Jason and Jerry Song are a force of nature, bordering on becoming a force for change.
The high-energy 17-year-old identical twins from West Vancouver are on a mission to get their teenaged peers not just engaged, but voting by the age of 16.
The pair are producing a youth-oriented politics podcast and serving as local heads of an international campaign to lower the voting age.
Their love of politics began at a young age when they were learning about public speaking and the art of debate. In Grade 10, they began volunteering at West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country Liberal MP Patrick Weiler’s constituency office where they found themselves on the front line of hearing about issues that mattered to their neighbours.
“It really got us seeing how important the policy made on Parliament Hill really is for everyone, and specifically youth,” said Jerry. “And it really got us thinking: Why are there not more youth voices at the table or young people really engaged in politics?”
The Songs opted to take up the cause themselves, adopting the technology of their peers. In June, they launched TwinTalk Politics, a podcast and YouTube series in which they expertly raise the issues of young people with elected officials.
Although they have their own almost-but-not-completely-identical views, the podcast is strictly non-partisan. To date, they’ve recorded episodes with 21 MPs, from five different provinces and four different parties.
Before they do their interviews, the Songs do thorough research and come to the table with an encyclopedic knowledge of the MP’s bills, motions, positions and backgrounds. The identical twins break the ice by quizzing the honourable elected member on which Song is which. (About 60 to 70 per cent manage to answer correctly, they estimate.)
Jason said they were surprised to see just how accommodating and open the busy MPs have been for “angsty 17-year-olds.”
The response to the podcast has been even more rewarding, they agreed.
“We’re constantly getting emails through our website saying, ‘Oh my god, your podcast is so cool. I love what you’re doing,” Jason said. “Teachers have been following along watching episodes. So have our peers. It’s really, really rewarding and really, really cool to see so many people tuning in and really caring about youth issues.”
#Vote16
Raising teen issues and getting young people plugged in is one thing. But Canada’s political systems leave them disenfranchised at a critical time, the Songs said.
Because teens under 18 cannot vote, political parties do not tailor policies to their concerns. This instills apathy, which leads to further disenchantment – a negative feedback loop.
“[Youth] are so passionate. They have so many ideas on how to forward motions, how to change the world,” Jason said. “But oftentimes, their voices are pushed down and not cared about for arbitrary reasons they can’t control… This means that they’re less interested in Canadian politics. As a result, they’re less likely to vote. They’re less likely to think that the government cares about them. And this has such huge ramifications in the future of Canada.”
The two appeared before West Vancouver council on Sept. 30 asking elected members to officially endorse the Vote16 campaign. In their rapid-fire presentation, Jerry and Jason rattled off studies and stats underscoring the case that 16-year-olds have the mental maturity for the responsibility of voting and pointed to examples around the world where 16-year-olds are given the right.
Council members were largely impressed with the Songs’ presentation, with Mayor Mark Sager noting he first got involved in civic politics by serving on a municipal committee when he was 16, and Coun. Nora Gambioli saying she would bring a motion to support the Vote16 campaign at a future meeting.
Only Coun. Linda Watt said she wasn’t supportive of the concept.
“My concern with this is not all 16-year-olds are like yourselves. One of the biggest arguments against lowering the voting age, of course, is you’re not paying taxes, rent, roofs over your head, seeing where finances go,” she said.
Following the meeting, the twins said they are very familiar Watt’s arguments, but more than a third of 16-year-olds have jobs. And there is more to governance than taxes
Post-secondary education and student debt, prospects for affordable housing and climate change, especially, are key examples where young people have a disproportionate amount of skin in the game but have no say in the creation of policies
“I think our perception of how we need to solve climate change is much more urgent than many of the older populations, because it feels like it actually may impact our lives really significantly,” Jerry said.
Jason and Jerry will graduate from Mulgrave School soon. There’s no question they’ll be going on to study political science in university, although they haven’t decided yet which post-secondary school – or schools – to apply to. The two joked that they have never been apart for longer than the three minutes that passed in between their births.
Whether the campaign to lower the voting age to 16 becomes law or not, and regardless of how many people their TwinTalk Politics podcast reaches, the Songs said they hope their activism sends a message to their peers who do want to make a difference.
“You can make an impact, regardless of your age, regardless of who you are, where you are, your race, your gender, all these arbitrary factors,” Jason said. “We can make a change in this world, and it’s time we do that.”
To find TwinTalk Politics, visit twintalkpolitics.com.
To learn more about the #Vote16 campaign, visit vote16.ca.
To sign the Songs’ petition, visit change.org/p/west-vancouver-lower-the-voting-age-to-16.
