Voting is a right of all U.S. citizens who are 18 years old or older. Since the 26th Amendment was passed in 1971, this has been the case, but in recent years many citizens have questioned whether teenagers should have the ability to alter our country’s fate.

As the 2020 presidential election approaches, seniors at NASH and all around the country are faced with many questions: Should I vote? Who will I vote for? How do I vote? Do I even know the candidates?

Such questions, however, reveal that most seniors are not fit to vote. But even though you are 18 years old and can legally vote in the 2020 election, if you don’t know what exactly you’re doing, I highly recommend that you do not vote.

It is wrong to say all new voters are incapable of taking the task seriously, but there are enough who are not mature enough to handle it.

As a senior in high school, I can confidently tell you that politics is not a number one priority for most 18-year-olds. Most seniors are too busy thinking about the college application process to focus on what is happening in the political sphere, leaving them with little to no information on political candidates. If these seniors take the little information they have and vote based on it, the whole process is unfair to a person who has done extensive research and thought about who they are voting for and why.

This concern can relate to students taking tests in school, too. If a student took a test on a book without reading it and got a good grade, the student who actually read the book will be upset. The student who reads the book did more work than the other student, but got the same results.  It’s both unfair and irresponsible, as the first student would possess only a fraction of the understanding that the second student would have.

If you don’t care about the future state of our country, then shame on you. You do possess the right, but you do not deserve it.   If you don’t care about our country’s future, it’s best to stay out of the decision-making process. There is no need to ruin it for someone else just because you can.