youth turnout

Michael recently called out the New York Times on their dismal profile of Declare Yourself for subliminally playing into the popular fallacies about the youth vote and youth turnout. Unfortunately, this is just one example in a long-standing problem with media coverage of young voters.

As it turns out, these repeated fallacies about young people being apathetic, not turning out, et al may be more damaging than we previously thought. To uncover the hidden damage done by the media's false narrative we must look into the field of social psychology.

In Dr. Robert Cialdini's Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, there is a chapter on commitment and consistency. Here is a passage that may help shed some light on the potential negative effects of this narrative:

What those around us think is true of us is enormously important in determining what we ourselves think is true. For example, one study found that after hearing that they were considered charitable people, New Haven, Connecticut, housewives gave much more money to a canvasser from the Multiple Sclerosis Association. Apparently the mere knowledge that someone viewed them as charitable caused these women to make their actions consistent with another's perception of them.

Potential young voters are constantly hearing that they do not vote, will not vote, and that they don't care. The danger lying herein is that some young voters that are not directly engaged may act, or not act as it is, because of unconscious consistency.

This may seem like a bunch of crap psycho-babble, but think about it for a moment. How often have we seen organizations talk about how to make voting "cool?" There have been efforts to combat a negative stigma towards political engagement and voting. We have a situation where the media says that young people don't vote, a young person may think: "I'm young. Nobody expects me to vote anyway. Other young people aren't voting. Why bother?"

This is a big reason why it is important to push back on these fallacious media narratives about young voters.

On the bright side, good media coverage and stories about young people getting involved have that positive effect on young voters. Good coverage also provides social proof that other young people are being engaged and voting.

This is also another reason why vote pledges are so important. As I wrote in an earlier post a while back, vote pledges involve an even more powerful use of the principles of commitment and consistency. The individual pledge to vote, a personal act of commitment, overwhelms the effect of demographic consistency.

What do you think? Does the false media narrative potentially lead to this danger, or am I just spouting psychobabble? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Its the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.

"Voter excitement, always up before a presidential election, is pushing registration through the roof so far this year - with more than 3.5 million people rushing to join in the historic balloting, according to an Associated Press survey that offers the first national snapshot.

Figures are up for blacks, women and young people. Rural and city. South and North.

Overall, the AP found that nearly one in 65 adult Americans signed up to vote in just the first three months of the year. And in the 21 states that were able to provide comparable data, new registrations have soared about 64 percent from the same three months in the 2004 campaign."

That is only in 21 states we're comparing... can you imagine what its like for all 50 states?

Our good buddies at the DNC sent out a memo detailing the information as well as quoting pertinent stats

• "Turnout for voters 18-29 has increased dramatically-tripling or quadrupling in many states-this election season. So far, more than 5 million young voters have participated, with an overwhelming number going for Democrats-building on gains made among this key demographic in 2004 and 2006. [civicyouth.org]
• This trend can be seen in state after state. In Massachusetts, for instance, youth turnout doubled, with young people voting for Democrats over Republicans nearly 3- to-1. 168,863 young people voted for Democrats while only 62,159 voted for Republicans, nearly tripling the numbers from 2004 [55,367] and 2000 [45,722]. [civicyouth.org]
• Recent polls confirm these results. According to a Pew study released last month, 58 percent of voters under 30 now identify as Democrats or lean Democratic, while only 33 percent associate with Republicans. The gap is even greater for young female voters-63 percent to 28 percent. [Pew Study, released 4/28/08]"

And we still have several more months left to register more. This is a great motivator for all those orgs out there - and its a great fundraising tool for those working on young voter registration, GOTV, and doing youth specific organizing.

In the past the youth movement has had a lot of drop off to get funders to invest in the youth movement - ideally this will rejuvenate those past donors and encourage bringing about new ones.

Happy fundraising!