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Essay On The Pros And Cons Of Lowering The Drinking Age

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The legal drinking age in the United States has traveled on a very bumpy road since the twentieth century. After the end of prohibition in 1933, you had to be twenty-one to enter a bar. Years later during the Vietnam War, the age was back down to eighteen. By the late 1970’s it was up to each state to decide which age they thought was best. Finally, in 1984, the government ordered all fifty states to raise the legal age to twenty-one years old, and since then the debate has been controversial with strong arguments on each side. Pros: The first argument in support of a lower drinking age is the idea that eighteen years old is the mark of adulthood. Most eighteen year-olds are just graduating from high school. An exciting time in their lives …show more content…

Mentioned earlier, several young adults are entering college at this point in their lives. John McCardell Jr, former president of Middlebury College, founded Choose Responsibly, a non-profit organization that promotes awareness of the dangers of excessive drinking and reckless alcohol consumption by young adults. His main goal is to lower the minimum drinking age by spreading awareness to the public (McCardell). He understands that the pressure to drink in college is very prevalent, and when we restrict eighteen to twenty year olds from drinking, it then creates the risk of an unsafe environment. This group is not allowed to drink in bars, restaurants, and other licensed locations, but this doesn’t stop them from drinking. Instead young adults move underground to house parties, basements, fraternities and several other unsafe settings. This, in turn, makes binge drinking and the resulting behavior a much harder situation to manage. According to the Annual Review of Public Health, alcohol annually contributes to some 1,700 deaths, 599,000 injuries, and 97,000 cases of sexual assault among college students and ninety percent of the alcohol consumed by eighteen to twenty year olds is an occurrence of heavy drinking. Pushing drinking behind closed doors, under no watch from parents, residence hall staff, or responsible supervision, is not only putting the drinker at greater risk, but the lives of

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More specifically, many people believe that lowering the legal MLDA to 18 will allow adolescents to gain the experience they need to become more responsible drinkers. For instance, people ages 18-20 will “get an idea of their tolerance and learn to drink under supervision at bars (or on campus, if in college), rather than at uncontrolled private parties away from school” (Center for Science in The Public Interest). This shows that many advocates for lowering the MLDA believe that supervision in bars and on university campuses will prevent students from doing any harm. They believe that this will be the most efficient and least harmful way of introducing alcohol to young adults. However, despite the fact that lowering the legal MLDA may help adolescents to learn their tolerance, it still can not prevent them from creating dangerous environments for themselves and the people around them.

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Instead of drinking in unsupervised places, young adults will be able to drink in places with less of a risk. They will drink in places like bars, restaurants and other licensed venues. Frequently, when bad things happen at parties, they are scared to speak up because of fear of getting in trouble for drinking. In this case, teenagers fear being told “Alcohol should not have been there in the first place.” Also, If the drinking age is lowered, universities and high schools can educate students on how to drink responsibly.

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Drown the Drinking Doctrine! There are a sufficient amount of states that granted the drinking age to be 18 or 19 during the 1970’s, so why would that need to change now? One is considered an adult at 18 meaning the capability of voting, joining the military, and to make an abundance of decisions alone without parents’ consent. So why would this not include the right to drink alcohol? When the National Minimum Drinking Age Act was passed by the congress the age was raised to 21.

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Prohibiting this age group from drinking in licensed locations influences them to drink in unsupervised places. Individuals will often drink in locations such as fraternities and/or parties where there are higher tendencies to participate in unsafe behavior. Despite increasing MLDA to 21 in 1984, the number of traffic accidents and fatalities that occurred within the 80s decreased less than that of countries whose legal drinking ages are already below 21 (Should the Drinking Age Be Lowered from 21 to a Younger Age?). In numerous European countries, teenagers at the age of 18 are allowed to drink in restaurants and other public places, under the supervision of trusted authority figures (Anderson). In the US, contrarily, teenagers at the age of 18 are not eligible to consume or purchase alcohol, and participate in these acts in risky areas where they are not under any supervision (Should the Drinking Age Be Lowered from 21 to a Younger Age?).

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Binge drinking is the consumption of an excessive amount of alcohol in a short period of time. It is also one of the most dangerous phenomenons occurring among many young adults in today's society. A strong emphasis has been placed on teenagers being prohibited to drink which has led to unsafe drinking conditions for many. Drinkers ages 18-20 break the law by consuming alcohol, which leads the majority of them to drink in unsupervised places. Fraternity parties and high school house parties are most prominently known for excessive drinking which is often more consequential than one

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Samantha Knehr 1 Mr. Hunt Block 15 May 2017 Lowering the Drinking Age Breaking the law!!?? Teenagers don't think about breaking the law when it comes to alcohol, It's perceived as the norm for a high schooler to go to a party on the weekend and drink. In 1984, the legal drinking age was changed to 21 because of a high rate of drunk driving. In my opinion it has only made underage drinking worse, young adults still get there hands on alcohol.

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Over the years, there have been debates about lowering the drinking age in the United States to eighteen. People argue that if a person can fight in the military or vote in elections, then he or she should be allowed the right to drink alcohol. Others feel that it is not wise to lower the legal drinking age because the results would be dangerous. Although there are arguments for lowering the drinking age, there is also an abundance of research that proves lowering the drinking age would be destructive. The legal drinking age should not be lowered to eighteen because it will give high school and even middle school students greater access to alcohol, interfere with brain development, adult rights begin at twenty-one, and increase traffic accidents among the youth.

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A way to resolve this issue would to be to actually lower the drinking age. This is because I believe if the legal drinking age was lowered to 18 then teenagers would learn their alcohol limit at a younger age. By lowering the drinking age, we are teaching teens their limit and how to control themselves versus them figuring out the hard way further on in life. “Teaching people to drink responsibly before they turn 21 would enormously enhance public health. Now, high school and college kids view dangerous binge drinking as a rite of passage,” says Gabrielle Glaser (ProCon).

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There was a short time in America between 1969-1976 where some states lowered the drinking age to eighteen. In 1984, congress passed the National Minimum Drinking Age Act which required states to raise the age to twenty one or they would lose 10% of their federal highway funds. Studies showed that lowering the drinking age caused less binge drinking, however, traffic accidents were higher. My stepdad is from England where the drinking age is eighteen.

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Legal Drinking Age Could lowering the legal drinking age actually be more beneficial for the U.S? The drinking age debate has been more prevalent today because of the conflicting viewpoints. People are now coming up with statistics and valid points as to how lowering the drinking age could be more safe than keeping it at 21. In our history, the legal drinking age in nearly all states was 18. In 1984, Ronald Reagan established the Presidential Commission Against Drunk Driving to control the drunk driving epidemic(Choose Responsibility).

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Not too long ago, people who were under the age of 21 were allowed to drink but, that all changed one day. In 1984, the National Minimum Drinking Age Act was put into place. This law simply told the states to raise the minimum drinking age to 21, or loose about ten percent of highway funding. As a result, shortly after, states were flying to put this law into play to keep that funding.

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has not always been twenty-one. In the late 60’s and early 70’s many of the states in the U.S. had their laws set to where the legal drinking age was eighteen (U.S. Dept. of HHS n. pag.). During this time where some stated adopted the legal drinking age of eighteen the death in alcohol-related incidents increase in young adults. Forcing some states in the early 80’s to reconsider the legal drinking age to be changed back to twenty-one. By 1984, congress stepped in to help lower the rate of alcohol-related incidents.

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1194 Words | 5 Pages

If you’re over the age of 21, you likely remember when you finally came of age, going to a bar with your friends and drinking like it was the end of the world. This event obviously has not been around forever, this is due to the drinking age laws that state any individual must be at least 21 years of age to consume alcoholic beverages. When the US was created there was no minimum drinking age until the late 19th century when they were beginning to be introduced in the country. For the most part, the age was set to be 21 because at the time that was the voting age. Throughout the next century, the age tended to change within each state due to individual county rulings and cultural differences except during prohibition, when all individuals couldn’t consume alcohol at all, but by the 1990’s

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Imagine the effect it would have on teenagers. This is why the alcohol age should not be lowered from 21 to 18. First of all, underage drinking is risky and unsafe, and that’s a no-brainer. Studies indicate that when the drinking age is 21, those younger than 21 drink less and continue to drink less through

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Among all the countries in the world, the United States of America is one of the few countries that requires people to be twenty-one years old before legally being allowed to drink. Due to the fact that a majority of countries require citizens to be eighteen before drinking, there is a bit of controversy across the states as to whether the drinking age should be lowered to match the majority of the world. But what good is lowering the drinking age in the united states when the drinking culture has not changed and will not change simply because the law does? Before any discussion of the drinking age can even be hand, let us look at how we can influence teen drinking culture.

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