I often hear from people, college students especially, that they aren’t going to vote because, in the grand scheme of things, their vote doesn’t matter especially with presidential elections coming up. Although this is technically true, and honestly there is a very small chance of your vote having any kind of major effect on the outcome of the election, the reasons why you should vote will always outweigh any of the possible reasons why you shouldn’t. With the current electoral processes in America using the electoral college, it’s hard to rationalize "wasting" your time going to the polling place to vote, especially if you’re living in a state which always votes for the opposite of your party. However, it’s still essential to let your voice be heard, particularly if you are a part of the group of voters aged 18 to 31, the group that is least likely to even register to vote by a large margin.
By not voting just because you think that your vote doesn’t really count, all you’re doing is saying that you hope that the people who actually go out and vote will make the same decision you would have made. Everyone’s probably heard someone say, “if you don’t vote, you can’t complain about the outcome,” and there is some truth behind that because, by not voting, you’re just leaving it up to everyone else to vote, and by not voting for the candidate you wanted to win, you aren’t doing anything to stop the candidate you didn’t want.
Another argument I often hear against voting is that they don’t want to just vote for the lesser of two evils. On the surface, this argument seems to make sense. If you don’t agree with all of the points of either candidate, it’s difficult to justify voting for a candidate knowing that they don't believe in everything you believe in. The problem with this logic is that not voting for the lesser of two evil is just giving your vote to the worse of two evils. This is because, mathematically, by not voting you’re actually just making someone else’s vote count more. So, by not voting for the lesser of two evils, you’re giving more weight to someone’s vote for the worse of the two evils, and by voting for nobody, you're allowing other people to vote against the ideals that may be important to you, and you're taking away a vote from someone who may stand up for and make change in an area that may be important to you.
Many college students always say how they can’t wait to grow up, and no longer have their parents making their decisions for them, but the generation of college students continues to be the age group that is least likely to vote, repeatedly allowing the generations before them to decide their futures. This trend is still blatantly present among millennials, and, with the upcoming election, it’s becoming more and more essential for young adults to use the voice that they have to decide their futures, instead of continuing to let the baby boomer generation decide for them.
