A Student's Perspective On Election Day

As high school students find the impact on the next four years of their future with voting for a new leader for the nation, we also see how this election will influence the political involvement of 14-18-year-olds this time around. During our current president's term, some of us have been paying attention to political issues, and some wish not to see politics in their daily lives, as it doesn't concern them. But, we have heard of a couple of controversial points from both sides that already make our minds up when we hear them. The only problem I see with this is that we are still in the mindset of believing everything we see the moment it's shown in front of us, and we become influenced to become ignorant and diminish our wish for understanding. Because of this notion, students with an already developed political ideology can sometimes struggle always to be open to seeing both sides and "agreeing-to-disagree" on everyone's opinions. Although there are many political clashes between students and their ideology on campuses in the nation, we can all say that we are quite nervous to see what will happen on November 3rd of this year.

One student states that, "I think it's just two guys just arguing; no debates were shown whatsoever until the second presidential debate happened," Most of the students agree the same with this quote. High school students have become irate by the consistent "debates" that all candidates have presented. Political discourse (the formal exchange of reasoned views of several alternative courses of action taken to solve a societal problem) is one of the foundational political structures. Without any discourse, no change can truly occur. Political discourse has evolved to become the definition of "arguing" since it seems to be people arguing and interrupting one another instead of discussing important issues focusing on this nation's people. This influences the young demographic to think the same way and adapt to this mindset of "debating" and thinking that it's helpful to argue instead of having a normal conversation and learning something out of it. Unfortunately, this brings political tensions to the extreme at the high school level, as I have mentioned before.

From what we now know, our political ideologies start to develop once we open ourselves to understanding perspectives from all kinds of people. High school is just one of how we learn what we see is beneficial for the future, and it is up to us to decide how we can influence our communities to become involved. But honestly, our perspective is that these are all the candidates we have left and have left us voting for whoever can make a change for the next four years. In reality, most think both candidates for the national election are not the right leaders for this upcoming term. In the words of a fellow student, "It seems like the election this year is a matter of choosing between the lesser of two evils." Because of this, we're seeing that many students are beginning to despise the topic of politics altogether. This makes many start to become careless about how this affects their generation, and the subject of politics is starting to become more taboo than an open topic it once was before. Another student states from their perspective that, "It's been fascinating especially in the final run with the information that's come out," which explains how misleading information appeals to the young demographic to become careless ever to find out the credibility of the source. The sources could lead to possible mutant statistics (distorted versions of the original figures) in statistics. Depending on the reader, they are either open to hearing all opinions or some that become intolerant to other students' views. However, even though we should follow the idea that "everyone is entitled to their own opinion, "unfortunately, many students at the high school level are becoming narrow-minded and believing that their opinion is the only correct one. This could be from possible influence from social media influencers, politicians from one party, or even just authority figures in everyday life. One student states that "There are some teachers that speak about politics when it's not necessary, praising one party and degrading another. It creates an unsafe environment and just shows even the oldest authority figures are just like high school students; naïve and intolerant". This becomes a primary example of authorities' influence that students could be adjusted to seeing from time to time.

High school students will say that it's a close call now. Both Biden and Trump are neck-and-neck between the states in polling from current percentages on each state and their respective popular votes. Unfortunately, students have just gotten tired of each nominee's constant bickering and are just waiting to see the results. As the only high schoolers that can cast their votes are 18-year-olds, the youth voting implements how focused the young generation is to start participating in the national elections. The only problem with that is that the voter turnout for 18-29-year-olds is still the lowest percentage count compared to every other age group. If students were interested in finally creating change for their future, it would be sensible to see a more significant increase in votes. Nonetheless, high school students are at a loss between not caring and caring to the fullest extent in politics, which has influenced some students to follow different agendas during their four years or even transition from one party to another. But from what we can see here, we are all just worried to see who will stand as the nation's leader for the next four years and if they will try to pay attention to the younger generation and focus on issues that benefit young voters. Hopefully, with this idea in mind, it could increase our wish for knowledge in the political world. Hopefully, we become more open-minded to the idea that politics is a crucial foundation for American society. With the right to vote, we are doing our part to become involved in our future.