With the upcoming presidential elections fast approaching, many politicians and their advisers are calling out to the 18 to 25-year-old voting populace.
It seems that they are all relying heavily on our votes for this next election.
The key question raised by this whole matter is whether the average college student is as informed in political issues as they should be.
Don’t get me wrong. If you’re a political science major and ready to debate me on the issues, please refrain.
I’m not here to argue, I’m only here to get things straight.
In the recent elections, the 18 to 25 voting demographic have become increasingly influential in the outcome of the election. With more and more of us voting every election, this makes it a necessity for us to be informed of the issues.
But where do we find out about the political issues of the day?
Sadly, most of this 18 to 25-year-old demographic falls into one of two categories.
There are those who get most of their news from satirical shows such as “The Daily Show” or HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher,” and those who tend to follow their news by faithfully tuning in to either Fox News or CNN.
Let’s start with that first category.
There are those potential voters who gain most of their political insight from such laughably biased and uninformed shows as “The Daily Show” and “Real Time with Bill Maher.”
These shows make it their point not to present the entire political issues, but to instead make fun of one side or the other.
So the average college voter, fresh out of his 11 a.m. psych class comes home to turn on “The Daily Show.” Immediately he becomes “informed” about Bush’s new immigration plan, thanks to John Stewart’s sarcastic reading of a quote taken out of context.
And how would our college student know what to think of the Democratic primaries without first learning from Bill Maher that Howard Dean yells a lot.
Although there may be some truth in what these men on television say, they tend to not plainly discuss the actual issues. Instead, they use comedy or their political bias to distort the actual context of the issue.
I have enough faith in my fellow classmates to know they will be able to form their own opinions of issues.
But by watching these shows meant to gain laughs, it becomes hard to get a fair look at what the actual issue is.
I don’t mean to suggest that one political faction is ultimately right or wrong. I just think that the issues should be dealt with in an unbiased way.
My second categorization of college voters is those who rely on either CNN or Fox News for their news.
While both of these networks give up-to-date reports of both nationwide and worldwide events in the news, it is the method that both use that distresses me.
For those of you slightly in the televised news dark, I’ll help to enlighten you.
Fox News, home of Bill O’Reilly and Geraldo, is the conservative news presence on cable. CNN, meanwhile, puts out its liberal viewpoints with help from Larry King and Paula Zahn, among others.
Now comes the hard part. I am well aware of people’s political views and understand their reasons for watching certain news with their own views, but in the long run, this is wrong.
If you are liberal, it only makes sense for you to want to hear the liberal side of any breaking story. This is the same if you happen to be a conservative.
But without ever hearing the other side of the story, your views become one-sided and you end up becoming less informed about the complete issue.
I also realize that those of you who are already decidedly liberal or conservative may not think this balance of news is necessary for you, but it really won’t hurt much to switch from channels 27 and 28 occasionally.
By the time November comes around, it will be up to us to decide the new path out country is ready to go down.
Let’s just hope our generation is informed enough to make the right choices.
May I make a motion for a president who is willing to outlaw halftime shows, or is that just going too far?
Edd Mullin is a sophomore English major. He can be reached at [email protected].