University of Guelph Vote Mob. Credit: Yvonne Su

No disrespect to your grandmothers and grandfathers (they do their civic duty every few years), but this election, the narrative isn’t about them. It’s 2011 and the election that started with the typical back and forth political spin between major parties and Elizabeth May shouting from the sidelines has taken a new direction. Suddenly, it’s energetic, engaged, and including a whole demographic of voters of whom in recent elections have usually been withdrawn from the political process. While the Tories claimed this was an election that no one wanted, it’s being turned on its head by the growing movement of “Vote Mobs” across the country. At 35 universities and counting, hundreds of youth are taking to their campuses and producing videos to share with the rest of their country. The message is simple: Youth are voting.

Days into the campaign, youth-related stories began to take hold in the media. From the student who was refused entry into a Harper rally because of her Facebook profile, the surprise welcome by University of Guelph students at Harper and Ignatieff campaign events, and the numerous Vote Mobs being planned through social media, students have started to take over the direction of the campaign. Groups like LeadNow, a new organization run by Canadians of all ages, have facilitated these vote mobs, many of which were inspired by Rick Mercer’s Rant. Mercer stated: “If you’re between the ages of 18 and 24, and you want to scare the hell out of the people who run the country, do the unexpected, take 20 minutes out of your day and do what young people the world over are dying to do, Vote!”

It now looks as if young Canadians are going to show up this time. This election seems to be everywhere, and especially dominating social media – which accounts for growing youth participation. After all, if you want to get young people involved you have to go where they are.

Knowing that youth are far more likely to vote Liberal, NDP, or Green, Canadian youth might effectively be accomplishing what Mercer suggested. “Scare (ing) the hell out of the people who run this country.” Federal Conservative candidate John Baird’s recent comment about “flash” and “mobs” being “disconcerting” may therefore be appropriate. No one really knows what the vote mob movement will result in this election. Consider this: most youth aren’t registered to vote, don’t have a landline to be tracked by elections Canada, and haven’t given their cell phone number to a political party in order to be targeted through that medium. People can guess whatever they would like about how effective the youth vote will be in changing this election, but the reality is that no one can really know until all ballots are cast. Considering so little attention has been paid to the demographic in the past, parties may now have to scramble to try and sway what could potentially be large numbers of available votes that they haven’t garnered before.

Such ambiguity has to leave politicians apprehensive about how to now grasp the “youth vote”. This, however, is easier said than done because not only is it unclear how many of the 3 million youth in Canada will cast a ballot this election, but also because this demographic doesn’t have just one priority they are allocating their vote towards. The youth vote won’t be captured by tossing out a bone like reduced tuition. Although such policy is relevant and important to youth, it isn’t good enough. Youth care about a variety of issues. A glance at the Vote Mob videos from across the country show that issues of environmental protection, women’s rights, aboriginal rights, income inequality, climate change, Canada’s international reputation, and education are all issues that youth want addressed. That being said, in an election that has focussed on few of those issues, the parties have much catching up to do to capture the support of a newly engaged, informed, and diverse generation. As a first time voter, my advice to each party would be to watch this movement carefully. If youth actually show up this time, this election could leave everyone surprised – without anyone having seen it coming.

Come out to the UBC VOTE MOB I’m co-organizing:
April 20th, at UBC. 12-2pm. Visit: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=117463898334533 for more information; Contact: ubcvotemob AT gmail.com

Read the article on The Commonsense Canadian
Read the Article on Abbotsford Today