Last election, there was only a 50% turnout among 18-29 year olds. For the amount that younger people are advocating for who they want in the election, the turnout in the last election sucked. It seems like the numbers were so low because maybe they just don't care to vote or maybe they aren't as educated as they should be (like me). I recently turned 18 and my parents have been urging me to participate and vote, but they tell me to also vote for who they are going to vote for. I think this may be an issue with a lot of newly turned eighteen year olds who don't know a lot about politics. They don't know what they personally believe in or what world issues they agree with so they just go with what their parents like or tell them to do. This is a huge issue because it doesn't allow their kids to have their own opinions and beliefs which causes votes to be taken away from who they might really want to vote for. I've seen a lot of stuff on Facebook about how "It's your fault if the person you want doesn't end up on the ballot/doesn't win" and I agree. I agree 100%. You can't just argue your opinions so whole heartedly and then not even go out and vote. It defeats the whole purpose when people are upset when the person they wanted isn't in the running or isn't in office when they didn't even go vote.
Now, obviously social media plays a huge part in political campaigning; especially right now since we are under lock down rules. Political candidates use social media of all types of platforms to get their word out to potential voters. I mean, seriously, Bernie Sanders is campaigning on Reddit. A lot of millennials and young people use that site pretty religiously so it's pretty smart that he is campaigning on there for his young audience to see so hopefully they'll get out and vote. There is also Donald Trump who is very active on Twitter. Last year Twitter had ad blocks that will block any political campaigning ads from its site. Democrats urged Facebook to follow suit and do the same. The internet has evolved in a way that is super helpful for people now. Instead of waiting around for results in the newspaper or the mail, we can get them instantly on our phones and on TV on the news.
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| Kristin Ausk |
Social media can also be a bad thing for political campaigns. Social media platforms always have people, who may or may not be the candidate themselves, who spread fake news about their competitors to try and sway people to vote for their side instead of the competitor. There can some times be bad propaganda spread in the form of memes (yes, we're back on the topic of memes temporarily). With these being spread during the campaign, it can lead to some harmful consequences for the candidates, like losing votes.
Overall, with the whole quarantine situation and not knowing how long we will actually have to be social distancing, politics online/social media will be pretty beneficial in my opinion. It'll allow the growth of voters and provide more knowledge leading up to the next presidential election. Social media and technology will forever continue to grow and evolve itself too for the younger people who don't know how to get up and go vote but still complain when the person they wanted isn't in office.
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