A US citizen at the age of 18 has the right to vote and serve in our military. If they have the right to vote of the potential leader of the United States of America's president they shouldn't be able to consume an alcoholic beverage? I will be discussing what alcohol is and if the legal age should she moved to 18. Along with that I will first discuss the benefits of moving the drinking age, then the effects on teenagers, and lastly I will have a general discussion over the topic. Alcohol is seen as the “forbidden fruit” to people under the age of 21. If the “fruit” wasn't forbidden then less people would be urged to try it. Isnt the United states the land of the free? Then why do other countries have more rights than we do? These are all …show more content…
According to “Mothers on drunk driving”http://www.madd.org moving the drinking age to 21 has saved 17,000 lives since it has been in effect. According to the “annual review of public health”http://www.annualreviews.org/journal/publhealth Alcohol has contributed to 1,700 deaths, 599,000 injuries, and 97,000 sexual assault cases. There's a part of the brain that rapidly changes throughout your teenage years. It's call the prefrontal cortex. The prefrontal cortex has to do with decision making and judgment. When it's not completely developed their is more of a chance to make the wrong decision, And being a teenager I know that I don't always make the right decisions in life but it's fine because everyone makes mistakes. Some seem to mess up a little more often than others. Consuming alcohol while your brain is still developing can the chance of having alcohol dependency. They might not develop right away as research states it usually happens down the road closer to the age of 25. Alcohol dependency is a previous psychiatric diagnosis in which an individual is physically or psychologically dependent upon drinking alcohol. There have been a fes rebel states that have lowered the drinking age for a small amount of time and they notice a increase in fatal crashes in the 18-20 year olds. Raising the drinking age to 21 has decreased crashes in 18-20 year olds by 13% which is approximately 27,775
Lowering the drinking age to 18 would make a lot of sense in the world. Lowering the drinking age to 18 would make more sense. It would be better for the teens that drink on college campus. The drinking age should be lowered to 18 because you can vote at eighteen, buy tobacco, it’ll reduce the thrill of breaking the law, evidence supports that early introduction of drinking is the safest way to reduce juvenile alcohol abuse, and college people that are not 21 drink also.
According to Drew K. Saylor, he writes that studies from a meta-analytic review showed that "Raising the minimum legal drinking age (MLDA) is associated with a 16% median decrease in alcohol-related crash outcomes while lowering the MLDA result in a 10% median increase in such crash outcomes" (332). The essence of this argument is that having the law of the drinking age to be 21 has a positive effect in the country because there is a decrease in car crashes. This is why the author Drew K. Saylor also agrees when he writes "A solution to this problem is not a simple as lowering the drinking age and asking young people to choose responsibility" (332). Saylor's point is to make the people understand that lowering the drinking age won't fix much because accidents will still happen, but with more frequency. Since in the past, the argument was deciding whether to raise or no to raise the drinking age to be 21 because of the danger youths had to live through if something happened to them. Drew K. Saylor argues that the drinking age has led to create a change in the people who are 18-20 years old because college students now a days tend to consume more alcohol than any others. When this happens among college students, it’s called binge drinking. According to Drew K. Saylor, a professor from the University of Virginia with a BA degree, he states that “Binge drinking is the consumption of an excessive amount of alcohol in a short period of time”
Thesis: I think that lowering the drinking age would be a great idea. 18 is a responsible age, and the underage citizens would react to it differently. We wouldn't have to do it illegally and we wouldn't have that rush of sneaking it around. Out of 190 countries, 61% of those have their drinking age to 18. There are only 11 not including the united states, who has their drinking age at 21. Why not change? Our economy would grow and increase by purchasing alcohol. I think if you are able to fight for your country at the age of 18, you should definitely have the freedom of drinking alcohol.
Unfortunately, more than a third of these drinkers are unable to remember what happened the night of a big drinking session. The youth particularly, are vulnerable to the effects of heavy drinking. Harms include an increased risk of traffic accidents, injuries from violence, death, health problems, and some studies suggest suicide. If the legal drinking age is raised to 21 then at least one will have finished the major part of their education. Therefore if people start drinking later in life, they may be more likely to drink in moderation and not get addicted at an early
Lowering the drinking age to eighteen years old would be medically careless. One widely noted reason for keeping the drinking age at twenty one has to do with alcohol effects on the brain. A human brain is not fully developed until the age of twenty or twenty one. During this period of adolescence major changes in brain structure and function are taking place. Consuming alcohol during this time may interfere
Should the drinking age be lowered to 18? Some people might believe that the drinking age should be lowered to 18 while other people think that the minimum drinking age should stay at the age of 21. If the drinking age was lowered to 18 the tax money that taxpayers give would go less to people who are in jail for drinking under the age of 21, because there would be less people in jail for drinking under the age of 21.
The drinking age in the United States is a contradiction. At the age of eighteen, one can drive a car, vote in an election, get married, serve in the military and buy tobacco products. In the United States you are legally an adult at eighteen. An eighteen-year-old, however, cannot purchase alcoholic beverages. The minimum drinking age should be lowered from twenty-one in the United States.
When it comes to the minimum drinking age limit, there are many different perspectives as to what age is a responsible, yet reasonable age a person should be allowed to drink at. The reason there is a drinking age limit is because of the Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984. This act made it so that no one under the age of 21 is allowed to drink any alcohol, as well as purchase any alcohol. Some people feel that the drinking age limit should be reduced to a lower age such as 18, because the age 18 signifies adulthood. Other feel that the minimum drinking age limit should be above twenty one because they think that it will increase the amount of health issues in different countries. Despite these different views,
In the United States the age you become an adult is eighteen and as an adult you should be able to make your own decisions. Turning eighteen entitles you the rights and responsibilities of an adult so you should be able to make your own decision of either to drink or not. In most countries turning eighteen entitles you to vote, smoke cigarettes and/or join the military-which includes risking someone’s life so if turning eighteen entitles you to lots of things which includes many things that can potentially kill you or cause permanent harm so why not being able to have the decision of either to drink or not. If people are mature enough to be an adult at eighteen than shouldn’t they be mature enough to decide either to drink or not. In conclusion adulthood in the U.S. is eighteen, so if we are trusted enough to be adults than why not being able to make the decision to drink.
A very controversial argument amongst Americans is determining that the current legal drinking age which is 21 should be lowered to eighteen or not. Researching the following propaganda made me understand the dangers to the youth and people in America if the drinking age were to lower. Therefore i will argue with whoever disagrees with me that the drinking age should be lowered.
Risking one’s life to serve this country, having the responsibility to vote for this country’s next leader, having the freedom to gamble one’s savings away: these liberties become reality for every young adult at the age of eighteen. Why, then, is it that the government wants to hold on to the ability for eighteen year olds to drink alcohol? Since 1984 the U.S. law has held the drinking age at twenty-one years of age. Some people hold that the drinking age should remain the same, while others fight for change. The U.S. government should lower the age for drinking to 18 because all other rights are given to Americans by then, it would cause less underage drinking, and it would be economically beneficial.
Drinking alcohol is a privilege,but it should be a right of an adult citizen. Thousands of people abuse it everywhere, but that doesn’t mean we should limit all adults from drinking because that's not reasonable for the people that won’t exploit that opportunity. I have a strong view that if you are 18 you are considered an adult so shouldn’t you be able to have all the rights and responsibilities associated with adulthood. If you’re considered an adult at 18 shouldn't you be old enough to purchase alcohol? Having a minimum legal drinking age (MLDA) hasn’t prevented teenage drinking.
Lowering the drinking age will damage the teenagers’s still -developing brain. Different sections of the brain develop at different times. The human brain is not fully developed until the mid-twenties. The use of alcohol before full development can cause many issues down the road. “The brain’s frontal lobes are important for planning, forming ideas, making decisions, and using self-control” 5 Lowering the drinking age to eighteen leaves room for six to eight more years of development. If teens are allowed to drink, their ability to make decisions and their self-control is affected; this puts them in harm’s way and could put them in difficult situations that they are not able to handle. Too much alcohol can make someone act without thinking or even become violent at times. “Drinking alcohol over a long period of time can damage the frontal lobes forever.” 5 The frontal lobes are responsible for so much a person’s life and if they are damaged before they are developed then there can be long-term. A lower drinking age will make teenagers more susceptible to brain damage in their underdeveloped brains both at the moment of intoxication and long-term.
College life is filled with changes. It is filled with many new experiences. As college students, we are on our own, adults. As adults we are responsible for keeping up to date on information that affects us. One issue that affects college students nation wide is drinking. The current legal drinking age in the United States is twenty-one years of age. The Federal government raised the legal drinking age from 18 to 21 in 1984. Even with the current drinking age at twenty-one, many people under that age choose to drink anyway. In fact, a government survey from 1996 showed that 56% of high school seniors reported drinking in the last 30 days (Hanson). With so many underage drinkers, many people
The laws concerning the minimum drinking age in this country sometimes seem ridiculous and unnecessary. In this paper, I will discuss why certain laws are unfair and I will provide alternatives to certain problems concerning underage drinking and binge drinking.