Women
are wasting their voting rights
Savannah
Tikotsky
On
August 26th, 1920 the 19th Amendment was
passed and women in the United States obtained
the right to vote. Voting was, and still
is, something most men feel that women never
deserved or could understand. It was a hard
fought battle to gain the equality to decide
how our government and our lives should
be run.
Since
1920 there have been many changes. Women
are seen as more equal to men. We have female
CEO’s, senators, congresswomen and
many other great women role models in positions
of power. Seventy-eight years later, and,
while things are not completely equal, great
strides have been made in obtaining equality.
Yet,
as we approach this presidential election
I can’t help but wonder why more women
aren’t taking advantage of the voting
rights our great-great-grandmothers worked
so hard to obtain. I’m sure most of
you have seen the commercials on MTV about
the “missing vote.” According
to the commercial, most college age women
aren’t voting. For every five male
voters, there are approximately three female
voters.
I
was skeptical about MTV’s commercial,
but a shocking thought came to me after
I spoke to my five roommates about the election.
Of the five of us who can vote (one of my
roommates is from England on an exchange
program), only two of us are submitting
our ballots for this upcoming election.
When
I asked my three roommates why they weren’t
voting, they said they had never registered
and didn’t know who to vote for anyway.
These are three very intelligent, bright
young women getting a college education.
None of them seemed troubled or disturbed
that they were not taking part in the electoral
process.
While
voting may seem like a complicated process,
it really is not. Anyone can register to
vote by printing out a registration form
or filling it out online at www.ss.ca.gov/elections/votereg1.html.
Once you register, information about the
candidates and where to vote is mailed to
you. As well, anyone away at school can
register to vote by absentee ballot and
send their vote in through the mail.
As
far as knowing who to vote for, just spending
five or ten minutes online reading about
candidates will help you decide. AOL, MSN
and the New York Times Online all offer
articles around election time, usually on
their home pages, about potential candidates.
A quick perusal of the results of any online
search engine can also help to learn more
about candidates.
The
implications one or two votes can have on
an election are enormous. George Jean Nathan
once said, “Bad officials are elected
by good citizens who do not vote.”
Take a stand; voice your opinion and vote
in the next election.
Savannah
Tikotsky is a public relations major at
Cal State Long Beach.
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