For a brief time when I was 18 & a senior in high school they did lower the drinking age to 18. Yes it was cool then but now that I have 2 teenagers & 2 small children it isn't so cool. It just came to my attention this morning on the radio that this is yet again a debate. It was said that Wisconsin is surely going to lower their drinking age, therefore if the surrounding states do not "go with the flow" the younger will just go across the borders to drink. Sorry to say this is not a new dilemma! My brother, whom is now 24, but when he was 18, he and his friends use to head to the Canada border to drink because of the lowered drinking age. Is there a way around this? I think not. The following is an article about the debate. Let me know what you think.
Debate: lowering the drinking age
Catalina Boneo
Issue date: 4/10/08 Section: Health & Lifestyles
Do you ever imagine what it would be like if the drinking age was lowered to 18? Recently many states have considered lowering the drinking age.
According to USA Today, various state legislators are fighting to lower the drinking age because they argue that men and women who are old enough to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan are responsible enough to legally buy alcohol. In the USA Today article, it states that there are seven states considering lowering the legal drinking age. These states include: Kentucky, Missouri, Minnesota, South Carolina, South Dakota, Wisconsin and Vermont. However, these various states have different terms in which they want to lower the bar. According to USA Today, legislation introduced in Kentucky, Wisconsin and South Carolina would lower the drinking age for military personnel only. In Vermont, a task force is being considered to study the issue. In Minnesota, a bill would allow anyone 18 and older to buy alcohol in bars and restaurants, but not in liquor stores until they are 21-years-old.
People fighting to lower the drinking age may face a hard time from Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), which could end up being an expensive obstacle.
According to the USA Today article, Congress voted in 1984 to penalize states that set the drinking age below 21 with a penalty of taking away 10 percent of their federal highway funds. Aside from taking away states highway funds, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says laws setting the drinking age at 21 have cut traffic fatalities involving drivers ages 18 to 20 by 13 percent.
The heart of the issue, however, tends to surround the question about whether military personnel should be able to drink legally. Some state senators tend to agree that if you have the responsibility to fight in the war and, most likely take a life, one should be able to enjoy a beer legally.
At the same time many people disagree with that notion.
Thomas Barret, a retired Coast Guard, interviewed by USA Today, said "I hear this bandied about that if you are old enough to fight for your country, you are old enough to have a beer…I don't think it is the same type of maturity."
Junior Kristen Divine agrees.
"I do not think that the two ideas correlate," Divine said.
On the other hand senior Lauren Sherman disagrees.
"I think that the drinking age should be lowered because fighting in the military requires just as much maturity and responsibility that comes with being able to purchase alcohol," Sherman said.
Here at Lynchburg College a large portion of the campus is not legally allowed to drink yet still do so every weekend and sometimes with heavy repercussions. Would lowering the drinking age prevent this from happening or would it make things worse? This is a topic that will probably be debated for some time. It is hard to decide what is the best thing to do when it comes to issues like these.
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