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Drinking Age Should Be Lowered
People use alcohol for numerous reasons; peer pressure, celebration, anxiety, sadness, boredom, rebellion and insomnia are just a few. Teens fall under the category of “people”. The legal drinking age is currently twenty-one, but illegally drinking age is as low as zero. Why? Is the main question asked. I can assure you the under age drinking age percentage would drop if the age is lowered.
Few reasons for teens drinking are: peer pressure, enjoyment, etc. But the main reason for doing so is “breaking the law.” 87% of high school seniors have used alcohol. That means that a large quantity of teens under the age of seventeen to eighteen have used alcohol before. We all know why teens drink, I mean is common since. Just the feel that they get of breaking the law is huge. Being rebel and not following the rules is an important role of a teen’s life. Consequences are the one that change them, but we don’t want them to experience the consequences of being under the influence of alcohol because we know them and they are fatal. Dying in a car accident and killing others is a mess that we don’t want to clean.
Despite the fact that is illegal for young teens to purchase it, they are able to get it through their parent’s own liquor cabinets, unscrupulous store clerks, or older friends who purchase it for them. As we all see, is not hard for teens to obtain alcohol. Why not lower the drinking age then? I mean any way you put it, they are getting it.
We have all heard of the famous saying “we want you to join the military and protect your country.” Blah blah blah. Well, you are telling me that I can legally kill someone at the age of eighteen, while I sign up with the military and go to war but I can’t have a sip of alcohol. Due to this none senseless situation, age should be equaled. In other words, if voting and military sign up is eighteen, then drinking should also be eighteen. Besides at the age of eighteen you are legally an adult. Why can’t we drink then?
Drinking age in Australia is eighteen, and in UK is as low as sixteen in restaurants. Studies have showed that those teens/adults are perfectly fine. In fact, Dr. Ruth Engs; professor of Applied Health Sciences at Indiana University in Bloomington, uses this examples to propose the following: “……the drinking age be lowered to about 18 or 19 and permit those of legal age to consume in socially controlled environment such as restaurants and official school and university functions” (direct quote from Dr. Engs).
Drinking age should be lowered, and I know that by lowering it we can drop the percentage of reckless teen alcohol abusers. It is worth trying it , and if everything goes the opposite then change the law once more (which is done lots of times, for dumb reasons) and raise the drinking age back to twenty-one. Changes are always good (most of the times), and I know this one in particular is an excellent one.
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JOIN THE DISCUSSION
This article has 740 comments.
As much as I applaude your efforts for posting this article here and engagin everyone in a decent argument, I for one do NOT agree with this . :/
Sorry, but lowering the drinking age is just gonna make it worse . Kids as young as 13 , where I come from , drink and lowering the age is not gonna make any difference to this . If anything, it'll just INCREASE the number of teens drinking .
And comparing it with something as patriotic and meaningful as fighting for your country.. I'm sorry, I don't think so :/ . (Even though, granted, you ARE killing people at 18 . But for a just cause, I think . Your country is reason enough, is it not ? )
But again, thank you for submitting this . Something to think about : )
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