The Ben Mulroney Show - Is there any merit to allowing 16-year-olds to have a vote in the election?

Episode Date: April 15, 2025

Guests and Topics: -Is there any merit to allowing 16-year-olds to have a vote in the election? -Superstar Hollywood Director James Cameron re-invents the wheel again with Guest: Mohit Rajhans Mediologist and Consultant, ThinkStart.ca If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! https://globalnews.ca/national/program/the-ben-mulroney-show Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney show. Thank you so much for joining us. I want to hear from you at 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225. Talk in 1970, the Canada Elections Act was changed so that the voting age would be lowered from 21 to 18. It's been at 18 ever since. Well, now there's a push by a group of young people led by a young, I mean, one of the most impressive young people I've spoken to in a long time, Jaden Braves, he's 16. He is the CEO of Young Politicians of Canada and he wants to see the federal voting age lowered to 16. He says, it's what's fair,

it's what represents constitutional democracy and that's what will protect our future at large. He thinks that lowering the voting age would boost civic engagement and voter turnout. He said his organization has proposed implementing standardized civics education to ensure Canadians understand the basics of Canada's political system. And in my conversation that I had with him yesterday, he reminded me that across Canada, there's only one province that has standardized civics lessons in public school and that's Ontario. And that sounds like a good thing until you hear that

we get a failing grade, our kids get a failing grade on that. I don't know how that squares with the idea of empowering kids to vote if we're acknowledging that they don't have the requisite fundamental information on how everything works. But give us a call at 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225-TALK. I have been part of these conversations before in the province of Quebec, where anytime the separatist specter would raise its scary head, it was done in tandem

with a push to lower the voting age in Quebec to 16. And the way I'm wired is I believe that the voting for separatism is not a, you can't make an economic case for it, so you have to make an emotional case for it. And so when you pair that with lowering the voting age, to me, it sounds like an acknowledgement that you are more likely to ply a young person with an emotional argument than an economic one.

And of course, why would a young person respond to an economic argument on separatism when they live at home by and large, they go to school, they don't have to work. And so that makes sense to me. So I ask you, our listeners, would you be comfortable knowing that 16 year olds have the right to vote federally?

Adam, welcome to the show. Hey, Ben, big fan. Absolutely. Thank you. Hey, so no, I'm not comfortable with the idea only because that 16 years still in high school. And I think you're too easily influenced by what's obviously a very left leaning institution in Canada. So I just think it's, you know, kind of gives them an unfair advantage.

Well, yeah. And what's what's that old adage? If you're, you know, you start out as you vote liberal while you're in school and then vote conservative when you start fantastic. Yeah, if you're if you're if you're a young person at if you're a conservative, when you're young, then you don't have a heart. And if you're a liberal, when you're older, you you don't have a heart. And if you're a liberal, when you're older, you don't have a brain, something like that,

right? But the implication is that you are probably more liberal and more progressive as a young person. And so I don't know if I don't know. So my personal opinion is I don't know that we need more people on the left in this country. But that that's just me. That's just me. I agree with you fully, Ben. Also, I'm a big fan of your dad, best prime minister ever.

Thank you very much, my friend. I appreciate it. And look, I'm not suggesting that every young person is incapable of the requisite knowledge to vote. In fact, having requisite knowledge is not a benchmark that you've got to clear in order to vote. You just have to have a have a certain age. And so why not at least consider it?

David, what do you think? Should young people as young as 16 be able to cast a ballot? No, in my opinion, no, they're not even done high school. They're more interested in TikTok videos and being on their phone all day. They don't have any real financial skin in the game. They're still living at home. They're not paying rent. They're not being hit by the economic, you know, top topsy-turvy world we're in. You know, they're just not equipped and they're not, you know, like I said, they've got no skin in the game. They're still living with mom and dad and

having everything that they need basically bought for them. So let me ask you a question. Let me ask you a question. If in fact, we were able to scale up civics lessons so that every public school system in Canada taught base a basic understanding of of governance and how our governments work and what the roles and responsibilities are of each person within that system. And if over the course of, say, a decade, we were able to get it so everybody passed those civics lessons, would that be enough to convince you that people as young as 16 are responsible enough to make an informed decision and vote? Absolutely not. Okay. You know, if they if they if they get an understanding of what the roles of every person is in a government system, you know, that's all well and good. But they still have no financial skin in the game. Okay, they're not they're not basing it on, you know, how do I save for the future? Yeah, you know, you know,

they're not buying houses. They're not doing full to be fair, my friend, not a whole lot of people are buying houses these days. Thanks so much for your call. I got a lot of people lined up who have an opinion on this. Let's welcome Frank to the Ben Mulroney show. Good morning, Ben. You know, the way I look at it, there are some extreme exceptions to this where you can make the case an argument that someone at 16 can go and some of those exceptions are as follows. There is proof out there there are some kids at the age of 14, 15 or 16 that have acquired a master's degree and some of which got close to getting a PhD. I know these are geniuses in society. But those kids have more intelligence than someone

that's 25 years old, 30 years old. So there's an exception. And I think that should be a consideration. Well, yeah, but exceptions don't make the rule. And that's the whole point. We have to have a rule, right? But Frank, thank you so much for the call. And who else wants to talk to us about this? Dave, should young people as young as 16 cast a ballot? No, I don't think so. Okay, here's my reasoning. Okay, so I'm almost 50 now. And my first vote, and I hate to admit this on radio, but was for Bob Ray, back in the day, you scoundrel, but was for Bob Ray back in the day. You scoundrel. I'm admitting it, okay? But I voted for different parties

for different reasons over the years. As one should. Right, because I educate myself on what they want and moving forward, okay? But at 16, when I was in high school, I had no idea a lot about what was going on in politics as I do today, right? So I'm more informed in making those decisions. As your previous caller did say, yes you do have intelligent people at the age of

16 that can make those kind of decisions, but that's a small minority of those people. So me being at 19 and having my first vote being what it was, I looked into it before I made that decision. Even then, did I really fully understand what economics of the world and how our government worked? Of course I did. I've learned my lesson and moving forward, yeah, I can't, it's gotta stay at 18. All right, well, thank you for that. I think I got time for Adam. Adam, what do you think about this debate?

Should we be opening up the voting to people as young as 16? Yeah, I mean, it's a tough one, but if you were going to, you would need some definitive thing. And I was just thinking the only exception to the rule would be if you have a 16 year old who in the summer has got a full time job making a lot of money and maybe a T for exemption somebody that makes, you know, 12,000 or something on the side. So you think it's got to be you think you would open it up selectively conditional upon proving that you have a job proving that you pay taxes is that right?

Well, I mean, yeah, if anything, I mean, you can't take an IQ test, obviously. So what is- A lot of us would not pass that, my friend. It all boils down to, I mean, what does government represent, right? We pay taxes and they work for us. So if a young person was willing and they're working hard

and they have some skin in the game and is paying tax, maybe that could be the definitive fact. All right, Adam, thank you very much. I've got time for John. John, you got 20 seconds to plead your case. Yeah, I think the benchmark still has to be 18. I mean, it's great to learn about it in school and you learn about the different parties, what law what not but the the ideology of the whole party if you like you, it's sort of shifted a lot. And I think, I think it's also the layer of do they watch the House of Commons? Do they watch the committee meeting? Do they watch a broad spectrum or listen to different podcasters and YouTubers to have a wide base?

Yeah, John, thank you very much. But sadly, that's not a benchmark that we apply to anybody. There are plenty of people out there who know nothing about the news, nothing about politics, and they have the right to vote. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney show. Always appreciate you joining us, whether you find us on a podcast, or you find us on the screaming app, or you listen to us on the good old fashioned radio machine. Thank you so much. And I want to remind you that every Wednesday, we like to do a little bit of a palate cleanse, a little reset by having some fun. And instead of trying to solve the world's most important problems, we try to solve your problem on the dilemma panel. Just send us your personal dilemma, whatever it may be at askben at chorus and dot com and me and my friends sit around and we have a lot of fun try trying is the operative word to solve your problems cannot guarantee we're going to do it but can guarantee it's fun radio.

I love speaking with my next guest please welcome to the show Mohit Rajans. He's a Mediologist as well as a Consultant with ThinkStart.ca Mohit welcome to the show happy Tuesday. And g'day g'day. So James Cameron has always been at the forefront of sort of new technology in film either he's one of the first to adopt it or he's the first to use it in a way that a mass audience will see. And if the technology doesn't exist, he oftentimes invents it. So one of the reasons it took so long for him to make Avatar

was because the technology didn't exist yet, and he had to help invent it. He had to invent a special camera so that he could shoot underwater for Titanic. And now he seems to be at the forefront of AI in film. Yeah, like you mentioned, James Cameron has actually been appreciated across the industry in the film business from technology places right down to obviously, you know,

the Oscars, et cetera, and right for innovation. He's always been at the forefront of innovation and he's been a catalyst for it. And he's also never compromised in that. He's been a leader when things like health and safety and making sure that people aren't sacrificing the wrong things to preserve Hollywood. All of that to say he is on board with AI and he's on board with it mainly because of what you said which is this idea that it shouldn't take two to five years to make a movie the size of Avatar and there are movies like Dune that could actually benefit from shrinking budgets and still be as good. But someone you said at the top you know he really he puts uh health and safety and

the welfare I think welfare is key of the people who work with him at the top of the list, even though he is aggressive on the technological front, but it does seem in this circumstance, adopting AI to slash budgets could put certain people's jobs at risk, no? A hundred percent. But I think what he's more so identifying

is how much time is lost in efficiency in the process. And I think when we look at anything from a workflow process that could be stabilized or just even look, you look at production that happens in the city of Toronto, I think we all know that you don't need the size of these trucks anymore in order to fulfill the productions that you're doing. I think everything's about scalability in Hollywood. And James Cameron is just looking at the AI side of it and saying, yeah, we need to jump on board

in order for us to even have an industry. Yeah. And also like who's to say that just because you shorten the amount of time and therefore the amount of people required to make a film, that doesn't mean that another production won't come in. If all of a sudden the barrier to entry to making a film is a lower cost, then a smaller budget film could come up, a film that never would have been made because the budgets wouldn't have allowed for it. All of a sudden, maybe you have more production, maybe you have more work that comes online because it just costs less to get into the business.

Well to your point, you can now make stuff for your market without necessarily having to go through a gatekeeping process in order to be the one person that gets to make the one project up. Right. So I think we're at least headed towards a place where people will start to feel like the barriers are starting to decrease now how it mobilizes to continue to protect people in the business. That's maybe not up to James Cameron, but it is up to the next generation. Okay, so we're seeing, we're in the time of the election campaign

where endorsements are coming out left and right, but sometimes it's not an endorsement, sometimes it's an open letter, a call to action with groups of people asking and urging leaders to see things their way. And there's a coalition of Canadian CEOs that issued a direct appeal to federal leaders urging the creation of stable

long-term strategies to support innovation, digital infrastructure, and global competitiveness. Talk to me about this letter. Yeah, I stumbled upon this because obviously I'd like to follow what's going on in Canada with respect to how quickly we're able to advocate for being, at least global providers of technology solutions and really being leaders. What I found about this, and these are CEOs of some major companies, there's the JNAB, there's Clio, there's the point click care, and they're all vested in multiple areas of interest

that they need to make sure that they open up barriers or are free from barriers in order to develop in the country. The reason I found this interesting though, Ben, is that it's still too vague. When I go and look at the Government of Canada website and I look at the guidelines associated with even engaging with things like generative AI, everything is still very surface level. And so while I do appreciate the fact that CEOs from these major companies are really calling on this push for innovation to be sort of barrier free and people to be able to collaborate and work, you know, obviously this is a call to action on everything from how you can outsource

things to how data can be used outside of the country. But it's not clear to me about how all of these technology companies think they're going to move the needle with this letter. Finally, I want to talk and spend a little bit of time on this antitrust trial in the States that could force Metta to sell Instagram. And I got to say, if I'm at the top of my head, if someone were to ask me about which company did I think would be first in line to face antitrust laws, I wouldn't have said Zuckerberg and Instagram, I would have said Google or I would have said Amazon. I mean,

this to me is quite surprising. Really, I think that what we've followed is a bouncing ball of just Zuckerberg pointing at look at the Cambridge Analytica story, for example, that was a clear indication that the things were wrong. Our issue, I think, is that, well, is that Zuckerberg has been hard to follow because he's been able to actually create such a great, prosperous company, you know, on the, in the idea that if there's a company that's already shown that they have a market share, he wanted

to go and get it. And this monopoly that he tried to build for years is being called to action. That's all that's happening. It's not like Yeah, but I'm looking at it, Mohit. I'm looking at the sort of who his competitors are in the space. I mean, it's a healthy competitive space, the social media space, you've got Twitter is is resurgent. TikTok is certainly dominant. There's nothing that says that him owning Instagram in any way creates some sort of monopoly or even threat of a monopoly. As a matter of fact, the story that we heard last week or two weeks ago was he was thinking of spinning off Reels into its own app

in an effort to become more competitive. So, like to me, this doesn't rise the level of the things we should be most concerned about. There are other spaces that are so completely dominated by one player, I think specifically of Amazon. Oh, Ben, I agree with you. We are definitely in a situation where this actual FCC, this hearing, et cetera, et cetera, is six, seven, ten years too late. This is not a conversation that should be having now. In fact, Meta has moved so far past what they're doing with their entire ecosystem

that you should probably be asking them about what they're working on next. How quickly they're able to scale up all of these AI products is more concerning with how quickly they're able to find my birthday online or straight. You know, and I agree, they're gonna, Mark Zuckerberg has actually had five years to make his case mentally. And he's just going to point out

the fact that they're not even number one in certain demographics anymore. So, so I agree with you on that. This is definitely more theatrical, but, but if it, this is where it becomes problematic. If it becomes a generation laughing at another generation about why they're doing it a certain way, this will get dismantled in real time and it will have implications. So on one hand, I don't understand why it's happening, but if they do react the way that they're supposed to react,

a dismantling of meta from WhatsApp and Instagram will have ripple effects on us as well. Let me ask you a question. I know that for years, the worry that Google was so dominant in search that they could be running a foul of antitrust laws was an iceberg that they may be colliding with. But I've got to wonder with the ascendancy of chat GPT,

I know a lot of people that do their search through chat GPT. I know a lot of people that do their search through chat GPT now. And I've got to wonder whether they've avoided that iceberg. Do you mean if chat GPT has or Google has? I wonder if Google is no longer sort of the target of this antitrust legislation because there's all of a sudden the definition of search and what it means in our lives has changed and evolved.

Yeah, it has changed so much so that all of the AI tools have search embedded in them. Now think about that for a second. It completely changes what and how you're searching for with intent. It has completely disrupted the space. They're not in a place anymore where they're necessarily even first to market

when it comes down to people actually searching for things. What I don't have an answer for based on your question though is whether Google is still answering for crimes of the past. Oh, I've got Mohead, I gotta run. I'm sorry. I'll talk to you soon. My bad. My bad. Didn't watch the clock. Want to transform your space and your Sundays? Well, Home Network is giving you the chance to love your home with $15,000. There can only be one winner. Tune in to renovation resort every Sunday and look for the codeword during the show. Then enter at home network dot ca slash watch and win for your chance to win big. Amazing! Ha! The small details are the difference between winning and losing. Watch and win with Renovation Resort on Home Network.