Do you remember your first taste of alcohol? How old were you? Twenty-one? All 50 states currently demand that their citizens reach age 21 before they can legally drink. But there's a growing movement that says mandatory minimum laws may do more harm than good. When determining the right date when a young person can take one of their final steps towards personal responsibility and freedom, what's the right answer?
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Under-21 students might drink the same amount of alcohol in a night would the drinking age be lowered, but they would drink this amount over a longer period of time. The Age 21 law forces students to "pre-game" by drinking to get drunk, but doing so for an hour or so BEFORE going out for the night. Normal adult social lives include the drinking with the socializing, but this is not usually an option for someone under 21.
- Daniel Demetri August 23, 2008 5:39PM
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Data is flawed. I am a Former State Trooper, worked the night shift my career and arrested alot of DUI suspects, sometime the same person multiple times. A DUI is the following:
1. Bad luck (the ratio of police to drunks on the road is flawed)
2. Good luck (if you have the skills to detect "truly" drink drivers)
3. Skilled (if you can stumble into mud and make it a gold mine)
Kids will drink and DO DRUGS (yes do drugs), the laws DON'T make a difference. There are establishments that sell to minors (and eventually get caught, but another replaces it)
SOLUTION: www.18or21.com
- FormerTrooper September 15, 2008 12:38AM
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Binge Drinking Puts Lives at Risk Off the Highways
- From Choose Responsibility
By Choose Responsibility - Balance, Maturity, Common Sense
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Drinking period puts lives at risk
It is not just a matter of off the Highway. It is every where. "Binge" driking has nothing to do with the law. That is a hypothosis formed by Amythest Initiative. In my opinion, they have taken a bunk of data, combined it, and formed a false conclusion.
As I posted earlier, the statistics for drinking in my community show that the same problem is present among those age 12-16. It does not make any more since to change the legal age from 21 to 18 than it does to change it to 16.
The law is not the root of the problem. You do not solve problems by curing a symptom of the problem. You solve the problem by going to its root. The root is the parents, plain and simple.
- UltraConservative August 19, 2008 4:30PM
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Enforcement of Law
Underage drinkers are afraid to call for help in a crisis in fear of getting repremanded by the police (which they are not sympathetic for) and that taking time away from law enforcement to patrol more dangerous crimes. By having the limit be 21, you are essentially criminalizing an activity that is legal to the rest of the adult world, creating even more of an incentive for underage kids to want to try it. Underage drinking will not go away, and there is a huge difference between 16 and 18. At 18, kids go off to college. Instead of living in a dream world where all rules are followed, you must acknowledge that the system in place right now is unhealthy and is more dangerous than if the drinking age was lowered and drinking was legalized at 18. You're right, the root of the problem is the parents, because they are too ignorant to realize that their children become a part of the real world once they hit 18.
- uofascott August 22, 2008 11:07AM
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Laws need well-defined goals... (Part 1 of 2)
Part 1 of 2 (cannot fit in 1000 chars)
Laws need well-defined goals that mesh with the tenets of our society AND abide by the restrictions on government found in the Constitution. Even with well-meaning goals a law is still wrong if it fails the second test.
Many of the proponents of the law cite a decrease in criminal activity that was committed while the perpetrator was intoxicated. One possible idea to communicate this fact is to treat crimes committed while intoxicated more harshly than those committed otherwise. This is similar to how a killing committed during the commission of a felony is automatically charged as first-degree murder.
- polobo
August 22, 2008 1:25PM
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Laws need well-defined goals ... (Part 2)
Part 2 of 2
Likewise, if the goal of the legislation is to protect people from harming themselves (binge drinking and dying of alcohol poisoning) then that legislation differs in principle from most other legislation in that we (society) are restricting actions that do not directly harm society. Most laws that attempt to do so are rejected by the Supreme Court for First Amendment reasons.
If you accept that American citizens are adults at the age of 18, and agree that based upon the First Amendment the government should not restrict the actions of individuals that do not pose a direct threat to society, then Legal 21 laws should be struck down as being unconstitutional. Since drinking can be done without becoming intoxicated and without committing crimes its restriction is unfairly punishing individuals who have not committed any crime.
- polobo
August 22, 2008 1:27PM
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Environmental effects on social attitudes
Thanks for making the point that the risks of binge drinking far exceed the carnage on our roads. Drinking to the point of intoxication has become the nomative way young people use the drug, which has far-reaching consequences--even if they survive the episode. The impact of binge drinking on brain development, unwanted pregnancy and STI's and violent incidents should not be overlooked or minimized.
I believe it is the way that this pattern of consumption is depicted in advertising, TV and movies, and other venues influencing popular culture on one hand--and the lack of comprehensive prevention programs on the other hand--that has brought us here. We need to push back against these influences.
Changing attitudes, not lowering the legal drinking age, will help our society to address the problem. We decided as a society years ago that we would not allow tobacco advertisers to glamorize use of this legal drug, and the rate of use among young people declined sharply. We need to make up our minds that alcohol should also not be allowed to be marketed to our kids.
- Concerned Skeptic September 4, 2008 12:41PM
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