Drinking Age

The thread about age of consent inspired me to start this one - what do you think should be the ideal drinking age and why?

I, personally, think that 14 is the ideal age - face the reality, most teens start sipping around this age, many of them taste alcohol even earlier. Also, I fondly remember my glorious high-school days, when we smuggled alcohol on our excursions. We got caught by the teachers on one of them and, to put it bluntly, they didn't care. Teens drinking alcohol is nothing that should be illegal - they will drink it anyway.

I think it's something parent (and, possibly, people who sell alcohol) should care about. It's very easy to drink while underage, the laws don't work

21's a good age for no other reason than because I really don't need already annoying teens getting shit faced by the masses.

edited 27th May '11 5:00:29 AM by Usht

>implying they won't get drunk anyway

Less of them now since there's a law in effect. Don't need it actually becoming popular instead of just something that the cool kids do, plus they don't want to get caught and so can't drink wherever.

edited 27th May '11 3:25:27 AM by Usht

Honestly, I've never seen a place where people obeyed this law and underage drinking wasn't popular and common.

Ignoring the anecdotal evidence going on there, the main fact is that it at least keeps it out of my and my neighbors' sights. While the kids go get themselves drunk all they want, they will at least do it in a place that isn't my front yard until they learn to be responsible about the whole deal. Age 14 and such is far from an age of maturity and so getting drunk only makes you get stupider, so at least go do stupid shit away from everyone else.

Also, moving the proper drinking age to 14, won't that only make them want to start drinking even sooner? Much like everyone always drives five kilometers above the speed limit, no matter the speed limit?

edited 27th May '11 3:38:11 AM by Usht

For comparison, I live in Serbia, where the drinking age is 18 (only in theory, it doesn't exist in practice). My parents let me taste beer when I was ten. When around 16, all my friends had no problems with drinking (even the Lawful Stupid ones), and many of them were already drinking hard drinks and experimented with mixing. However, problems with drunk teens are practically nonexistant (except for car accidents, but that can happen to anybody drunk). How is that possible, I have no idea.

edited 27th May '11 3:42:14 AM by MilosStefanovic

Never understood that you're allowed to learn to drive before you learn to handle alcohol in the States.

Exactly. The minimal age for the driving license should, IMO, be 18.

Yeah, the drinking age in the USA is odd as hell. An additional age requirement for adults? What?

Here in Germany it's 16 for beer etc., and 18 for liquor etc. And de facto already 14 years old can, ehem, organize beer from somewhere, of course. It's really not all that bad. I don't see a reason for a general age limit of 18, let alone 21.

What? Large swathes of the US is rural, and there's plenty of Middle'o'Nowhere in it. If the driving age ain't 16, kids from backwater towns are screwed.

We should lower the drinking age, not raise the driving age.

The people who want to drink still drink and the ones who don't stick to the law.

People who want to steal something still steal and the rest stick the law too.

You can say the same about murder. What's your point?

edited 27th May '11 4:09:57 AM by Usht

Lemme get this straight, Usht: You're defending criminalizing people who are legally adults drinking simply because you don't like drunk youngsters?

Quite heartless and authoritarian.

If they're adults, why the Hell should the government regulate their lifestyle choices?

This is where I insert a face palm macro.

Heathen, I never said adults shouldn't drink (though I will say the vast majority of them have no taste in alcoholic drinks), I'm just saying that we shouldn't ignore that people drink underage just because they do drink underage.

Frankly, I like the Italian system for once.

There is no drinking age, at all. If you are a minor (<18 years) you cannot buy alcohol, but if your guardians are OK with it they can let you drink as much as they want (under their responsibility, of course — if you end up in the hospital, they will face the legal consequences).

When I was twelve or so, it was normal during big family dinners for me to have just a little bit of wine in a glass of water, and to cheer and drink together with the others.

It tasted good, it made me feel like a "grown up", and it was of course entirely harmless.

edited 27th May '11 4:18:50 AM by Carciofus

I got to say, I like that system. It allows for a certain amount of flexibility.

Why shouldn't we? If they're 18 or over, they're legal adults.

Puritanical laws that restrict what vices adults can or cannot partake in are wrong.

You're moving the goal post as usual. I just said drinking underage is bad, never said what age people should be allowed to drink at. Personally, if the Italian system lets people at least have a taste and get it out of their systems that drinking equals being an adult, then it's great. Beyond that, I really have no preference as to when people start drinking, aside from at least a couple of years before or after they get to start driving, because age is not a factor in maturity.

Why is it bad? Because it's against the law?

Many things (lots of them perfectly normal things that standard folks do) are against the law. Surely, something being illegal doesn't make it wrong.

Because I doubt many of those teenagers have the level of maturity necessary to handle alcohol. While not all of the adults by the time they reach the drinking age in their country have the maturity either, it's at least to a point where we can safely hand them a bottle of whatever and expect them not to go batshit insane with it. A lot the underage drinkers around here? Doing stupid stuff like crashing a car while driving drunk, downing a power line and putting power out for a good eight hours.

EDIT: For all of those wondering why people get to start driving so soon in the US is because of necessity. Things tend to be quite spaced out around here if you're not in a city with public transportation.

edited 27th May '11 4:44:38 AM by Usht

18-year-olds are legal adults. Treating them as kids is downright patronizing: I favor low drinking ages, but I think having a drinking age above 18 is a monstrosity: 18 year olds are not kids. They're legally adults, and the law shouldn't regard them as kids.

Again, I never said anything about what age they should be. I'm open for suggestions.

Your first post defended the drinking age of 21, completely glossing over the fact that 18-21 year olds ARE LEGAL ADULTS.

It was, in fact, quite cavalier about the law treating young adults like they were kids. Drunk youngsters are obnoxious, so they banning them from drinking is justified was the gist of it, Usht. You edited it after the fact: Your post originally said 21.

edited 27th May '11 4:58:34 AM by SavageHeathen