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Comment by grondilu | Hacker News Reader

> The saddest part is that older people(fact) practically decided for the future of the younger ones.

Why is it sad? Do you think the vote of young people should weigh more than the vote of old people? That'd be discrimination.

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Well the young people have to note live in the world much longer. They have to get educated, finds jobs, develop their politics, grow their selves. The old people mostly have done all that and don't have a primary interest making those things easy. The ramifications won't be felt for perhaps 3 years and then not fully for perhaps a decade.

It's not sad, to me (not the parent) that the voting power of each person is the same; it's sad - though expected - that older people seemingly looked to their own interests and not those of the people who will have to live through it more.

>"that older people seemingly looked to their own interests and not those of the people who will have to live through it more."

You're making assumptions there as to peoples' individual motivations. Just because someone voted in a way that you deem is not in the best interests of another group doesn't mean that they didn't have that group's best interest in mind.

I personally think this is a good thing for both young and old people. So in your mind, me voting to "leave" would actually be me not-voting in the interests of the young?

You're right of course, the young people (I'm off course talking in generality of the modal opinion) could be misguided in what they wanted, but they wanted it.

I suppose it's also possible there was a cadre of older people who felt the young would be better out of the EU - the same problems but no say in how to fix them and less cooperation, that's got to help /s - but who choose to keep silent about that position?

On the other hand, I have three children and I'm voting to make life good for them more than myself. They are old enough to vote, yes, but they have far less experience of looking at political life than I do. I'm not at all ashamed to vote the way I see best, and perhaps even tell it to my kids, even if I don't think it is wise to push that too much, or at all indeed.

Think of that quote attributed to Churchill - not liberal at 20 has no heart, and not conservative at 40 has no brain.

> that older people seemingly looked to their own interests

That's an assumption. You could even look at it another way and say it's the other way around where they've lived in the UK prior to being in the EU and know what the UK is capable of on it's own.

> Do you think the vote of young people should weigh more than the vote of old people?

Sure, why not? At a shareholders meeting, people with more shares get more say. Young people had much more at stake in this vote than old people.

This isn't like a normal election where there can be a course correction in a few years. In all likelihood this was a once in a generation decision, and the old folks voted to take away young peoples' right to live and work anywhere in Europe.

Perhaps the older voters are wiser and should receive a greater voting share.

Is it really discrimination? Why do older people get to decide the fate of a world they won't experience?

As soon as you start limiting people's ability to vote based on the perceived stake they have in the future, you start down a dangerous path.

It is discrimination by definition, whether you think it is justified or not.

The case could be made that not letting the people who will have to deal with the consequences for longer have a larger say is also discrimination. To be clear I'm not advocating for this to be put into practice however I do think that elderly should vote with this point in the back of their minds.

By this line of reasoning you could indeed decide to give less of a voting power to old people, arguing that all political decisions have important long term consequences.

There are plenty of reasons why that would be unacceptable, and I'm sure that's why human right conventions prohibit this kind of discrimination.

Is it really discrimination? Why do younger people get to make decisions with so little experience?

“A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in.” I'm curious how you will act when you have grand children.

You could easily make the argument that the younger people lack the experience to make sound decisions on the future.

You won't experience my life. So why should you get a vote on anything that affects me?

Based on the views in this subthread, it seems votes should be weighted by inclusive fitness.

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