Posted on 09/09/2008 2:29:35 PM PDT by neverdem
What happens when presidents from more than 100 of the nation's best-known colleges call on lawmakers to consider lowering the drinking age from 21 to 18? Well, a brigade of hyperbolic mommies start screaming at them, that's what.
In the Amethyst Initiative, college presidents have offered a rational, if counterintuitive, plan. Let's stop treating young adults like wards of the state. Mothers Against Drunk Driving (naturally) replied: No debate allowed.
There is plenty of empirical evidence suggesting that the drinking age of 21 is counterproductive. To begin with, it bars parents from educating their own children about alcohol and, like all prohibitions, it fosters criminality.
"Kids are going to drink whether it's legal or illegal," explains Johns Hopkins President William R. Brody. "We'd at least be able to have a more open dialogue with students about drinking as opposed to this sham, where people don't want to talk about it because it's a violation of the law."
Sham, indeed. It begins with the demonization of alcohol. (Mothers Against Drunk Driving once compared alcohol to heroin.) Imbibing is a satisfying and highly pleasurable way to spend a couple of hours. It is completely harmless for the majority of adults. Let's not pretend otherwise.
And by outlawing even the moderate use of alcohol among young adults, society creates a forbidden fruit. It drives students off campus and underground. It creates an incentive to drink as much as possible in the shortest amount of time possible.
According to the presidents, the drinking age has "created an environment of excess consumption and goal-oriented drinking. While fewer individuals aged 18-20 are drinking, those who choose to drink are doing so at dangerous and alarming rates."
Perhaps if young adults were allowed to experience the effects of alcohol in a controlled environment, they would be less inclined to binge later. (Binge drinking, incidentally, is usually defined as the consumption of five or more drinks in a row by men and four or more drinks in a row by women. Let he among us without sin . . . .)
The present drinking age, it can be noted, treats 18- to 20-year-old adults as if they were criminals, pre-emptively outlawing them from partaking in a legal product that other adults — even adults convicted of drunk driving or serious felonies — can enjoy legally.
Every state has the authority to set its own drinking age. They won't. After the 1984 Congress passed the National Minimum Drinking Age Act, the government blackmailed states by threatening to take away 10 percent of federal highway funding.
There is no politician who has the audacity to take on MADD, anyway. No one wants to be accused of willfully hurting children.
Yet, even if MADD were right, the safety of the "children" should never be the sole basis for public policy. Call them naïve or idealistic, but there are still people in this country who believe the word "freedom" matters as well.
If I may indulge, let's extrapolate on a cliche: It's regularly pointed out that young adults can volunteer to serve in Iraq but are prohibited from buying a beer. But young adults are also free to produce children (many children). A young adult can plan the entire course of his or her life by the age of 21. A young adult can serve on a jury and determine the fate a fellow citizen. If a young adult chooses, he or she can act in pornographic films, gamble nightly, smoke several packs of cigarettes or, in some places, even engage in the truly depraved act of becoming a politician.
Yet this same young adult is breaking the law when ordering an appletini?
It makes little sense. And when a large number of college presidents ask, "How many times must we re-learn the lessons of Prohibition?" the answer is: We never learned the lesson the first time.
I see lots of comments about “old enough to defend your country”. The problem with this is that there is no draft and a very small percentage of 18 to 21 year olds are in the armed forces. Reinstate the draft, make every 18 year old go into the service for 2 years and then they can all drink at 18!
The next problem is that a significant number of 18 to 21 year olds will not “drink a beer” they will drink way lots of beer then with their immaturity get behind the wheel and drive.
Kids going to college who are not yet 21 manage to drink anyway and do so with gusto. I lived in a college town for many years and can’t recall any underage person getting busted yet there were plenty of parties.
The problem isn’t the drinking age, it is the attitude of some of these colleges that make drinking a sport. Sure not everyone becomes an alcoholic, but go to any campus after hours or on a weekend and look around - I suggest you walk around as driving is ill advised.
Where I live there are significant problems with drunk drivers because the bars are not within walking distance. Increase that risk by adding a whole bunch of immature, drunk drivers and the roads between 11PM and 2 AM will be impossible to drive on. In today’s newspaper there were three arrests for DUI over the last weekend - all three of them were also arrested for underage drinking. There were no arrests for DUI where the driver was over 21 - what does that say for this issue? Ok so they won’t be underage drinkers, but they will still be drunk drivers.
Thought so.
Orthodox Jews would be breaking the law all the time.
As a mother of children in college, I would prefer that the drinking age be lowered to 18.
When I was their age, it was being changed from 18 to 21 and the immediate rise in binge drinking was glaringly evident.
Drinking is like anything else that carries great risk; it should be taught by the parents at home, not by other kids who are too often clueless and reckless.
Are you nuts?
Yes I am.
The question isn’t whether they join the military. The question is why do we a setup a set of laws that ALLOWS them to join the military but not drink? How can someone possibly be considered legally mature enough to decide whether or not to lay their life on the line but not old enough to buy a beer?
Having the drinking age 21 doesn’t seem to do anything to reduce binge drinking in the 18 to 21 set. So while that problem certainly exists this is clearly not the solution.
There is definitely something to be said for the rebelliousness of youth when it comes to drinking laws. Probably my period of largest alcohol consumption was right before I turned 21, that last month was one massive binge. The next month after I turned 21 not so much, it wasn’t quite as fun when it was legal.
Years ago the argument to lower the voting age to 18 used the logic that if an 18-yr old was old enough to be drafted and fight for his country, and also was old enough/responsible enough to drink, then the voting age should be lowered.
That said, the argument has now been twisted and somehow we have a situation where an 18-yr old may be old enough to serve in the military (and fight and possibly die), as well as vote for the president, but somehow that same 18-yr old is not responsible enough to have a drink?
Madness.
I know in college that alcohol was illegal in campus dorms. So, the majority of students who were determined to drink would either break school rules or go to a friends house party. A lot of the kids went to parties, and some of them drove home afterwards. Some of these kids were actually over 21, but because you cant have beer on campus, they were forced to go elsewhere, increasing their likelihood of driving drunk.
Same effect as raising taxes: more people willing to participate in illegal activities/cheat.
Quite true, IMO.
I believe its main use now is to serve as a big moneymaker for DUI lawyers and the courts, through the excessively outrageous fines charged.
Or maybe it is because you have hit the maturity level deemed appropriate. But what about kids who go to college when they are 15? Or what about 30 year olds who still live with their parents?
The problem is it is an arbitrary number, based on current society. In the past, getting married at 12-15 was perfectly normal. Now it isn't.
It is the same argument as minimum wage. Start off asking if $20 should be min wage. The person will say, “Well, that is too high.” Then, ask what about $7. They will say, “Yes.” Then, go up by increments of $1, saying “well, if x is good, why not x +1, it's only 1 dollar.” Using that logic, you will get most people to agree on $20 at the end, even though they originally disagreed.
It is all based on arbitrary numbers
Precisely. I went to college in England for a semester and saw firsthand how drinking was not a big deal in the sense of “binge” drinking amongst 18-21 year olds ( who were at the bars I went to ). I was 21/22 at the time and it was weird to see kids who were obviously younger than me but they were raging drunks ordering shot after shot after shot.
I came to the conclusion that alcohol is a part of life there and was not pushed away but rather embraced as something that people can enjoy and use reasonably and responsibly. Of course there were really drunk people but no matter what age we choose there will be. I support 18 big time since it can be introduced to the newly aged adults by their parents and they can do it at home where the parents can discuss the affects and responsibilities of drinking instead of Joe Blow at college who loves to bong beer four at a time.
just my 2 pence, mate.
There's no real justification for treating 18 year-olds in the military any different than their civilian contemporaries in this regard. We can be grateful for their decision to defend their country, but that doesn't mean they are any more or any less ready to start drinking at 18 than the kid who is in college or working construction.
I'm in favor of choosing one age of adulthood, for all purposes.
I agree with you. I have yet to meet a parent that has not had to deal with their son or daughter underage drinking. The biggest thing is not, “don’t drink” it is DON’T DRIVE! And that rule applies no matter what the age.
I also think we have become too overbearing when it comes to our kids. Traditionally 18 was considered adult and there were adult expectations. Now, we never let go and we constantly make excuses for their immature behavior instead of teaching them how to be adult.
I’m still wondering how I ever made it to 45, without all the laws that are now on the books to protect “the children”.
Why? The drinking age should be lowered (it should be 19 not 18), I totally agree with the author.
And states should counter-sue the federal government. If the feds are denying me 10% of what my state resident's motorists are paying for in gas taxes then that's simply taxation without representation.
Lowering the drinking age means young adults would have something to do. I remember when I was 19 and I felt dumb partying at dry bars with a bunch of 14 and 15 year olds.
If you lower it to 18, the 14 and 16 year olds would have a lesser incentive to drink. They'd just wait until they're 18.
“You hit the nail on the head.
Perhaps we should do away with age limits for anything. If 18 is old enough, why not 16? If 16 is old enough, why not 14? Etc...
susie”
It’s the inconsistency that’s hard to swallow. As an eighteen year old, you can legally make a decision to purchase a house with a thirty year mortgage, get married, have sex, become a stripper, join the military, or donate a kidney, and you yourself are legally liable for every decision you make without your age in any way mitigating your responsibility. But you can’t have a beer...
I believe you’re incorrect there. Mrs. Thinking called the cops and asked about it and was told exactly the same thing.
Should there be any age requirements for having sex or getting married?
When you change the argument to fight it, you show the weakness of your argument.
No one mentioned 14 or 16 y/o’s.
At 18, a person is an adult for everything except buying and drinking alcohol.
Why are you for this prohibition? Do you want to raise the age of consent for marriage and for military service to 21 also?
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