Getting Political

"I have come to the conclusion that politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians." -Charles De Gaulle

First, happy Monday.  Second, I'm so sorry for getting this out so late.  It's National Coming Out Week which means we're super incredibly busy.  It's SAGA's biggest week of the year and we've got events going on every day.  When you couple that with work and tons and tons of homework--it gets busy.

One of the things I hear most often from my friends these days is that they can't wait until the election is over.  I know many many people who have worked with the campaigns either interning or doing other types of organizing or volunteer work, and from what I gather they're just so exhausted.  Here's the thing though...as much as we wish it wasn't so, politics are important.

I'm always incredibly bothered when people in my generation (or anyone really) dismisses politics or elections.  I know I'm so biased as far as all of this goes, but dang it, these decisions are going to affect our future!  People are always complaining about the state of our government, yet those same people don't go out and exercise their right to vote.  I think most of you know that I'm a MN resident, and so the Vote No campaigns for both amendments are hugely important to me.  In fact, I'm lending my face to a video on Thursday through SAGA and Campus Democrats.

I get sick of politics too.  Believe me, I do--but at the same time I get even sicker when I think about what will happen in our future if people refuse to become educated and consider these issues before election day.  Many college students feel underrepresented by their government, something they have every right to feel, but if we made our voices heard through democratic processes, maybe our elected officials would acknowledge our demographic. Why should they think of the college age population if the college age population doesn't bother to vote?

For me, as for many of my friends, this election season rests on some very tender nerves.  I wouldn't be able to sleep at night if I wasn't doing something to try to help out some of these campaigns.  Some of them won't even affect me personally but I know SO MANY people who would be affected.  I'm not going to stand back and do nothing.  It's just not my style.

If you need to register to vote, you can go to https://www.gottaregister.com/ and if you're a first time voter in MN, we are lucky enough to have same day registration, so lucky you!  If you need to vote absentee in MN, you can go to http://www.sos.state.mn.us/index.aspx?page=211 Also, if you need to vote absentee in any state, you can just google "Vote absentee (insert state name here)"

With that, I hope all you folks age 18 and older will hit the polls on November 6th!

With love and hugs,
Megan