You kind of defeated yourself. First you say our culture would work out as well, then you went on to say that drinking underage and breaking the law is socially acceptable. I think our society is pretty irresponsible, when you look at those statements.
Except I pointed out quite clearly that it's a direct result of the drinking age being 21. You're completely missing my points. I ask again, if you're so adamant about drinking why not go to the extreme and ban it, go the complete prohibition route... What happened last time we tried to do that? People completely ignored the laws, and it's a line that once crossed, seems like it doesn't matter how many more laws you break while you're at it. If the drinking age were lowered to 18 then there would not be as many college parties where people drink till they throw up and pass out, smoke other illegal substances, break, steal, etc.
Why do you continue to ignore my relevant points? Our culture may be different, but this is a result of our laws. If we changed our laws we would change our culture's outlook.
Yes, there are many other cultures, but not a single one is like America. We're one of the only democracies in the world, we have more freedom than any other country(that is not crime-ridden), and we raise out kids differently. If you can, find me the country most similar to America in culture, and we can compare.
We are not one of the only democracies in the world! Check this out:
www.economist.com/media/pdf/DEMOCRACY_TABLE_2007_v3.pdf
The US isn't even ranked among the top 10 democracies. We absolutely do not have
more freedom than any other country in the world "(that is not crime-ridden)". Stop holding on to this patriotic dribble. This is still the most stupid argument against evidence: people/cultures are different therefore we can never compare anything about anyone.
This is exactly what I have: almost every other country in the entire world with hundreds of different cultures showing fewer drinking problems with the age being 18 (I'm not saying get rid of it, or lower it to 16, even though countries with that age have few problems as well). This is what you have: they are different.
It's as if I tried to say, look, bashing your children's heads into the wall every day will not make their brains any stronger, look at every other parent in the world, this has never worked and you retort with well, they are different children.
We need to crack down on underage drinking, but it's not the parents that lay down peer-pressure, it's the, well, peers. They teach younger kids, those kids teach a younger generation, and it just keeps going. The law enforcement needs to crack down heavily on drinking, including harsher sentences, larger fines, and just more severe punishments overall. I believe the drinking age should be lowered eventually, but not with the way things are run today. After some discipline is laid down, then it should be considered, but not now.
This is exactly leading to the same road as prohibition. You don't try to see both sides of possibilities/outcomes, you only try to see your own. Larger fines and harsher sentences won't reduce the number of underage drinkers by much, all it would do is hurt society in the long run.
Let me ask you this, why do you think we have juvenile court? Why do judges avoid sending children to jail? Why do they opt either to let them off with community service or with cooperation of some kind? [highlight]What happens to a youth when he starts out going to jail at a very young age?![/highlight]
You're thinking short term, not long term. Even if it were only heavily enforced for young adults between the ages of 18-21 most of them are very young and the same thing applies... Should a kid in the middle of his college career have to ruin his life because he drank some alcohol?
I'm sorry but no matter how you look at this I see no plausible way to keep respect with the law and keep the 21-drinking-age in effect. You can talk all you want about hypothetical situations, but you know what, there's a little thing called history and evidence which contradicts your hypotheses.
Ok, for the last time, I can't stand people dissing on my age! It means nothing. I was raised in a crime-filled city where you would walk down the street and see homeless people, stolen cars, drinking on the streets, and almost no law enforcement in sight. It's called 'the ghetto' now, just because of such the high crime rate. I don't think many older people have more experience than me on this board. Luckily my family moved after a while, but I've seen a city as bad as it gets here on the west coast, way worse than anything in college or LA or even NY. 'You're only 15' is not some trump card you can pull out to make an argument about the real world in America void, so do not bring it up. It's immature and shows that you have a sense of superiority. By the way, don't try arguing with anything I just stated, about whether or not I was raised in the ghetto or not, anyone living in Tacoma Wa. could tell you large portions are nothing but crimes. My cousin works for drug dealers or something, he won't even tell anyone.
I want to point out something very important here: you started off by claiming how you've seen the "real" world while everyone else in the forums hasn't:
I think everyone hear who boasts they're maturity are just arguing blindly for a cause. I've seen the real world, I've seen how things work in the real world.
I said absolutely NOTHING about myself. I did not claim to be above you or anyone else. Stop being hypocritical. It is all too often those who make such claims as these are actually guilty of these crimes themselves : "It's immature and shows that you have a sense of superiority."
If you were truly an experienced and wise individual you would show it through your words and actions, not by making claims of superiority, which is exactly what I was bashing you for earlier.
