Lower the drinking age to 18

“600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda”

I don’t drink. At all. No beer, no wine, no champagne. It weirds some people out, but I don’t care, it’s just who I am.

That said, enough with this “21 to drink” business.

Monday the presidents of one hundred colleges and universities announced an initiative to lower the legal drinking age to 18. According to them, the change in the law – set to 21 in 1984 and which has supposedly “saved 25,000 lives” according to Mothers Against Drunk Driving – will reduce "a culture of dangerous, clandestine 'binge drinking'" on their campuses.

I agree.

I’ve been, as far back as I can remember, the designated driver. Yes, even when I started driving at 16.

And as far as I can remember, kids have been saying that it’s unfair for them to have the privilege and right to vote and to join the military and die for their country but not to drink a beer.

That sounded like all sorts of BS back in the day, but now – after thousands of young soldiers have been killed in the Middle East wars since 2001 and while the country is captivated by November’s historic presidential election – it doesn’t sound quite so self serving.

The real reason most people don’t want the drinking age to be reduced to 18 is because then parents would have to deal with it.

Yes, a 21 minimum drinking age means that parents can wash their hands of the uncomfortable task of talking to their kids about responsible drinking. Forget actually modeling responsible behavior – imagine that! – and forget about discussing the role alcohol plays in family life. As it stands today, parents are free to simply cross their arms across their chests and refuse to talk about drinking unless it’s the standard “don’t you dare drink!” admonitions.

They get ignored, just in case no one noticed, as do the “21” laws. MADD’s numbers speak for themselves:

• In 2006, the average age at first alcohol use among [those] aged 12 to 49 was 16.6 years, earlier than any other drug except inhalants
• It’s been found that family factors, such as parent-child relationships, discipline methods, communication, monitoring and supervision, and parental involvement, also exert a significant influence on youthful alcohol use
• In a survey, 33 percent of 6th to 12th graders said their parents never, seldom, or sometimes set clear rules for them and almost half said their parents never, seldom, or sometimes discipline them when they break the rules
• Between 1985 and 1996, there were 5,555 child passenger deaths involving a drinking driver. Of these deaths, 3,556 or 64 percent occurred while the child was riding with a drinking driver
• Of the 306 children 0-14 years old who were killed in alcohol-related crashes during 2006, half (153) of those killed were passengers in vehicles with drivers who had been drinking.
• Only 31 percent of parents of 15- to 16-year-olds believe their child had a drink in the past year, compared to the 60 percent of teens in that age group who reported drinking
• Youth who reported that a parent or a friend’s parent had provided alcohol at a party within the past year reported drinking more on their last drinking occasion and were twice as likely to have consumed alcohol within the past 30 days and to have engaged in binge drinking

These numbers don’t paint the full picture, of course, but it does point to a serious lack of modeling, guiding and teaching healthy drinking habits on the part of parents. “There’s no reason to do so,” most parents – even the ones who wouldn’t dream of letting their kids drive without supervision – rationalize, “after all, by the time they can drink legally, they’ll be grown.” That’s called a false sense of security.

Let’s just take the fake security blanket away and drop the age for drinking to the age of dying for your country and voting for the top leader of the world.

Accepting what is (kids find ways to drink no matter what the age) rather than focusing on what should be (kids waiting to drink until they’re “mature”) will save way more lives than denying that a general lack of parental responsibility leads to more alcohol-related deaths than can be estimated by well-meaning moms’ groups.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

Comments

Why? Because it's not served in a beverage glass. A straw would seem
silly, no? Sometimes you see people drinking broth, when all the
goodies are gone from the soup, however that is considered bad
manners.

[Ajlouny]

I remember going to Hawaii and back in the 80's and the drinking age was 18, not too sure if that had changed, but at the time, it was no big deal. If your going to abuse the right to drink, it doesn't matter if your 14 or 21.