It’s cool to vote, kids

Rock the Vote? Perhaps the campaign should be called Mock the Vote, since I can’t imagine that anyone finds credibility, or an incentive to vote, in watching the humiliating and hilarious attempts of our general election candidates to get ‘down with the kids’.
These attempts include: Enda Kenny’s revelation to Hot Press that Marilyn Monroe is his favourite sex symbol, Pat Rabbitte’s proclamation that Bono is “the leader in the new pride Irish people feel in their Irishness”, and Sinn Fein’s MEP Mary Lou McDonald wielding an electric guitar outside Government buildings (I’m not sure why).
The campaign exists for a reason, I’m not arguing with that. I certainly didn’t vote when I was 18 and neither did anyone else I knew. We were too busy finally being old enough to legally drink to care about finally being old enough to vote. I’d say the number of people who wake up the morning of their 18th birthday in an ecstasy of voting anticipation is non-existent. More young people should vote, we all agree.
The problem is, a Rock the Vote campaign would not have made me, for one, rush to the polls. Why? Because it is essentially talking down to young people, who don’t need Irish ‘celebrities’ like Katie French (No, I don’t know who she is either) telling them it’s sexy to vote, since they are, in fact, capable of reading a newspaper and deciding for themselves like everyone else. Maybe the ones who don’t vote just don’t care.
A similar American campaign, led by rapper P.Diddy, was mocked by many during the US presidential election in 2004. The subtle ‘Vote or Die’ campaign was criticised for not actually having any effect on the turnout of young people on voting day – exit polls showed that 18-29-year-olds made up just 17 per cent of all voters.
“Yeah, we rocked the vote all right,” remarked gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson, sarcastically commenting on this turnout. “Those little bastards betrayed us again.”