Lowering Minimum Legal Drinking Age
Turning 18 is similar to a rite of passage in today’s society, an entirely new world is opened up once someone is 18 years old. People can now make numerous life-altering decisions because they are legally adults, however, drinking alcohol is not one of these new adult decisions available to 18 year olds. Drinking alcohol is just as life changing as smoking a cigarette; the minimum smoking age is only 18, so why is the drinking age 21? People argue that the drinking age needs to stay at 21 because frontal lobes in the human brain, which control decision making, are not fully developed until 21, if this is true then why is 21 not the mark of adulthood? Bringing the legal drinking age back down to 18 could …show more content…
No matter how hard colleges and police officers try, no one can completely prevent binge drinking that occurs on campuses of colleges and universities. College and high school students always manage to find a way to get ahold of alcohol, and often times they do it just because they know they are not supposed to. Lowering the drinking age could deter some students from drinking because the rush of doing something illegal will no longer be there, making it less exciting. “Colleges should afford students more independence instead of implementing ineffective restrictions…By keeping drinking out in the open in areas like college dorms, such activity could be better regulated by resident advisors and therefore could be much safer. If 18-year-old students can purchase their own alcohol, they will also have less reason to seek out alcohol from fellow students or strangers, and therefore will likely be less at risk of the dangers of the consumption of ambiguous amounts of alcohol--or even alcohol laced with other dangerous substances” (Cavalier Daily). Binge drinking is defined as- consuming an excessive amount of alcohol in a short period of time, this is a very common thing that occurs at parties. Despite being popular at college and high school parties, this act is extremely dangerous and can even lead to death. “According to the 2013 NSDUH- National Survey on Drug Use and Health- approximately 5.4 million people ages 12–20 engaged in binge drinking…this survey also found that 4,358 people under age 21 die each year from alcohol-related car crashes, homicides, suicides, alcohol poisoning, and other injuries such as falls, burns, and drowning” (“Underage Drinking”). Lowering the drinking age and enforcing stricter drinking laws could drastically bring this
Turning 18 is similar to a rite of passage in today’s society, an entirely new world is opened up once someone is 18 years old. People can now make numerous life-altering decisions because they are legally adults, however, drinking alcohol is not one of these new adult decisions available to 18 year olds. Drinking alcohol is just as life changing as smoking a cigarette; the minimum smoking age is only 18, so why is the drinking age 21? People argue that the drinking age needs to stay at 21 because frontal lobes in the human brain, which control decision making, are not fully developed until 21, if this is true then why is 21 not the mark of adulthood? Bringing the legal drinking age back down to 18 could …show more content…
No matter how hard colleges and police officers try, no one can completely prevent binge drinking that occurs on campuses of colleges and universities. College and high school students always manage to find a way to get ahold of alcohol, and often times they do it just because they know they are not supposed to. Lowering the drinking age could deter some students from drinking because the rush of doing something illegal will no longer be there, making it less exciting. “Colleges should afford students more independence instead of implementing ineffective restrictions…By keeping drinking out in the open in areas like college dorms, such activity could be better regulated by resident advisors and therefore could be much safer. If 18-year-old students can purchase their own alcohol, they will also have less reason to seek out alcohol from fellow students or strangers, and therefore will likely be less at risk of the dangers of the consumption of ambiguous amounts of alcohol--or even alcohol laced with other dangerous substances” (Cavalier Daily). Binge drinking is defined as- consuming an excessive amount of alcohol in a short period of time, this is a very common thing that occurs at parties. Despite being popular at college and high school parties, this act is extremely dangerous and can even lead to death. “According to the 2013 NSDUH- National Survey on Drug Use and Health- approximately 5.4 million people ages 12–20 engaged in binge drinking…this survey also found that 4,358 people under age 21 die each year from alcohol-related car crashes, homicides, suicides, alcohol poisoning, and other injuries such as falls, burns, and drowning” (“Underage Drinking”). Lowering the drinking age and enforcing stricter drinking laws could drastically bring this