Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (Full Version)

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Dubya -> Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/23/2008 1:39:23 PM)

Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking?

More than 100 University and college presidents have signed a newlu circulated "manifesto" calling the country to rethink the minimum drinking age. They suggest that doing so will reduce the amount of "binge" drinking on campus.

What do you think?



rcjames -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/23/2008 1:43:44 PM)

No.

Thanks
RC



blessedinnyc -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/23/2008 2:09:12 PM)

One of the things that I have observed as a college student is that people stop drinking quite as much once they turn 21. (Or maybe people just stopped drinking because they were afraid of drinking in my company when I turned 21!)

Maybe 21 is when folks reach a certain maturity level, but maybe it also has to do with the fact that people don't enjoy the thrill of being a scofflaw anymore. I think we should try an experiment and let a willing state lower its drinking age for a few years, and see what happens.

In any case, when I was 18, I thought the drinking age was patently unfair and a potential violation of the 15th amendment. If I was old enough to vote, old enough to enlist and/or be drafted, and old enough to get the DP if I committed a bad enough crime, surely I was old enough to drink.



ljmac -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/23/2008 3:09:37 PM)

I got another idea, let's give 14 year olds driver's licenses and see if traffic accidents go down.



colliefan -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/23/2008 4:00:48 PM)

Don't think so; booze was legally available at the time I was in college. Had some binge drinking back but it wasn't as pervasive as it seems to be now. All that will occur by lowering the drinking age back to 18 will do is to push more of the problem down to the HS level.

I believe part of the problem is related to how booze is marketed. Instead of being promoted as something to be enjoyed responsibly with a meal or with a convesation with friends, it is protrayed as a necessary ingrediant to party hardy.



inthysite -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/23/2008 5:04:33 PM)

I first started drinking when I was 15. I usually stole a beer or two from my dad. However it was difficult getting beer for me and my friends when we wanted to go to parties or just hang out. We would hang outsite of liquor stores and try to get someone to buy us beer. We actually talked an off duty cop into buying us some. That was back in the early 80's. The drinking age was 21.

When I was 19 I move to Georgia where the drinking age was 19. It was then that my drinking took a serious turn and would lead me down a path I wish I had never taken.

Making alcohol easier to obtain will by no means help solve the problem. If you are bent on drinking you will find a way to obtain what you need but why make it easier?

FYI: I've been clean and sober for over 7 years now! [:D]



colliefan -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/23/2008 7:31:05 PM)

quote:

FYI: I've been clean and sober for over 7 years now!


Praise God.



SonInMe1 -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/23/2008 10:13:19 PM)

...and how many college students use drugs? Lets legalize them too.

How many college students go on sex binges? Lets legalize rape too...afterall, students cannot be RESPONSIBLE for their own actions..can they?

That is why the drinking age is 21. So people can be a little more mature when they engage in activities that could possibly, if handled irresponsibly, cause trouble, they will be able to cope with it in a more resaponsible manner.



blessedinnyc -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 12:21:13 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: ljmac

I got another idea, let's give 14 year olds driver's licenses and see if traffic accidents go down.

Actually, they do that in Iowa, and it works. Kids can drive themselves to school, and Mom and Dad can work on the farm and/or go to work. The accident rate among 14 and 15 year-olds isn't high enough to justify increasing the driving age to 16, so Iowa hasn't done it.

Wisconsin was the last state to increase the drinking age to 21, and only because it was forced to by the feds. It didn't feel that increasing the drinking age was otherwise justified.



Ps103 -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 12:58:09 AM)

It's been a long time since I was 18, but looking back, I had great big holes in my brain that had filled in quite a bit by the time I was 21.

I have observed similar phenomena in The Lad, The Lass and my nieces and nephews.

I do not think this is a family trait, as all my friends and their kids went through the same thing.

I do not think allowing people to drink before the holes in their brains start filling in is a good idea (even though drinking age was 18 when I was younger.)

I think all those college presidents are simply trying to get out of a part of their responsibilities, and do not like the idea that they actually have to control what goes on on their campuses.

Iirc, the instances of drunken kids being killed in car wrecks decreased when the drinking age was raised. And I think it will go up if it is lowered again, just to appease a bunch of college presidents that do not think life outside their campuses exists.



OneOfHisJewels -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 2:06:24 AM)

quote:


I have observed similar phenomena in The Lad, The Lass and my nieces and nephews.


I thought you didn't have kids, or do you have stepkids?



OneOfHisJewels -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 2:08:29 AM)

Well, I am obviously going to be the odd man out in this thread. I have believed for years we should have NO drinking age. I've always believed if it wasn't the forbidden fruit it wouldn't be such a big deal to teenagers. In Europe, children grow up having wine with meals from day 1, and over there, to teenagers getting drunk isn't such a big deal.



cog41 -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 8:28:07 AM)

No. Not one bit.



bzirk -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 10:53:20 AM)

Haven't read the whole thread.

Wasn't this logic the same that said if abortion were legal, then it would help reduce abortions because it would no longer be done in the shadows?

We see how that turned out.



Ps103 -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 11:39:06 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: OneOfHisJewels

quote:


I have observed similar phenomena in The Lad, The Lass and my nieces and nephews.


I thought you didn't have kids, or do you have stepkids?



Yep. Two of them. I am the "Evil Stepmother."[:D]



blessedinnyc -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 11:44:26 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: bzirk

Haven't read the whole thread.

Wasn't this logic the same that said if abortion were legal, then it would help reduce abortions because it would no longer be done in the shadows?

We see how that turned out.

That's a really interesting question, and though I don't want to take this discussion off-topic, a quick look at the abortion rate chart seems to indicate that we may hit pre-Roe abortion levels for the first time in 35 years in the next few years.

However, to answer your question, I think the states usually know best. Different states have different laws on drinking due to different local cultures, etc. Wisconsin might be one of them; they were the last state to raise their drinking age, and they did so because they were forced by the feds.

I think this is a question that we should let individual states revisit if they want to.



ljmac -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 12:54:04 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: blessedinnyc

quote:

ORIGINAL: ljmac

I got another idea, let's give 14 year olds driver's licenses and see if traffic accidents go down.

Actually, they do that in Iowa, and it works. Kids can drive themselves to school, and Mom and Dad can work on the farm and/or go to work. The accident rate among 14 and 15 year-olds isn't high enough to justify increasing the driving age to 16, so Iowa hasn't done it.

Wisconsin was the last state to increase the drinking age to 21, and only because it was forced to by the feds. It didn't feel that increasing the drinking age was otherwise justified.


Not exactly. In Iowa kids can get an "instruction permit" that allows them to drive with "parental supervision". They can't get a full license until they are 17.

Anyone can look it up.



SonInMe1 -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 2:23:41 PM)

In New York...or at least when I was a kid...any farm kid could drive any farm vehicle within a quarter mile of their property, I believe at any age. I was driving a tractor at 6. Driving a pickup before I got my drivers licence.

eh.



ik3900 -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 2:54:22 PM)

I think that an age limit of 21 simply delays the maturity of otherwise fully developed (albeit less experienced) adults. Reducing the age limit would, I believe, allow people to get to grips with the responsibility earlier but would not neccasarily reduce the magnitude of binge drinking by nearly/newly legal drinkers.



OneOfHisJewels -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 7:49:52 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: bzirk

Haven't read the whole thread.

Wasn't this logic the same that said if abortion were legal, then it would help reduce abortions because it would no longer be done in the shadows?

We see how that turned out.


That analogy makes no sense because there is murder and sin in abortion. While it is a sin to get drunk, it is not a sin to drink in moderation. And there is no such think as "in moderation, non-sinful abortion."



colliefan -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 8:11:42 PM)

quote:

to teenagers getting drunk isn't such a big deal.


What about Europe's noted soccer hooligans? Here in Raleigh it's the much hated Buffaslug fans.



bzirk -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 9:05:03 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: OneOfHisJewels

quote:

ORIGINAL: bzirk

Haven't read the whole thread.

Wasn't this logic the same that said if abortion were legal, then it would help reduce abortions because it would no longer be done in the shadows?

We see how that turned out.


That analogy makes no sense because there is murder and sin in abortion. While it is a sin to get drunk, it is not a sin to drink in moderation. And there is no such think as "in moderation, non-sinful abortion."


Certainly it's possible to drink alcohol without it being a sin. But the logic being used to lower the legal drinking age is that making it illegal has only facilitated a higher rate of binge drinking, so to make it legal would help lower binge drinking. Where I come from binge drinking means someone gets drunk. Maybe it means something else to you or others.

It would be interesting to study the statistics for traffic fatalities and binge drinking in states where the mandatory age has been 21 since there were even laws on the books for such things.



colliefan -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 9:23:45 PM)

I was getting something to eat during the second intermission of a Canes games last year when a coed in the line next to me ordered a bottle of Gatoraid.

I asked her if she had been sweating up a storm cheering for the Canes. She replied she had been drinking too much and needed to re-hydrate herself.



agapetos -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 9:26:35 PM)

Interestingly, there's a move to increase the age to 21 here. There's concern that too many young people are binge drinking.

There aren't many shops who will sell alcohol to under 21's now ~ most will ask for id if people are around that age.



colliefan -> RE: Will lowering the drinking age reduce binge drinking? (8/24/2008 9:37:05 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: agapetos
Interestingly, there's a move to increase the age to 21 here. There's concern that too many young people are binge drinking. There aren't many shops who will sell alcohol to under 21's now ~ most will ask for id if people are around that age.


Does this mean the church is failing to meet the spiritual needs of this age group? If so, why and what can be done to correct it?



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