Most cultures around the world have a designated age their youth must reach to be considered a legal adult. The age when a teen is seen as an adult is often dependant upon a culture’s beliefs. In America, it is believed that at age eighteen, one becomes a legal adult. As a legal adult in American society one earns the right to go into combat, take part in elections, purchase cigarettes, get a tattoo or piercing without parental consent, and fill out legal documentation without a parent’s signature. In other words, those who are eighteen in America are allowed to risk their life by fighting in a war, choose who they think should lead the country, potentially damage their body by purchasing and using tobacco products, risk infection with a tattoo
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The United States is one of very few countries around the entire world to have a Minimum Legal Drinking Age of twenty-one. Despite the high MLDA that America holds in hopes to prevent alcohol abuse, other countries with a lower MLDA seem to have less alcohol abuse. This is because young adults don’t feel the need to binge drink when they come in contact with alcohol, since they can have it daily without breaking the law. Those who can drink at eighteen in other parts of the world are taught alcohol responsibility early on and are monitored by their parents or other adults in the institutions where they consume alcohol. Alcohol regulation is another responsibility young adults should learn early …show more content…
People at this age are trying to fight against society; they feel like they are big shots and want to rebel. The article “Underage Drinking: Why Do Adolescents Drink, What Are the Risks, and How Can Underage Drinking Be Prevented,” written by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism in 2006, even states that teens naturally search for hazardous situations to take part in due to the stage of development they are going through (13). It is believed that if the Minimum Legal Drinking Age was lowered there wouldn’t be as much abuse of this law. One could say the MLDA is nearly obsolete because it is ignored by so many people both young and old. The drinking age law is broken more often by people who are closer to twenty-one. They feel like the law doesn’t apply to them the closer they are to being of age. Laura Vanderkam helped support this claim in her article “Busybody Alarmists Set Arbitrary Standards,” published in 2002, with a survey performed during 2000, titled, “National Household Survey on Drug Abuse.” This survey reported that twenty percent of fifteen year olds consume alcohol monthly, whereas thirty-two percent of seventeen year olds consume alcohol monthly
The United States is one of very few countries around the entire world to have a Minimum Legal Drinking Age of twenty-one. Despite the high MLDA that America holds in hopes to prevent alcohol abuse, other countries with a lower MLDA seem to have less alcohol abuse. This is because young adults don’t feel the need to binge drink when they come in contact with alcohol, since they can have it daily without breaking the law. Those who can drink at eighteen in other parts of the world are taught alcohol responsibility early on and are monitored by their parents or other adults in the institutions where they consume alcohol. Alcohol regulation is another responsibility young adults should learn early …show more content…
People at this age are trying to fight against society; they feel like they are big shots and want to rebel. The article “Underage Drinking: Why Do Adolescents Drink, What Are the Risks, and How Can Underage Drinking Be Prevented,” written by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism in 2006, even states that teens naturally search for hazardous situations to take part in due to the stage of development they are going through (13). It is believed that if the Minimum Legal Drinking Age was lowered there wouldn’t be as much abuse of this law. One could say the MLDA is nearly obsolete because it is ignored by so many people both young and old. The drinking age law is broken more often by people who are closer to twenty-one. They feel like the law doesn’t apply to them the closer they are to being of age. Laura Vanderkam helped support this claim in her article “Busybody Alarmists Set Arbitrary Standards,” published in 2002, with a survey performed during 2000, titled, “National Household Survey on Drug Abuse.” This survey reported that twenty percent of fifteen year olds consume alcohol monthly, whereas thirty-two percent of seventeen year olds consume alcohol monthly