Drinking age. (haven't seen anything like this on here wanna see what you think)
 

Ok ... I live in Canada where the Drinking age is either 18 or 19 ... where I live it is 19. I don't understand how Americans can have a drinking age of 21. I am sure there are reasons or this has been talked about somewhere else but I haven't seen it and I want to know where everyone stands.

I don't drink much, only socially. I have never understood the fun of getting so plastered you make an ass of yourself, do stupid stuff that can hurt you, or someone else, and can't remember what you did. Where is the fun in that? If you have to get plastered to have a good time, there is something wrong with you.

Just wanted to point out:

Having fun getting plastered does not = only able to have fun getting plastered.

Heck, I think laws regarding legal drinking ages should be like they are in holland:

16+ for beer and coolers and lighter stuff
18+ for the harder stuff

IMHO, I think it's fair. Even though every 18, 19, 20 year old can get booze, to do it at a bar, legally, 21 is just fine. At 18, you think you know it all, same for 20, 22, etc. The consequences for fucking up at at 18, stay with you a long time. Well, for any age at that matter. But at 18, to say I've been convicted of DUI, even though it's legal is a huge problem and you're paying for it much longer than if you were 30. Maybe I'm way off, but I think 21 is just fine, plus, I've been drinking myself for about 3 hours, so my thoughts aren't as rational as they could be.

As I sit here with a beer in hand, I would say that 21 is a bit too old. Why not let them drink when they are old enough to go to college? They do it anyway.

18 seems fair to me but 21 isn't too bad either (I think I can wait).

I second the motion... Now can we vote and pass it? Please?

I'm eighteen. I can get married to anyone of any age I wish, but I can't legally have a glass of champagne to celebrate.

I think that they should lower the drinking age to sixteen. It's not as if every sixteen year old I know (have known) who wants to drink doesn't anyway. Even the laws in Holland would be better than here in Ontario.

Mind you, I can understand why bars don't want sixteen year old kids running around...

18 should be the age. if a 18 year old can go to war and vote he should be able to drink

bottom line, if a 10 year old wants to drink, there is some way for him/her to get it... seriously....

i say 18/19 is fine... 21 is a little high...

I think that 21 is too high, but bringing it down will only exaggerate how long childhood lasts in America. Drinking is only about half as fun when you're allowed to. And how many people start smoking cigarettes, because it tastes good? High school kids start smoking, because they aren't allowed to. Then they get addicted. I think the tobacco companies rested easy when tobacco use was restricted to 18.

I like it in Canada.. (Live Here).. Me being from Ontario always found it fun when i was 18 to drive to Quebec and have a drink..
I think its fine how it is

A very accurate observation. I think that more attention needs to be focused on teaching responsible behavior, at a younger age, than in inhibiting behavior. I know people younger than 21 that are more mature than some people my age (42). Who decided that 21 was a magic age? A 16 year old is empowered to operate a 2000 pound chunk of metal, at speeds in excess of 65mph down a highway. 18 year olds are entrusted to decide upon the leader of the most powerful nation on earth. 19 year olds are asked to fight and lay down their lifes blood for reasons that are often not fully understood by them. But, you're not ready to drink until you're 21? I still don't get it. Not even after all these years. To me, if someone is old enough to come home in a flag draped coffin, he's old enough not to be arrested for Minor In Possession

I seem to be getting some good response from this post. I my self have been drinking since my grade 9 year when Seniors in our school took us to a farm and got us messed up off of 3 beers ... hah ... but I am 20 now and been publicly drinking with family for 4 years and in the bars since 19 (legal where I am) ... now at 19 I was in the bar every weekend blowing between $100 - $200 a night ... that lasted all but 2 months. I feel the Europeans got it right, lower the age, have it socially acceptable and part of everyday life so then it won't be such a novelty to pick up a "2-4" and get pastered ... plus the tax dollars on those cases of beer and such ... they would be crazy not to!

I've been drinking since I was 17 and I have never done anything insanely stupid. I can have a good time, but I can still control myself to where I don't indanger myself or anyone else's safety. That is how drinking age should be determined. Drinking is a privledge not a right, and it should be taken away if you can handle it maturely.

I think the drinking age could be lowered if the punishment for a DUI offense weren't a slap on the wrist. In a few European countries (where the legal age is around 18), the threshold for a legal blood-alcohol level is as little as a fourth of what it is many US states. This, combined with harsher punishments, would probably make a younger drinking age reasonable in the US.

kids will drink if they want to anyway, the legal drinking age is only basically stopping most kids from going to a bar, rather than partying at home or a friends house. keep the age barrier as is, or atleast if you lower the age, raise the age you can start driving at. I live near a high school and teenagers and cars don't mix!

Over here in the UK, the drinking age is technically 5.

Below 5 your only allowed medicinal (sp) alcohol, above that you are allowed to drink on private property with your parents permission. At 16, you can have a cider or glass of wine with a meal, and at 18, you can drink until your hearts content.

I believe an 18 year drinking age is perfectly fine. Suits everyone around here, and makes turning 18 even more fun, as your legally allowed to get pissed, hell, it's almost a legal requirment :D

I don't agree with a younger drinking age. I know kids will always get drunk underage, but letting them in bars at 16/17 isn't good. An older drinking age is just silly, like people have said before, you can drive, get killed in the army, your a full adult, but you can't legally get drunk? Bah!

If you wanna claim that a person is not responsible enough or of a mature enough mind to be able to consume alcohol until they're 21, then you have no fucking business holding them responsible in the justice system and prosecuting them as a person of a mature enough mind to understand the consequences of their actions for the very crime of consuming alcohol.

Seriously, forget about "I can die for my country, but if we win the war I can't celebrate with a drink." Think about the idea that you're not old enough to drink but you are old enough to be arrested for drinking: What the fuck is that?

EXACTLY my thoughts, and I couldn't have put it any better.

^^^ I couldn't agree more as well.

A former boss used to regale us with stories of being 18 and in the Marine Corp. Most of which centered around his drinking escapades on base where it was perfectly okay for him to have a couple of beers despite it being illegal while he was in town on leave.

I always thought it odd that it's perfectly okay for someone to make the decision to die for a country, but not be able to decide to drink.

In addition to what BOR said, Ive noticed that in those countries without such restrictive drinking laws, you dont see the same drinking problems you do in the States. It's generally unacceptable to be drunk in public, people dont binge drink, and while people drink more often (a glass of wine with lunch, dinner), no one does it abusively or to excess like they do in the States.

It seems to me that the drinking laws are nothing more than political wrangling that do more harm in the long run than help.

"Think about the idea that you're not old enough to drink but you are old enough to be arrested for drinking: What the fuck is that?"

-Agreed

Why can't logic like this be applied to our legal system.

Totally disagree with that - I spend entirely too much time in the UK and in Australia -- the 18 year olds that I encountered drinking there we not exactly responsible. and were just as obnoxious probably even more so than the 18 year olds who drink to excess in the US.

More often than not I would come out of the train station and head over to my hotel and encounter a staggering, drunken, vomiting, pack of boys who could not hold their liquor and while it was legal for them to drink, they surely should not have been drinking.

There are 25, 32, 37, 58 year olds who can't drink responsibily. Changing the drinking age doesn't prove anything. Changing attitudes towards drinking should be the goal, and not just in the US.

Why, is getting drunk so exciting and fun?

I used to hear all the time "In Japan they drink more then the United States but with much more care and not to excess." But that all turned out to be bullshit. People in Japan drink the same as people in America. I see countless people drinking, and the number of drunks on the trains at the right times are very high.

Just two days ago I saw a older man, drunk, following a girl saying something like "watch out the wind will blow your skirt up, oh oh, almost, watch out, oh oh oh."

Japan with out drinking, wouldn't be Japan I have heard a few times. After any form of business you go and drink.

The legal age here is 20, this is for everything though not just drinking. But this is hardly ever inforced... there are beer vending machines.

On a side note, there is a legal age for consent in Japan. It is 18 here in Tokyo, I am suprised how many people have said otherwise.

Because life is a joyless, empty experience spent toiling away for the pleasure of a select few. Alcohol allows me to forget that for a little while.

I really don't care who drinks or when they do it. I disagree with allowing the government control over personal actions. If a five year old wants to drink, let him; it's not our business to say he shouldn't.

In Germany, when you turn 16 you can drink one beer in public. At 18 you're an adult as far as drinking is concerned. At home I think there are no drinking age restrictions.

Germany has currently the highest rate of alcohol consumption of any country in Europe. I don't know how binge drinking there compares to the U.S., but there's plenty. I see kids drunk and throwing up every weekend in Berlin.

Too true. otherwise, change the definition of Adult to 21, because 18 year olds are obviously not considered to be adults.

The UK is a bad example... They close the pubs and bars at something like 11pm... what this leads to is everyone drinking as fast as they can in the short time they have to drink... as a result the streets are littered with drunken louts by midnight...

At the tender (and I really mean TENDER) age of 17, I joined the army. I wasn't allowed to go for a drink to celebrate the Graduation of the course. My Sergeant walked up to me and said:

"What is your problem, numbnut? You can't stomach the booze?" He was screaming at me, and little drops of his spit kept landing on my lips. I felt like we were kissing, which was nauseating.

"NO SERGEANT! I am not legally allowed to consume alcohol here..."

"Fuck that. If you are old enough to wear the green sack, you are old enough to pound them back." Did I mention he had a thing for poetry? You should see the things he could make rhyme with "uck".

So we all got drunk together. My instructor finished by telling me "I just spent alot of energy teaching you how to kill someone. If anyone ever tries to keep you from drinking, show them what you know."

I don't see a problem with making the legal age for enlisted personnel an exemption. Hell, I think it could be a good recruiting tool. Everyone makes a big thing about "being able to die for your country but not being able to celebrate..." that is BS in reality. I love having a new guy (hell, some of them are 16 now with their parent's consent) in my platoon and getting him wasted on 3 beers. That poor kid on morning PT makes everyone laugh. Why? BECAUSE IT IS A RIGHT OF PASSAGE. love it.

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthread.php?t=9483

Realizing that I fall under this as well, I think the above thread coincides nicely with this one.

While I don't drink (only partially because I'm underage), I don't think there's any problem with it, but I do think 21 is a good age. Mostly because at 18, I'm still under my parents, and that's enough trouble without alcohol involved.

I find it rather silly that a person can vote and elect leaders and be drafted and be trusted to drive yet they can't consume a legal product.

I'll add my support to this, perhaps at 18 to remove some of the enticement of drinking and driving, but then again in most places I support raising the driving age to 18 as well, but that's another thread. Very well put BoR

America demonizes drinking and makes it a "goal" for teenagers to take part in instead of something that they ease into while living at home with adults around. In Europe they don't have the binge drinking problems and university alcohol problems to near the extent we do. A lot of hipocrasy around this issue.

I don’t see underage drinking as a problem - I see it as an opportunity to educate. :rolleyes: This coming from a 18 year old kid with a corona in his hand and a mini fridge full... anyway, I think it would be much healthier if kids were taught the dangers of drinking* (Not the propaganda) and were allowed to experience what it was like so they could establish their limits early. Give them an opportunity to do it in a safer environment WITH PARENTAL GUIDANCE so they don’t go crazy when they go to college. This may just me being idealistic, but Jesus Christ, kids want to rebel - they want to do things that are "wrong", maybe because they think they're missing out or want to grow up faster, maybe because they just want to go against the system. I know that’s the one I went with, anything I could do to throw the system on its knees I’ve tried to do.

That having been said, everything I did - whether it was drugs or getting a tattoo.. Hell, even drinking, I researched and checked the risks. I provided myself an education so when I did do something I knew what I was getting into. If parents could do the same thing for their kids I don’t think there would be as many cases as drunk driving, binge drinking, etc. I don’t see how age can define maturity - I do, however, see how being educated on a topic could. Educate, don’t deny. That’s my 2 cents.

Personally, I think we should all be like Germans: drink at 16 (get the party out of the system, etc.) and drive at 18.

The problem is the way alcohol + teens are treated. In Europe, it's perfectly okay for a parent to allow their kid a small glass of wine in a restaurant when accompanied. In the US, however, if we hardly let a person under 21 have a sip of wine, we can be in big trouble by restaurant personnel.

Another point: They allow men to go off and fight in a war at 18, but they don't let them drink? Pssshhh...

I'm much older, but I have talked to some teenager who've gone to Britain and elsewhere as exchange students. These 16-year-olds go to the UK, and they're treated as adults; they can go out drinking, they can go to clubs, and so on. Then they come back to the US, and they're children again.

Yeah, 16-year-olds may not know how to hold their liquor, but civilization sure isn't falling in countries where it's legal for them to drink. They're drinking anyway. If you want to ensure responsibility, routinely suspend driver's licenses for a year or more for any violation involving drinking or drug use under age 20.

The other downside of high legal drinking ages is lack of access to entertainment. In my town, most of the live music is in clubs, and nearly all of the clubs are hard-liquor-serving over-21 establishments. The club owners say they can't afford the entertainment without the liquor sales. So people under 21 don't have as many entertainment options.

I think the drinking age is right on, for two reasons, one valid and the other BS.

American culture does not encourage responsible drinking, and I don't believe lowering the drinking age would fix this.

The BS reason is that it's terribly fun to be an adult but still sneaking about to get your buzz. Some of my most favorite memories are making the 2 mile hike through the snow from McConnell Hall to Tinsley Dorm (to pick up the guy who was 21) and finally to Safeway for booze and back again. It builds character, and there is nothing quite like that first sip sitting back in the comfort of your heated dorm room with some rum and coke and a cigar. Now that I'm 21, the struggle for alcohol has lost it's joy. It's too easy, and it's boring.