Should the drinking age be lowered to eighteen?

What does everyone think about the magical number being "21?" Should it be lowered to eighteen, or stay as it is?

I think it should be lowered. How much sense does it make to be able to be tried as an adult and shipped off to die in Iraq at 18, but still not old enough to buy a beer? That's borderline hypocrisy.

The drinking age in Ontario is 19 and I think thats even stupid. Should be 18. Makes no sense how its 21 for you guys in the states.

Honestly, I think it should stay the way it is. They know better, they know people are drinking illegally but I guess they will keep it at 21 so that maybe some people who are law abiding citizens will adhere to the law and not drink until then. Truth be told, you are a little more mature (at least you should be) at 21 then you are at 18 and alcohol is not something young, reckless, immature people should handle. So I'm actually for raising the age limit of everything you can do at 18 to 21. Can't drink until you're 21? Okay, you shouldn't be able to go to war and buy cigarettes until then too.

^ Agreed. IMO, eighteen is too barely legal to allow kids that age to (legally) drink. Of course they do anyway, but as you say, it stands to open the floodgates to underage teens having more access to liquor. No eighteen year old kid is going to be "the adult" in the company of his sixteen and seventeen year old friends. If he's chillin in his bedroom with a couple of beers and his 17.5 year old boy shows up, they're gonna both be buzzed.

ThePayback wrote:No. With the drinking age at 21, it limits kiddie drinking by association. Not many 21 year olds hang out with underage kids. However, it's not uncommon for an 18 year old college freshman to have a few lingering underage HS buddies. How likely is it that when he goes to buy alcohol that he'll restrict his 17 year old buddy riding in the passenger seat from throwing back a beer with him?

This is actually the reason why they raised it to twenty-one in the first place. When my parents were eighteen, they could drink. I suppose too many of the eighteen year olds of the day who could at the same time couldn't be trusted to not use their leverage to allow their underage pals access to adult beverages too.

Allowing 18 year olds to legally drink would spike up the # of drunk driving crashes and fatalities. When I was younger I would have argued for lowering the drinking age, but I now see why it's 21. Adulthood comes in dribbles and drabs. Someone can't be a child for 17.9 years and then on their 18th birthday they're suddenly a fully functional adult, capable of handling full grown adult responsibility. The human brain doesn't reach full maturity until around age 22/23. Let someone grow a little further into their adulthood than 18 before we start allowing them to shrivel their liver.

I agree with those who say "no" for the reasons mentioned already.

I say it should be lowered to 18. At 18 you can do everything else including go off and fight for your country and die, but you'll be busted if you have a beer before shipping off for Iraq?
3 years difference is NOT going to magically make 'irresponsible' 18 year olds into responsible drinkers. The way I see it, drinking in general is a taboo BECAUSE it has a higher age limit, so everybody does it younger and they do it harder and in excess because it's rebelling. If it were 18 like everything else, it wouldn't be such a forbidden fruit and might not seem as appealing. Besides, being the law isn't stopping anybody from doing it so I highly doubt lowering the legal age would make much difference on the road. If somebody's going to be an irresponsible drunk driver, they'll do it whether they're 16, 17, 18, 21, or 53. Age doesn't make you responsible and it doesn't make you a better driver. And not everybody who has a drink suddenly gets behind the wheel as soon as they finish their beer, some people still stay home and have a drink to unwind.

I say no. Despite their now legal status, 18 year olds aren't mentally mature enough to handle alcohol IMO. The average adult doesn't reach full emotional maturity until they are around age 23. In the case of alcohol, I think it should be reserved for adults who have progressed further into their adulthood than 18.

Except how can we know they're not mature enough to handle alcohol when the law hasn't given them a chance to try without risk of arrest for about 30 years?

I think the drinking age should stay where it is, though when I was 18 it was legal to drink. When I was almost 20 they suddenly raised the drinking age to 21. Didn't stop me though and it doesn't stop anyone now.

So what would be the point in keeping the law at 21 other than just another way for Big Brother to rule how everybody else lives? Drinking in itself should not be a crime, no matter how old you are, if you kill somebody because you got drunk, that's worthy of being a crime, but there's a difference in drinking and being drunk.

So kids can legally get drunk? Yeah, that's something the law needs to waste time condoning.

Well I don't see what good is coming of it being illegal since it has to be known that any and all teenagers they bust for drinking is only a drop in the bucket compared to how many actually do it and how many don't get caught.

And, not everybody who drinks drinks to the point of drunkenness. And not everybody who drinks (contrary to what some people think) is going to automatically get behind the wheel of a car and kill somebody. If I were going to drink, I'd do it in the privacy of my own home and stay there minding my own damn business, thank you very much.

Besides, if the law says you're an adult, how can if you're 18 and your parents give you booze and you get into a crash and kill somebody can they be charged with supplying a MINOR with alcohol? The law is very two faced about that. You want to have sex at 18, fine, you're an adult. You want to buy cigarettes that will give you lung cancer and emphysema, fine, you're an adult. You want to get married at 18, fine, you're an adult. You want to join the army, go over to Iraq and get blown to bits? Fine, you're an adult. You want to buy a car, rent an apartment, buy a house, fine, you're an adult. You want to drink? Sorry, you're still a minor. That makes no sense whatsoever.

If you ask me they should raise it to 25. j/k.
But no it should stay @ 21.

Wow, good question. Why can't there be a graduated system where you can buy beer and wine and drink it at home after 18, but you can't go out drinking at a bar or buy hard alcohol until after 21 or something?


I just feel like it's asking for trouble to lower it, 18 is still a "teen" and a person that age's brain is not mature yet...Why make it easier for them to go kill themselves and someone else?

But I do "get" the argument for it as well, you can join the military but you can't drink and all that...

Alcohol is just so dangerous. I'd have no problem with it if we were talking pot and not booze.

I think the problem I have with it is that a person is mature enough to join the military at 18 & when the draft was instated during the Vietnam war, they were mature enough to be drafted into war regardless of their stance on it. But not "mature" enough to vote. So I think they need to go one way or the other with it. Either the legal age is 18 or it's 21. They need to pick one & apply it across the board.

Supernova wrote:Well I don't see what good is coming of it being illegal since it has to be known that any and all teenagers they bust for drinking is only a drop in the bucket compared to how many actually do it and how many don't get caught.

And, not everybody who drinks drinks to the point of drunkenness. And not everybody who drinks (contrary to what some people think) is going to automatically get behind the wheel of a car and kill somebody. If I were going to drink, I'd do it in the privacy of my own home and stay there minding my own damn business, thank you very much.

Besides, if the law says you're an adult, how can if you're 18 and your parents give you booze and you get into a crash and kill somebody can they be charged with supplying a MINOR with alcohol? The law is very two faced about that. You want to have sex at 18, fine, you're an adult. You want to buy cigarettes that will give you lung cancer and emphysema, fine, you're an adult. You want to get married at 18, fine, you're an adult. You want to join the army, go over to Iraq and get blown to bits? Fine, you're an adult. You want to buy a car, rent an apartment, buy a house, fine, you're an adult. You want to drink? Sorry, you're still a minor. That makes no sense whatsoever.

That's true, a lot of them drink. But, as a former teenager who had friends who drank, smoked, and did drugs...I can tell you that it was WAY easier to get illegal drugs than it was to get alcohol. I mean, the difference between calling up a friend and having it within an hour, and calling like 10 people to find someone who had an older sibling or whatever and then waiting for them to be available and all that.

I don't think I've ever heard of a teen getting into trouble for just drinking though, now that I think of it.

My position on it remains. I don't feel the typical 18 is mature enough to handle the responsibility of alcohol, and interacts with too many underage kids who would wind up with access to it.

It should be 16.

What if it weren't limited by the law at all and people could "teach" their kids to drink responsibly from childhood?

That place is called Ireland.

BA DUM PSH!

CeCe wrote:I think the problem I have with it is that a person is mature enough to join the military at 18 & when the draft was instated during the Vietnam war, they were mature enough to be drafted into war regardless of their stance on it. But not "mature" enough to vote. So I think they need to go one way or the other with it. Either the legal age is 18 or it's 21. They need to pick one & apply it across the board.