I see two sides to the following article, posted on the Australian PAL Gamers Network website. (there are other similar/identical articles on CNet and others).
The aim is to get young voters to the polls, one site noting that young voters would have a tendency to vote for Obama.
1) It is a good idea to encourage young voters
to register and get to the polls BUT…
a) Will they be informed and qualified to cast a ballot?
b)If they are avid war gamers, would there not be more of a tendency to support the war? (making the Obama comments/hopes backfire)
c)Will they simply form peer groups of online friends that all vote one way or another to vote OPPOSITE enemy teams online?
I think youths SHOULD be encouraged to vote, but perhaps this is not teh right avenue. They also note that they are encouraging bands of another website to get fans to vote. Again, doesn’t that just mean that a bunch of youths will be voting for the party simply because other fans of the band have? (Which I can honestly see being very Democratic favoured as artists and musicians generally vote for the Democratic Party “All we are saaaaaying, is give peace a chance”)
http://palgn.com.au/article.php?id=12570&title=Xbox+Live+allows+voters+to+register+for+U.S.+election
SO while promoting youth voting is a good thing, isn’t educating them important too? Should an very strong emphasis be placed on the importance of those votes so that youths will actually think about it before jumping on a ‘me too’ bandwagon?
EDIT: As it is clear that my post was either unclear or people simply do not read properly, I must clarify.
This is NOT a way to vote electronically or online. This is just s way to encourage youths to vote and a way for them to register as voters, they still must visit a voting booth and cast a ballot just like anybody else.
