refusing to pay taxes in protest wouldn't get me far.

Ultimately, I can live with things as they are now and I'll probably become more engaged if I ever feel unjustly treated in a more direct way. It's a sad truth.

I live in Sweden, by the way.

Politics are boring as hell, and when I did pay attention to them, they did nothing but irritate me. The fact that they have 'influence' does not mean that politicians deserve more attention than things I actually enjoy.

@dr_nefarious said:

@Fallen189 said:

Because it's fucking boring

Not if you have influence. And Influence = power = wealth

No, it's still boring as fuck.

Any interest I had in politics was destroyed when I had to take compulsory politics units at university. Everyone wants to be a progressive little snowflake - but they just come across as pretentious morons most of the time.

For that very reason I do not want to cover politics as a journalist.

I think part of it is that the government tends to be full of old men.

Gone are the days where the elders were the wisest in the village, now they're mostly just ignorant to the current state of the country and too stubborn to adapt.

@Dunchad said:

It's the futility of it all. No matter who wins the elections, nothing fucking changes. Politicians try to differentiate themselves during the elections, but once they're in the parliament they'll either drop the pretense or quickly realize they can't change anything by themselves and settle for making meaningless objections in media to prove that they're still trying. And presidents are fairly useless in my country (they're just the PR/international relations person), so who fills that position rarely matters either.

Politicians get nice salary and they do barely any work. More often that not, it's the same people getting voted in every four years and rather than trying to change anything, they're more interested in preserving the status quo. Nobody wants to rock the boat. Those that do, rarely achieve anything and probably won't get re-elected.

So yeah - it's rather hard to care about politics.

This really sums it up well. I'm 30 and i have voted on political parities for some time now. And no matter who gets elected nothing changes, and sometimes what you think would have been a good choice just ends up being the worst. And its rather hard taking politicians serious when all they do is take potshots at each other around election time, rest of the year they just spew nonsens and act like dicks.

But sadly they are necessary.

Because it's fucking boring

For me the political stuff happens just appears to not change the way i do things in life so i don't really notice it or pay any attention to it.

And i believe its much better to let the people that pay attention to politic vote instead of me just throwing a vote out that has little understanding behind it.

Which country?

The Majority of Young people have always been rather apathetic and disinterested in politics, except for the occasional "Down with Authority!" outburst. It's the same around the world - a startling amount of Malaysian Teenagers don't even know the name of their own prime minister. In Australia, one person I met sincerely thought that the leader of our Conservative Party (confusingly named the Liberal Party) was head of the Greens Party. If you asked young people who the last 10 US presidents were, in order, and what party they belonged to, most of them couldn't do it.

The young have always been far more interested in themselves and their petty concerns than politics. That's just human nature. They'll gain more of an interest later however, when they age. At any rate, with the dwindling population of young people in the developed world, their influence is quite small right now.

Because your choice is effectively whether you vote red or blue, both of which only ever turn out to be purple anyway.  If you're young you're going to get fucked over either way, because you and your peers have no influence over anything whatsoever (unless you happen to be Mark Zuckerberg or something). The time spent worrying about who you should vote for would be better spent figuring out a way to become rich and powerful, so that one day you might actually get to have a say.

To get a young person in politics, I think we should hired teenagers to run for office.I'm not kidding, I think they should let 17 year olds be a mayor for like a month while under the supervision by one of course.

If they wanna do bigger, they should let a teen become a president for a week while being supervised by Barrock Obama.

This might give the youth some interesting in politics.I don't think they care much because they can't relate to 50 year old middle age men or woman in the office.

I'm 23 and actively engaged in local and national politics, I'm not old! :p

Bullshit. If you think an entire age group doesn't care then you are completely dillusional. Read through the comments on this video by Hank Green who asked this exact question (after he had got tired of arguing against the people who kept telling him what you just said and so he asked his viewers who are mostly young people. And before you point out the many people saying "it seems to me that the people my age don't care ect..." take a second to realise that the person that made that comment (and all the people who upvote those comments) are the same age and care - they just don't see many other people doing the same. Moral is: You have groups of young people who care and groups who don't. Like in every damn age group, culture and walks of life.

Do you know the voting figure averages for the past one hundred years? On average, a third of people vote. It has always been that way. Those that care have always been the minority.

It makes me sick how people try and talk about youth as if they are a completely different race of people and refuse to understand how they are simply human and every age group is like that.

Put simply, because:

ENTERTAINMENT > EDUCATION

in the minds of the majority of the population. We're an incredibly a-historical nation, most people have no idea where we came from. Frankly, they don't care, they'd rather see what's on TV or play with their gadgets.

Someone probably said it already but: Because politicians don't care about young people. That's true for every country.

My vote changes nothing, so I don't vote. I'm just waiting for the day when everyone else decides to do the same.

Because when they do become interested they realise that the status quo is in most cases (like America) bullshit. They don't care because they don't like the way the system is run, but there doesn't appear to be anyway to change it. Take the 21 drinking age for example. Most people 18-25 I think disagree with that and think it should be lowered to 18 or 19, but there is no way anyone in politics is ever going to address the issue. Same thing about marijuana legalisation. Look at how abortion is still a 'controversial' issue. Even in conservative states, I think most young people don't want it outlawed.

They're usually too wrapped up in their own meaningless existence to care about anything besides themselves, let alone politics. On top of that, they're too stupid to understand it so they just regurgitate what their parents say.

Right now I wish I could care, but trying to just ends up making me depressed, especially with all the xenophobic right-wingers in Europe. I always vote, but in the latest election I did it mostly to keep the Neo-Nazis from entering parliament (didn't help).

@dr_nefarious: Because the last thing young people want is to put up with being hassled. And with politics today, looking into it at all usually leads to just seeing a lot of awful arguing or partisan nonsense. Then, after informing themselves, they gain the ability to have... some of the worst arguments they'll ever have in their lives, with random people and families and friends. After that, they see themselves marginalized by the major parties, big money, and the realization that if they're not in "swing state", their vote probably won't matter much outside of local elections that they'll barely keep up with.

So, they see little reason to learn more about something that will either make them feel more powerless or just give them more hassles in life. Caring about politics and government is important, and eventually, people usually learn to care about it as they see things directly impact them and not just their parents. Some young people -do- get interested in politics and become involved at an early age, but they are definitely a minority. There seemed to be some hopeful glimmers in 08, but that does not appear to be an enduring improvement. Many seem to have learned the valuable lesson that politicians are politicians and a significant bit of what they say is just for riling people up and not for actually affecting any real change in government or our lives.

Hopefully we can make politics more appealing in the future, or at least make it less awful. As parents, we can also teach our children and encourage them regarding politics. And as friends and family, we can try to rein in our own vitriol and abrasiveness on political topics to make others feel more comfortable caring about and sharing their views on politics today. An improvement of political discourse in the home can make a major difference in whether young people will think it is something to avoid or a topic worth pursuing further in their lives.

I'm young and really care about politics so...

@dr_nefarious: because there are only 2 parties who have the exact same political ideology ( capitalism , market economy ) and behave exactly the same?

Im gonna say its probably that

I started to have interest before the last UK general election because my 18th birthday was coming up but as soon as the government decided that all students going to uni had to be fucked over financially I realised that all politicians are complete bastards and should be shot.

Humphrey Appelby and Malcolm Tucker are responsible for my lack of faith in all things political in nature.

I'm guessing they see what fucking idiots the adults who are involved in politics are.

Because they know and feel the system by which global politics work, is nothing but a sham. Hope lies in the young.

@dr_nefarious said:

@Fallen189 said:

Because it's fucking boring

Not if you have influence. And Influence = power = wealth

And young people don't. The fact of the matter is that one person's vote means very little. Especially in a system where it's one party or the other. It also doesn't help that the 18-30 age bracket is the one that politicians like to moan about frequently. Also that equation needs to be reversed to be accurate.

In a slightly less politicised explanation, it's also because primary and secondary education on politics is fucking awful if it even exists at all.

Because it's boring is disgusting.

I'm only interested in gerrymandering and filibusters.

I'm about to turn 20 and I still don't find politics interesting. It never clicked with me and I usually lose interest fast.

I just have literally no interest in the matter. Part of that probably comes from the fact that I still live at home and don't really deal with the government on a daily basis. I feel that adults are more prone to caring about politics because they live in the real world.

Also, politics are one of those things (like sports or religion) that makes people ABSOLUTELY CRAZY and argumentative. Part of the reason I stay away from politics is to avoid those people.

@Mars_Cleric said:

Because politics sucks now.

Everyone involved is an opinionated idiot who has no regard for what is best for the country and only cares about pushing their party's outdated policies.

So yeah, I'm disillusioned with politics because no one in politics has done anything to earn my respect.

Fuck politics.

This,

@Dunchad said:

It's the futility of it all. No matter who wins the elections, nothing fucking changes. Politicians try to differentiate themselves during the elections, but once they're in the parliament they'll either drop the pretense or quickly realize they can't change anything by themselves and settle for making meaningless objections in media to prove that they're still trying. And presidents are fairly useless in my country (they're just the PR/international relations person), so who fills that position rarely matters either.

Politicians get nice salary and they do barely any work. More often that not, it's the same people getting voted in every four years and rather than trying to change anything, they're more interested in preserving the status quo. Nobody wants to rock the boat. Those that do, rarely achieve anything and probably won't get re-elected.

So yeah - it's rather hard to care about politics.

this, and

@WarlordPayne said:

Because the political system is completely fucked and there isn't a damn thing they can do to fix it. No matter how many people want to change things for the better they are outnumbered by the legions of drooling morons out there that wouldn't know a good idea if they were clubbed to death with it.

So, in the US at least, we're left with two parties whose primary concerns are their own self interest. When your choices are between a guy you don't want elected and a guy that you really don't want elected it's hard to give a shit.

this.

To sum it up, folks, politics is just a bunch of rich monkeys flinging shit at each other to decide who will get to step on us next. None of them ever seem concerned about the poor or middle class except when it benefits them, and then it's usually a rousing speech of empty words that turns into a boot pushing down on my head.

@dr_nefarious: I started paying attention to politics shortly ago. I realized that it was pretty depressing that my only options would always come down to "Well, he's not as bad as the other guy." but never "well, he has a great plan." In this day and age, the internet allows us to fact check quite a bit easier; but things aren't going to change until the mindless fools watching MSNBC and Fox News die off and the people who are incidentally informed take over.