Are you really an adult at 18?

Many incoming freshman enter college at the age of eighteen. They are able to experience fun weekends and great nightlife. There is one factor that seems to stay constant, whether it is at bars, football games, the dorm or frats; this factor is alcohol. While students have access to all of this alcohol, they are not of legal age to drink, possess or even handle it. Drinking, possession, and handling of alcohol under the age of twenty-one are all illegal activities in the United States; however, in many other countries the legal drinking age is eighteen. In these countries, when adolescents turn eighteen, they are able to go to the bar, have a drink and walk down the street with that drink in their hand. While it is understandable that there are many harmful side effects of alcohol if you consume too much, why is it legal to drink at eighteen in some countries but not others? Therefore, this paper is addressing all United States Legislators who need to reevaluate the current legal drinking age from twenty-one years old to eighteen years old.

“The current United States legal drinking age is 21. Many United States citizens disagree with this age. Many believe that the age to legally be able to purchase, consume, or possess alcohol should be 18. A United States Citizen is allowed to vote when they are 18 years of age. Eighteen-year old males are forced to join the Selective Service, for possible drafting. This means that 18-year old males can go to war. At age 18, a citizen is also inclined to jury duty. So, an 18-year old is given the responsibilities of voting, being selected for jury duty, and possibly being drafted for war. If an 18-year old citizen is to be given these responsibilities, why is the legal drinking age 21?” (The Undersigned)

The purpose of this paper is not to say that drinking is acceptable to excess, but drinking alcohol can be done responsibly. Any type of excessive behavior is a problem. Eating too much causes obesity, which carries numerous health risks; yet, too the other extreme, eating too little can create varying health risks. We are taught as adolescents that if we eat from the five basic food groups and exercise, we will maintain a healthy lifestyle. We are not taught not to eat too much or too little, we are taught to eat healthy and in moderation. We have similar training about alcohol as we enter high school. We are taught the limits we need to set and we are taught the risks. We are introduced to the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) program in elementary school. This program was established to educate children of the risks of drugs and alcohol. Perhaps this education needs to be pursued and modified to have a stronger impact.

Understandably, the teenage years are a very influential time period. Peer pressure and defiance to adult experiences are at its prime; however, these are still formative years. At this time schools and communities should provide education on how and why drinking alcohol must be done in moderation. In essence, the message they are trying to install into adolescents is in order to be treated like an adult, you need to act like an adult. One should have the ability to make informed decisions.

Much like the tobacco industry has done over the last few decades. People are now educated as to the risks of smoking. We all know that smoking is bad for your health and if you smoke to excess you stand a stronger risk of medical problems and in fact dying at an earlier age. Yet, legislation has made it so that smoking is legal at eighteen years old. If congress can support the legality of smoking at eighteen, congress needs to reconsider supporting the consumption of alcohol at eighteen.

At the age of eighteen, our own legislators believe we can make important choices that elect them into office. This is why at that age one is considered adult enough to register to vote. In order to vote, you need to develop the ability to form your own opinions. You must to be able to make very significant decisions. Keeping this in mind, why do legislators believe that we, at the age of eighteen, are considered old enough to vote, but not old enough to make the same important decisions about how much alcohol is appropriate to consume? College campuses are often a big target audience for those campaigning. Politicians are there to promote those issues that are important to them for their campaigns to be successful. These same politicians need to realize that eighteen year olds are adults not just when it fits their mold. We are adults who do have the ability to make intelligent choices, alcohol included.

It is all about being mature and informed enough about making the right choices. How can it be that at eighteen, one is considered responsible enough to fight in a war when perhaps it is a war that they do not believe in nor support. If our government and legislators can not only ask, but demand, that at the age of eighteen we fight and be willing to die for our country, how can the same government cite and/or arrest the same eighteen year old for having a beer in their backyard with their family during a Fourth of July celebration. The same could hold true if that eighteen year old were to have a glass of champagne to celebrate another New Year in the absence of a terrorist attack. This same government would gladly accept an enlistment in the military at the same age of eighteen to defend us as a nation, or defend the attacks against our country as on September 11, 2001. The government says that one is responsible enough at the age of eighteen to make a legal decision to die for our country, but not mature enough to even take a sip of alcohol. After all, drinking alcohol before age eighteen is illegal – no questions asked.

The same eighteen year old can also serve as a juror in court on a case that can decide right from wrong, perhaps even life or death. How can there be so many inconsistencies on when you are considered responsible enough to make the right choices? Why, with such other enormous responsibilities, can an eighteen year old not make an intelligent decision as to when to drink and how much to drink? Drinking does not have to mean drinking to excess, or binge drinking. An eighteen year old citizen can be held accountable to make decisions about someone else’s life, but not about their own. Our civic duties seem to be prioritized over our civil rights.

In 1984, the United States government changed the legal drinking age from eighteen years old to twenty-one years old. In that year “The National Minimum Drink age Act” was passed which made it mandatory that all sates raise their minimum purchase and public possession of alcohol age to twenty-one years old. Within a two-year time period, these states had to comply with the new law or risked losing their highway funds under the “Federal Highway Aid Act”. This law was passed mostly in part because of Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD). MADD was created for a good cause that stemmed from an unnecessary death at the hands of a drunk driver. There are definite limits to drinking and driving. The dangers and hazards are too critical not to set legal limits. These laws that have been created are necessary in order to keep drinking and driving at a safe level. The fact is that drinking and driving should be addressed and MADD has done wonders to control drinking and driving.

Subsequently, what MADD has done is they took the excessive behaviors of some eighteen to twenty-one year olds and made it the norm. An increase in the drinking age from eighteen to twenty-one is an extreme reaction. It is one thing to continue to address the problems of drinking and driving and perhaps enforced a stronger degree for eighteen year olds or second time offenders; yet, it does not seem appropriate that someone at the age of eighteen who has been given so many other responsibilities is not deemed smart enough to make wise choices when it comes to drinking alcohol. Alcohol, as previously stated, is easily accessible to eighteen year olds, so why not encourage drinking responsibly?

Our own bathroom stalls at Penn State University have signs posted that state: ‘drink responsibly 0 – 4 drinks’. It seems contradictory that someone could be walking on a college campus after having had a single drink, staying well within the legal limit and yet be cited. Where is the risk involved in this scenario? Therefore the laws MADD has created should not apply to all situations. These laws have penalized those eighteen year olds that know right from wrong. For example, you could be walking on any college campus, having come from a party where you had a sip of a beer. Having fun with friends, totally unrelated to any alcohol intake, you are stopped by an officer of the law and asked to take a breathalyzer. At that moment, you are guilty even if you register a .01 on the breathalyzer, by the mere fact that you are eighteen and not twenty-one. Life is about being accountable for your actions. It seems to me that in this situation, being on a college campus, surrounded by drugs and alcohol, a .01 is being responsible and accountable; yet, our laws state that at the age of eighteen taking a sip of alcohol is breaking the law. You lose your license for three months, pay a $300 fine and are required to take a youth offenders program (YOP). What is even more ridiculous is that those punishments are only for first time offenders. If you break the law again, your license is taken away for over a year and you are found guilty without the option of a program. The penalty far surpasses the crime.

The better success of a youth offenders program, as previously discussed, would be to offer this program during the high school years. Education would be the better suited as prevention to the problem, and not a solution to the problem. “Research from the early 1980’s until the present has shown a continuous decrease in drinking and driving related variables which has parallel the nation’s, and also university students, decrease in per capita consumption. However, these declines started in 1980 before the national 1987 law which mandated states to have 21 year old alcohol purchase laws” (Ruth C. Engs) From this, it shows that although the drinking age rising to twenty-one years old and the number of Driving Under the Influence (DUI’s) have decreased, they are not directly correlated. The reason for the decreasing in DUI’s is from the stricter rules on the road, and the education programs taught about the consequences of drinking and driving. Once again the problem is not that you are eighteen, the problem is those eighteen year olds that take it to the extreme and ruin it for everyone else.

Legislation should be written for certain scenarios that pertain to dangerous drinking, just like the laws that have been created for drinking and driving. It should be unlawful for binge drinking. Binge drinking is defined as five or more drinks for males and four or more drinks for females in one night. This is found on many college campuses. Lawmakers believe that by raising the drinking age, they are improving conditions, but in fact it is becoming a lot worse. Because of the legal drinking age being twenty-one years old, too many people under the legal age see drinking as the “forbidden fruit.” Many school Presidents believe that binge drinking is the most serious problem on campuses today, and by lowering the drinking age back down to eighteen years old will prevent much of the binge drinking and the injuries as well as sickness that comes along with it. “While there has been a decrease in per capita consumption and motor vehicle crashes, unfortunately, during this same time period there has been an increase in other problems related to heavy and irresponsible drinking among college age youth. Most of these reported behaviors showed little change until after the twenty-one-year old law in 1987. For example from 1982 until 1987 about 46% of students reported "vomiting after drinking." This jumped to over 50% after the law change. Significant increase were also found for other variables: "cutting class after drinking" jumped from 9% to almost 12%; "missing class because of hangover" went from 26% to 28%; "getting lower grades because of drinking" rose from 5% to 7%; and "been in a fight after drinking" increased from 12% to 17%.” (Ruth C. Engs)

Taking this point one step further at the age of eighteen we are considered to be responsible enough, by the law, to have consensual sex. And should we take this behavior to the unfortunate extreme and become pregnant, we do not even have to inform our parents, because we are considered adult enough to make the right and informed choices on how to handle this situation. If we are responsible enough to have safe sex or handle a situation that has perhaps gone too far, why is that we are not responsible to drink alcohol and know what our limits are? The consequences of unsafe sex are equally as important and life changing as the consequences of drinking.

Although not legal at the age of eighteen in the United States, the legal age for possession, handling, and drinking alcohol in other countries is eighteen years old. In many other countries with eighteen or no legal drinking age, the children and teenagers are able to drink at special occasions, holidays, at dinner, or socially. “To many Americans, the idea of offering children alcohol is reprehensible. Yet, this approach to drinking seems to inoculate children against alcohol abuse later in life.” (Stanton Peele) This shows that from having not such high standards of a drinking age, such as twenty-one years old in the United States, children and teenagers are learning early how to drink responsibly and not to abuse those privileges when they get older. Seaman says that “in Montreal, where eighteen- year-olds may drink, students are less likely to end the evening hugging a toilet. His remedy: Roll back the drinking age so youngsters can drink in legal, controlled settings and "learn to handle alcohol like the adults we hope and expect them to be." (Seaman, Time)

“Despite our claim to advanced medical knowledge about alcoholism, America produces many more problem drinkers than do many traditional cultures.” (Stanton Peele). With that statement alone, our United States legislators should reevaluate the drinking age. With the “traditional cultures” alcohol is not abused like it is here in the United States. Changing the drinking age would prevent that, because those under twenty-one years old would not have to hide their drinking, and would prevent much binge drinking.

One should support the advocates who have crusaded to make people everywhere aware of the dangers of drinking, from binge drinking to drinking and driving. What should not be advocated is that the laws have been created for those people who are not responsible and penalized those of us that are accountable for our actions. The key to the success of people drinking at any age is being informed of the dangers and making knowledgeable decisions. When I personally think back to my days in elementary school when one kid was bad, we all would get punished and not be allowed to go out for recess. That same scenario applies to underage drinking. Many of us who are eighteen – twenty-one years old are being punished for the behaviors of the distinct group of irresponsible and dangerous drinkers. Enforce the laws, set the legal limits of drinking, but at the age of eighteen one should be able to have a drink. Drinking responsibly and within the legal limits should not be considered breaking the law at the age of eighteen. The government cannot pick and choose when an eighteen year old is an adult. Perhaps if an eighteen year old were treated as an adult, their behavior, drinking included would be handled with respect. It is imperative that those adults, regardless of their age, be held accountable for their actions, should they exceed the legal limits.

So why, with all of the responsibilities of life or death, fighting for your country, and the decision to have sexual relations, are those same eighteen year olds unable to make the decisions of how much alcohol to drink? We have learned from statistics of other countries that have eighteen or no legal drink age, that lowering the drinking age to eighteen years old does not cause more trouble, which many people in the United States believe, but rather teaches responsibility, prevents binge drinking, and alcohol abuse in later years. I understand that the responsibility lies within the person holding the drink, however, I believe the current United States legislators, are obligated to reconsider changing the legal drinking age from twenty-one years old to eighteen years old in the United States.