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Drinking Age is 21..or is it 19? Meh, my fake ID says I'm 28

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Solaris, Mar 29, 2010.

  1. Samr

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    My personal experience (and I know this does not necessitate a consensus by any means, but I'm gonna offer it):

    Every bit of drinking and driving I have done* was between the ages of 16-18. Every time, it was because I had to drive to another house to get drunk, because I could not purchase alcohol for myself. Then I had to sneak back home lest my parents find out what I was up to.

    Now that I am of legal drinking age, I PREFER to drink at my own house, where I won't have to pay for a drink what I could spend on a 6-pack, and more importantly where I don't have to worry about finding a sober driver (or play the terrible game of "who's the least drunk").

    In my experience, being "underage" played the only role in my only times of drinking and driving.

    *driving tractors, atvs, and my personal vehicle on my ranch, while under the influence, is a damn-near nightly activity. It's also a competitive sport on the weekends. Example: the fiance and I have been known to see who can drunkenly run over the most varmints in the pasture behind our house. We take turns, and right now I am in the lead, not surprisingly, because she is a woman driver and accordingly sucks. One night fairly recently I got so hammered at my parents' house across the ranch, I drove back to my house, opened the door, fell on the ground, and passed out there for a few hours. Only damage incurred was the time I got drunk and high and drove my truck off a small cliff on the ranch while listening to Simon and Garfunkle and my brother was trying to hook up on a mattress in the bed of the truck... another story for another time.
     
  2. ssycko

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    Oh, you're younger than I thought you were, for whatever reason. Either way, I don't think that anyone really considers it? I mean, most of my friends aren't retards and won't drive if they're drunk, underage or not, but as for the lower half of the bell curve, I'm pretty sure they just don't give a shit either way. I don't want to sound all hoity toighty but the differences in... not-retardedness between people my age (same as ghetto) and the kids just a few years younger is astounding, in my experience.

    As for weed, what I've found is that it's almost unanimous among potheads that smoking pot and driving is "fine." From what I've seen, I beg to differ.

    While I'll give you that, you can't ignore the fact that the whole culture surrounding alcohol in America is much, much different that it is in other places that American kids who want a lower drinking age point to and say "LOOK AT THAT COUNTRY IT DOESN'T EVEN HAVE A DRINKING AGE AND THERE IS NO ALCOHOLISM VIS A VIS LOWERING THE AGE IN AMERICA WILL REMOVE ALL DRINKING PROBLEMS."
     
  3. ghettoastronaut

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    Dude, seriously? That's beyond fucked.

    And would you listen the fuck up:

    THIS IS NOT THE MOTHERFUCKING POINT. The point is that people will drink and drive regardless of how legal or illegal it is to drink and drive in the first place. Regardless of how legal or illegal it is to drink at their age. What the fuck is raising the drinking age to 23 or 24 going to do to deter people from drinking and driving? You just admitted they're going to do it anyways, so what the fuck's the point in turning a large sector of adult society into a bunch of minors? I don't care that you were a fucking retard at my age. I'm not a fucking retard, and I won't be assumed to be the lowest common denominator of human being just because lowest common denominators exist.
     
  4. falconjets

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    Could always just switch the drinking age and driving ages, that would solve a lot. If the drinking age was lowered to say 16, but the driving age was raised to 18 it would give people the time to realize how they can handle their alcohol and that they can't handle it when driving.



    You could add in certain clauses for those who are not dependents at the age of 17.
     
  5. Frebis

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    This is why part of my statement said they should make the penalty for drinking 10x stronger. Seriously, jail time is the only thing that keeps me from doing a lot of things. Trust me if faced with 6 months in jail for drinking and driving (or just drinking) no one would ever think about fucking doing it. I feel this would also be a good way to force public transit to expand.

    And, one more thing.... just give it a few years. You will realize just how dumb you are now. *cry cry cry I want to be treated like an adult…wahhhhh* When I was your age I was naive too.
     
  6. ghettoastronaut

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    I know that I'm 21 years old and have a lot of mistakes left to make and shit to learn, but what the fuck has that got to do with my ability to drink alcohol? If you're going to say that I'm too immature to drink, there's a whole lot of other shit that I do that you're going to start taking away first. Surely I can't be trusted to instruct people as to how to take malaria medications if I can't handle beer. And if I can't be trusted with helping people not contract a life threatening illness, how the fuck could I be trusted to count inventory of narcotics and controlled substances in a pharmacy without "accidentally" dropping a few on the floor?

    When you take a group of adults and infantilize them and take away responsibilities and independence because you think they're too young and stupid, you're going to get a bunch of infants who aren't going to learn lessons that they otherwise would have learned because they weren't allowed to make mistakes. Make the drinking age 24 now and in 20 years you'll have to push it up to 27. As for not liking people my age in the bars you frequent, well, I understand that. In that case, just frequent bars that young people don't flock to. There are even bars around where I live that are 21+ just to cater to people who want to go out and avoid 19 year olds who are out at the bars for the first time.

    Besides that, you didn't answer the part about what raising the drinking age to 24 is going to do to combat drunk driving. Even though MADD has turned into a neo-prohibitionist movement, their consciousness-raising efforts have been so successful that most people object to drinking and driving on its own terms; criminal records, fines, probation, jail, etc., are only auxiliary. Again, that's just most people. The type of people who disregard laws about drinking and driving are also going to disregard laws about the legal drinking age.
     
  7. pincinelly

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    The drinking age in New Zealand is 18; I was able to use my older brothers ID to buy booze since I was 16. I think a big issue with a low drinking age is not knowing your limits. Of course when someone starts drinking there is going to be a period of time when they figure out how much they can drink without getting completely fucked up, and that this is the case regardless of the age at which people start drinking. However, I think that with a higher drinking age, people drinking will be more mature and less likely to get annihilated then do something stupid.

    I have two stories that help illustrate my point. When I was 16 years old, I was drinking vodka and coke with a friend. After drinking too much too quickly we went out and I got into a fight and broke my nose. (I was talking shit to some guys and apparently said "I'm not talking to you (pointing at one guy), I'm talking to that faggot (pointing at his friend)." The second incident happened a year later, when I had been drinking cask wine and Vodka RTDs. I got black out drunk and got into another fight, this time getting stabbed in the arm. I was lucky that no arteries were severed or anything like that.

    I guess my point is that younger teenagers are more likely to get fucked up and do stupid shit. I think drinks with a low alcohol content like beer should be legal for 18 year olds, while stronger drinks should be legal at a later age.
     
  8. LessTalk MoreStab

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    In Australia this is a real problem, drunken dumb fuck teenagers Darwining themselves and a car load of their mates seems to be a weekly occurrence.

    The whole country has a 18YO boozing age limit and you can get your provisional drivers licence at 17, this seems about right to me. 16 year old girls have NO place in bars or clubs, jail baiting is illegal in this country.
     
  9. Frebis

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    delete please, arguing about who is retarded is just retarded.
     
  10. Kubla Kahn

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    The plain fact is, is that there are strict education and professional standards you had to pass before you could be "trusted" to do what ever medical practice you are doing, there are no such standards for the consumption of alcohol, you turn a certain age you are just entrusted to make good decisions. I think the average teenager, having lived in the most average town that was far from the lowest common denominator, are not mature enough to make sound decisions on the subject of drinking. Between letting them do something legally that they'd do either way, Im siding with giving them the penalty for breaking a law.


    As for the narcotic statement, I assume you mean stealing them, that is a serious concern that I think medical employers should be biased about weeding out.
     
  11. Dcc001

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    This sums up my thoughts on the matter quite nicely. I grow very tired of the whole, "A 17-year-old is too immature to ___!" Bullshit. Kids are capable of being as mature as their situation and culture demands. When I was 17, I lived in a different country from my parents and traveled back and forth internationally every semester by myself. My cousins, who are not yet 18, are - no kidding - publishing a book that gets launched tomorrow and using an inheritance cheque they received from my grandfather to take six weeks and tour the world in an effort to promote it. We didn't get this way by accident. Our parents supervised us when we were young, gave us responsibility at an early age and ultimately trusted us not to let them down.

    Now, if you ask me how to undo an entire culture that has come to believe that young adults are idiots? I don't have an answer for that. I just know that they're not, and if we demanded more of them most would rise to the new standard.
     
  12. ghettoastronaut

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    Not really. I did well enough in high school to get into university, and did well enough in my first year of undergrad to get into said professional school. Four months after starting school I was doing site visits in a community pharmacy. I had to sign something stating that I didn't have a criminal record (not that they checked). For that matter, I know more than a few people who were counting narcotics unsupervised when they were still in high school. But I thought the whole discussion here was that university students are young, stupid, immature, and not to be trusted with alcohol.

    So we need to be punishing people because they're doing something they're not responsible enough to do? Isn't this a bit like arresting a pair of 13 year olds for comitting statutory rape against each other? It seems pretty arbitrary, and frankly, the police and criminal justice system have far better things to worry about than teenagers who drink (unless, of course, those teenagers drink and drive). The argument is entirely unconvincing. It's fairly well established that introducing kids to drinking at home with their parents (wine with dinner for example) reduces binging later on. So if a parent does the smart thing and lets their 15 year old have a bit of wine with dinner, both the parent and teen need to be punished for making a decision about something the 15 year old is too immature to make a decision about? If it should be illegal to do things you're not responsible or mature enough for, then everyone from a 13 year old girl who thinks she's in love to most people who have children will be criminals.

    Well I do mean stealing them, and sure it's a serious problem. People of all ages steal narcotics. People even impersonate nurses, get hired, and move from hospital to hospital every few months raiding the narcotics safe along the way.
     
  13. PewPewPow

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    I'm all for letting service members drink at 18. I think it's only fair since the ones stationed overseas are allowed to.

    I'm actually all for letting kids drink from 16 onwards, natural selection needs all the help it can get. Most European kids I met who were drinking had a slightly cooler head about their drinking. Mostly I think because they had to go home to mom and dad at the end of the night. Shit, how many 16 year-olds do you know who can afford to get piss ass drunk on the regular?
     
  14. ssycko

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    When your kids are naturally selected to be run over by a drunk retarded 16 year old, let me know how you feel about that.
     
  15. PewPewPow

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  16. fuzzzy

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    Along with this, it seems the typical thing in most states in terms of driver's licenses is that there is an age (16 in my state) where you go through driver's education. You go through a bunch of hours in a classroom, followed by 8 hours of practice in a car with a driving instructor. You then take a test and when you pass, you are allowed to have your license. If you don't want to take those classes, you wait until you are 18 and then just take the test. In my state, there is also a temporary permit (at 15 and a half) where you are allowed to drive for half a year, but only with a parent. You have to do this before you are allowed to get your real license.

    I can only assume that the reason it is like this is in order to insure that people who have no idea what they are doing aren't driving around. Because that could be dangerous. Drinking when you have no idea what you are doing can be as well. Sure you have DARE come around to schools, and you might take a test about alcohol in a health class or something. But other than that, like Kubla said, you turn a certain age and are expected to make good decisions.

    Why not change that? Have a course you have to take at 18, or after graduation, whichever comes last (doing a better job of keeping it out of high schools, if that is a concern). Learn the facts about alcohol, but also get experience. Have a temporary license where you can drink under supervision. Maybe even do something equivalent to the in-car classes where you drive with an instructor. Have a class where you practice drinking and can see its effects while supervised with someone who is trained to supervise you.

    Hell, out of my high school graduating class of 900, about 30 didn't graduate. Of those 30, I would say 28 or 29 of them were hard core drinkers throughout high school who just didn't care about school. If nothing more, maybe graduating high school as a requirement to take the drinking class would have motivated at least a few of them to make it through to graduation.

    And as with getting your driver's license at 18 without having to take the class, you could get your drinking license at 21 without the class if you would rather just wait until then.
     
  17. Crown Royal

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    From me, 18 is the right age. If you can vote or get shot by those crazy foreigners at 18, then you should be able to get drunk without your parents or the guys in the little blue suits getting all nimbly-bimbly over it.

    Of course, I'm a proud past participant and supporter of underaged drinking (provided it isn't followed by driving or underaged date-raping) and if teens want to get drunk at a party, let them. They're ALREADY idiots regardless, let them prove it....and have fun.
     
  18. syphon

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    Under this lovely system in Queensland, Australia, I still have 1 year left (i'm 19) on my Green provisional licence until i'm classed as an open licence holder (when you can drive whatever i want and have a max 0.05 BAC driving). Meaning that I cannot have a drop of alcohol in my system whilst driving and can't drive anything with a V8, supercharged or turbocharged engine. All because a couple of bogans in V8's and WRX STIs decided to wrap themselves around a tree at 3am in the morning with a car full of friends.

    The great "NannyState" of Australia is even considering raising the drinking age to 21 because of these select few morons. Natural selection is my opinion, we need to thin the herd.
     
  19. ghettoastronaut

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    How about this: sex should have graduated licensing. You're only allowed to apply for the license after you graduate high school. You start off having sex under the supervision of approved instructors, and after a few years of practise, take a test to ensure that you know enough to do it on your own.
     
  20. Kubla Kahn

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    I think there are two main worries that people seem to have here, binge drinking and drinking and driving. Particular drinking and driving because of the possibility of harming others but binge drinking also carries similar risk. Im really talking about the average teen not being able to make sound decisions of course there is a portion that make mature decisions as if they're all growns up. But faced with the ability to cause harm to other people we've decided as a society that there does need to be some sort of age limit associated with various things, otherwise why wouldn't we'd just make them completely legal in the first place? How low would you consider it right to allow a person to drink or get a license to drive a car? Why would we ever apply an age limit to anything if we didnt want to punish somebody for personal responsibility?

    As for the parents getting spanked with criminal charges for serving a glass of wine at dinner, Im not 100 percent on the extent or what localities use it but there are allowances for instances like this. You won't be busted for letting little jimmy have a toast of wine at Thanksgiving. Furnishing a kid with a keg so you can supervise their party as a parent is illegal though.