I controversy part 1, Should the drinking age be lowered to 18, no.
In this day and age of freedom to choose for yourself, many young people drink, regardless of their age. What I mean by this is that more and more people under the age of twenty-one are drinking alcohol. It is argued that the legal drinking age should be lowered to eighteen, the age where you are officially an “adult”. Why not? It's not like kid's aren't doing it anyways. Yet, that word 'adult', what does that really mean? Does it mean once you hit your eighteenth birthday, poof, you have acquired all sorts of new wisdom. Fully developed, and ready to go out and explore, new things. No, It does not. Eighteen is a number, nothing more. Frankly drinking at that age is down right idiotic. The brain has not yet fully developed, and alcohol is bad for your brain. Also at that age, people are rash, and adding a substance that gets rid of your impulse control, is a good way to get hurt or killed.
I grew up in a very religious family, that doesn't drink alcohol. That stated, some of my extended family drinks a lot. Many of them suffer from alcohol addiction. Most of them started drinking at a very young age. I believe that the drinking age should not be lowered to eighteen. From watching them, and girls I have known growing up. I know that drinking before your brain and body has time to fully mature, in an emotional and physical sense, can cause devastating effects!
Many of my aunt's and uncle's are drinkers. Most of them started at a young age. To then alcohol, is a normal part of everyday life. Exposing children to them getting drunk is considered normal. I understand most families do drink. However exposing young children to alcohol abuse, in my opinion, is dangerous. At one family camp out, one my parents were not there, they always kept us away from this, one of my aunts got very drunk. She then proceeded to become incredibly suggestive and mooned my cousins and I, some no older than ten and stumbled off, with another of my drunk aunts. Their daughters who were about seventeen and eighteen and one of my uncles, had to follow them to make sure they wouldn't fall off a cliff. I believe this kind of exposure is wrong. It teaches children this type of behavior, especially in front of children, is acceptable. Another experience at a different family camp out, a younger cousin of mine who was maybe eight or nine, found the beer keg. He was happily getting into it, when he was caught. My aunts and uncles found this hilarious, including his own mother. There was no consequence, all my cousin knew was that everybody found it funny.
Drinking like this does impact a child's decisions later on. When I was fourteen, my parent's sent me to an RTC, a residential treatment center, I was sent for severe anxiety and depression. I lived for fourteen months with other girls with other problems including; abuse, emotional problems, substance abuse, and eating disorders. Most of the girls drank excessively and did drugs, while I never had done either, I have only their stories to go off on. It was heartbreaking to learn their stories. How their parent's allowed or encouraged them to try alcohol and they got addicted. Some girls would drink side by side their parents. Many of their parents struggled with the same issues their daughters were fighting. I watched them fight for sobriety, a horrible uphill battle. It is difficult at any age to conquer an addiction. For teenagers life is incredibly hard, everything is still really new, when you look at the grand scheme of things. Girl's tend to have a really hard time. With everything going on who can blame them? Hormones, drama, changes in life. Life is difficult and when you are egged on to drink, by friends, family etc... it is so easy for anyone to get hooked. It is a simple and easy way to make your problems go away. That's when they got addicted to alcohol. When you are young, the brain is building habits. It is much harder to fight a battle with addiction when you've been addicted for a long time. That is why it is so important not to get addicted to these things especially early on. I remember watching some of the girls come from a D.N.A meeting (Drugs, and, Alcohol) just horrified and crying. They had received a very hard lesson that day. The therapist in charge of that group was a firm no-nonsense woman, but by no means was she mean, who wanted to really show them what they were doing. So she showed them a video of what substance abuse brains looked like. Probably what many of their brains looked like. It scared them. I wish there was a happy ending to this story. I must say that there is not. Close to eighty to ninety percent of the girls I came to know and think of as sisters, fell back into alcohol abuse. This was not a flaw in the RTC, rehabilitation works, but you have to want it to. You have to fight every day for the rest of your life to keep the skills you learned. Some reasons for falling back into old habits are, partially because of a lack of a support system at home. If mom's drinking, well...It's so easy for them to go back to partying with mom. A lot went back to it because they were so young they had not truly learned any other coping skill for when life got tough.
This is why I firmly believe that the drinking age should not be lowered. Underage drinking is terrible for the body. It impacts social relations with peers. Starting habits like this at a young age makes people prone to addiction. Alcohol is often used as an easy way to deal with problems. Which only makes the situation worse. There are so many cons to drinking young and so few pros it is just not worth the risk! So much sadness and so many deaths could be prevented by not drinking young!
I controversy part 2
I controversy part 2, Should the drinking age be lowered to 18, no.
Experts, have always warned against under age drinking. In the last several decades, more and more research has come out about the ill effects alcohol has on anybody, especially teenagers. At the same time however, the rates of underage drinking is going up. Many people believe to better the economy and to get rid of a frustrating legal minimum age, the drinking age should just be lowered to eighteen. The legal age of adulthood. While this may be the age at which you can do many things such as; get a mortgage, get married, and many other things. Top researchers are showing that the brain does not finish developing till mid twenties, and drinking before then can damage the brain. Alcohol effects many parts of the brain. Ken Winters, a psychiatrist who studies the treatment of addiction at the University of Minnesota said. “Alcohol, as well as other drugs of abuse, targets the brain's reward pathway region," The dopamine receptors in your brain are the receptors that give feelings of pleasure, alcohol floods these receptors. This causes the person drinking to feel at an all time high, they are completely invincible. At the same time, alcohol slows down activity in other parts of the brain. "It's not just giving you an emotional high, it's also impacting motor coordination and alertness” (Crone 2010). Everybody is effected by this, but especially young people. The combination of emotional high and lack of coordination are deadly, This is the reason there are so many drunk driving accidents. The driver feels good, high as a kite, why shouldn't they drive? Their impaired judgment and motor skills are the causes of so many fatal accidents. Due to this it is critical that the drinking age is not lowered.
So many teenagers feel the need to fit in. Many of them will try alcohol so that they will feel like they are part of the group. Due to that; “Three out of four teens have tried alcohol by the time they graduate from high school, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention” (Crone 2010). This is a terrifying fact. Many teens feel pressured into drinking before they become a legal age. This pressure often comes from friends, and the need to fit in. While more and more evidence of the damage done to teens who drink is coming out, the problem is not going away. It is a racing battle to educate the next generation against this before it is too late.
Teenagers especially are at risk for many health problems from underage drinking. New research is showing that, “late adolescence and early young adulthood were peak periods for the development of alcohol dependence and that early initiation of alcohol use (i.e., before age 15) was associated with a fourfold increase in the probability of subsequently developing alcohol dependence” (Windle, Zucker 2010). This is the peak of development, while new habits are forming. Becoming addicted to something is incredibly easy at that age.
While trying to fit in, teenagers also tend to believe that they can play it safe. Enjoy drinking, but do it safely. This is often not the case, many think if they stay away from the harder liquors such as whiskey, vodka, or tequila, they are fine. But a few beers couldn't hurt. A study of different alcohols was done to compare the alcohol content in each, Crady Crone, who wrote an article called Sobering Facts about Alcohol, in Scholastic Choices, said. “Ounce for ounce, wine has more than twice the alcohol of beer. Hard liquor has eight times as much. But each type of drink is usually served in different-size containers or glasses. Beer tends to come in 12-ounce cans, wine usually comes in 5-ounce wine glasses, and a shot glass has room for 1.5 ounces of liquor. Each of these is considered a standard drink and contains 1.2 tablespoons of pure alcohol, So someone who chooses beer instead of wine or liquor can become just as inebriated” This is something that all young people should be taught. They do not realize that they are consuming just as much alcohol as they would have, with whiskey, or tequila. Another thing most teens do not know is that, their metabolism is so fast that, they cannot handle the amount of alcohol and adult can. They get drunk a lot faster than your average adult (Crone 2010).
Alcohol doesn't just effect the person drinking. Thousands of families are effected by alcohol use, even future ones. One recent study showed a very troubling fact; “Male children of alcoholics (COAs) are four to nine times more likely to develop alcoholism in adulthood, and female COAs are two to three times more likely than are children without such a family history (Russell 1990; also see figure 3). Approximately 50 percent of that risk is conveyed through genetic factors” (Windle, Zucker 2010). The prevalence of alcoholism passed down from family member to family member, should be taken seriously. The developmental pathways can be effected in children who's parent's are alcoholics, this can even effect temperament and behavior. This is not the only way others are effected. Look at this study done in 2003 “major causes of death among 12- to 20-year-olds in the United States-unintentional injuries (with motor vehicle crashes accounting for the majority of deaths), homicides, and suicides (Subramanian 2006)- all are associated with alcohol use, especially heavy use. For example, in 2003, motor vehicle crashes were the leading cause of death among 12- to 20-year-olds. In that same year, a report by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (Pickrell 2006) indicated that among drivers ages 20 years or younger who were involved in fatal traffic crashes, approximately 20 percent had consumed alcohol at the time of the crash” (Windle, Zucker 2010). That's thousands of people involved in accidents every year. A lot of people who weren't drinking, and driving responsibly are paying an ultimate price, for someone's behavior.
These risks and facts are too overwhelming to allow young people to drink. Looking at the facts the stakes are high. The reward nil. It is time to educate our children on the true effects of alcohol. Teaching children the risks will help them make better decisions. Doing this will help create a healthier and safer environment for future generations.
Should The legal Drinking age be
lowered to 18
I controversy part 3, Should the drinking age be lowered to 18, yes.
The legal drinking age should be lowered to 18, new studies are showing that it would be beneficial to lower the legal age. The legal drinking age is currently 21, states changed the laws not because it was better for the health and safety of the population but because they were practically forced to. The federal government enacted the National Minimum Drinking Age Act. This act made drinking under the age of 21 illegal. If states refused to comply the federal government would stop help funding road maintenance, a costly task. The leverage against states by with holding critical funding, made resistance practically impossible. Lowering it to a more reasonable age would dramatically improve the current problem of uneducated underage drinkers. Several countries drinking age is 18, and many of them have a lower DUI rate than the United States. By lowering the drinking, young people can be exposed to alcohol in a healthy environment, teaching them how to responsibly drink. It is necessary that the problems with young alcoholism must be dealt with. It is possible however to fix these problems in an unlikely way. If we give kids some experience with alcohol when they are young, we can teach them an responsible way to drink alcohol.
The United states is the odd man out, for the drinking age. Many countries around the world have a lower drinking age, the most common drinking age in the developed parts of the world is 18, this is including Many European countries such as France, and Italy with a legal age of 18 (Griggs 2015). There are even a few countries that will allow certain types of alcohol to be purchased by teens as young as 16, a couple of these are Denmark, and Belgium. Very few countries have legal age over 18 (Griggs 2015). How young is to young to start teaching our children about alcohol? Well one anthropology professor said “Dwight B. Heath knows what he is about to say will sound a little crazy to most people. When asked what the minimum legal drinking age should be in the U.S., Heath says 8, or maybe even 6. No, the Brown University anthropology professor is not advocating getting kids drunk. Instead he favors a cultural model, common in countries like France or Italy, where parents serve small amounts of wine to their children at family meals” (Griggs 2015). While most would find this absurd, to expose young children to such a dangerous substance. There may be some merit in this. In many cultures alcohol is just part of normal society. Teenagers do not feel the need to sneak of and binge drink, when alcohol is acceptable. As Dwight B Heath put it “In general, the younger people start to drink the safer they are,Alcohol has no mystique. It's no big deal. By contrast, where it's banned until age 21, there's something of the 'forbidden fruit' syndrome." A lot of times this is where kids get into trouble. They are rarely exposed to it so they drink as much as they possibly can. Becoming completely inebriated as soon as they can get their hands on it.
Since teenagers have had no proper education on alcohol many teens do not realize that they cannot handle the same amount of alcohol as your average adult. This is due to their very fast metabolism. They often will try to compensate their lack of experience and proper education with a sense of 'playing it safe' by not trying strong alcoholic drinks. Again they do not realize that “ Ounce for ounce, wine has more than twice the alcohol of beer. Hard liquor has eight times as much. But each type of drink is usually served in different-size containers or glasses. Beer tends to come in 12-ounce cans, wine usually comes in 5-ounce wine glasses, and a shot glass has room for 1.5 ounces of liquor. Each of these is considered a standard drink and contains 1.2 tablespoons of pure alcohol, So someone who chooses beer instead of wine or liquor can become just as inebriated” (Crone 2010). This is very troubling, if these teens had been taught about alcohol's effects on their bodies, and if they had had the chance to experience how alcohol effects them personally, over drinking would not happen as much.
By lowering the legal age, it would give turning 18 something to look forward to besides being able to sign for a mortgage, 18 feels much more like an age they would be willing to wait for. At 18 people legally become responsible for themselves, they can sign a lease, get married, serve on jury duty, join the military, be tried and convicted as an adult, and will be held to written agreements. Treating people of 18 as adults needs to include one important responsibility, the ability to choose for themselves to drink or not to. Without having to hide it. If this was done, teens would learn how to drink safely. Most teens are afraid to get help, if they have a problem, by opening up our acceptance they would be able to seek help, if they needed it.
Many people argue that raising the drinking age has been a wonderful thing. The DUI rate has gone down dramatically. Yes, there have been statistically fewer drunk driving accidents since the act of 1984, but that could be due to many other reasons besides the age. One of the biggest ways to help prevent a problem such as a DUI is to educate people of the risks. Since 1984 the anti drinking and driving campaign has been pushed into every health class and into the core of society. That could be a major reason that drunk driving incidents are going down. There are a few troubling statistics that should be mentioned. Many problems of uneducated underage drinkers aren't heard about, they need to be brought to the for front for society to change. From the Centers for disease control; “people aged 12 to 20 years drink 11% of all alcohol consumed in the United States. More than 90% of this alcohol is consumed in the form of binge drinks. On average, underage drinkers consume more drinks per drinking occasion than adult drinkers. In 2010, there were approximately 189,000 emergency rooms visits by persons under age 21 for injuries and other conditions linked to alcohol” (CDC. 2014). Most of the 189,000 emergency room visits would not occur if teens were able to be open about their alcohol use. Most teens binge drink whenever they get the chance because alcohol is such a rarity. If alcohol was not so rare teens would be able to talk openly with parents, teachers, counselors, to receive proper education.
The statistics show that yes, there is indeed a problem. What is done about it, is up to society to make the right choice. Many countries have significantly lower drinking ages and do not seem to have nearly the same amount of problems with alcohol related incidents that the United states does. By lowering the drinking age and exposing children properly to alcohol, many deaths could be prevented. It be a age that most teens feel isn't too far away to wait. Teens could open up to people about what is really going on in their lives, and seek advice, without worrying about legal consequences. Binge drinking would drastically lower, since alcohol wouldn't have to be hidden. This is why the drinking age should be lowered to 18.
I controversy part 4
What is the most complex part of this issue? How do you deal with that complexity?
While I do feel that underage drinking should still be illegal, I do think there are better methods for preventing underage drinking than what is used today. It is a very complex problem. It's effects can dramatically change lives and sometimes even take them. Due to free will, it is impossible to completely eliminate the issue. However there are many things we can do to reduce it's impacts on society. Alcohol addiction prevention needs to start when children are very young. Around five or six. Younger children are now using alcohol. A very interesting article done by the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism stated, “Among eighth-grade students (who are ages 13 to 14) surveyed in the 1999 national representative sample of the Monitoring the Future study, 52 percent reported having consumed alcohol in their lifetime, and 25 percent reported having been drunk in their lifetime. In addition, 24 percent of the eighth graders reported having used alcohol in the past month” (Komoro, Toomey). We need to change these statistics. By improving the way we educate, I believe we can.
In high school, everybody goes through the same alcohol prevention program. This is usually in health class. I feel that most of the education is based around scaring teens into not drinking. This isn't working. Nearly three quarters of teens have tried alcohol before graduating high school. I believe that due to the need to explore and test out everything teens ignore the warnings and try drinking anyways. We can't control what people will do, and trying to control what a teenager will do is only going to backfire. Although many teens want to do whatever they please, they also really don't want to get into trouble, and don't want to be labeled as useless, or hopeless kids because of the choices that they have made.
If we change the way we educate teens I believe that underage drinking may not be so much of a issue in society. Yes, teens will probably still drink. However if we change our society into one where there is more understanding and support for them, the DUI's and the binge party drinking rates may go down. We need to explain the alcohol contents in different drinks, so teens don't feel that they may be playing it safe by only drinking beer, rather than whiskey (Crane 2010). They have not had been educated as to how to drink safely. If teens felt that they could come to their parents to ask questions, or get help, teens wouldn't feel the need to have to be so secretive. There are many things we can do to better prevent alcohol usage, recent studies are showing that the more time teens spend unsupervised or not in extra curricular activities the greater the risk of alcohol use (Komoro, Toomey). I don't mean a few hours here or there, but when it's quite a bit of time throughout the days, weeks. As an example of this, I knew a girl who lost her mother to breast cancer when she was young. Her dad who is very wealthy traveled most of the time. She very rarely ever saw her dad, she grew up with nannies and maids to give her company. She became very lonely and turned to drugs and alcohol for comfort and was hooked. This doesn't happen to everyone, but it does increase the risk. While many parenting methods are out there to help parents learn and be better parents I feel a gentler approach may be best. “A less intense family involvement approach is based on including parents in homework assignments around issues of alcohol use, thereby increasing the likelihood that alcohol, tobacco, and other drug use is discussed at home, and potentially enhancing parenting skills by increasing communication between parent and child and providing behavioral tips to parents. For example, Project Northland, which is described later in this article, used homework assignments to engage families and provide behavioral tips” (Komoro, Toomey). By simply being there parents can help improve the relationship between them and their children, building trust and friendship between them.
Even if we put together a perfect education system to teach children about alcohol prevention, or just how to be responsible about it. If we changed society's attitude towards teens who drink. There will always be the complexity of how to handle those who still drink, and how to handle those who just don't care who they hurt by their actions. Accepting responsibility for one's actions can be very difficult to do at any age. Teens must learn for every action there is a consequence, whether bad or good there is still a consequence. For teens that choose to drink, regardless of the law and the education, I believe that there ought to be a three strikes your out, type of policy. This means that for their drink, there should be a more minor consequence (grounding, a lecture, extra chores), strike two a talk with a counselor, and strike three be more severe, going to a week long alcohol prevention class, talking with a counselor on a regular basis if needed. If laws are broken, or there is something severe like a DUI then legal consequences should be involed.
There is no perfect method to fixing this. These are just my personal veiws on what may make things better. We as a society need to be more understanding, they are just kids, and kids need to feel they can approach adults with things. If they feel they will be yelled at or have to go to juvenile detention for a mistake they won't get help. That doesn't mean that they can always get away with it. Repeat offenders do need repercussions. This is the only way I feel things will change.
Sources
Board, Managing. "Why Colleges Should Support a Lower Drinking Age." The Cavalier Daily ::. N.p., 04 Feb. 2015. Web. 13 Apr. 2015.
Crane, C. (2010, 09). Sobering facts about alcohol.Scholastic Choices,26, 8-11,T7. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/749400834?accountid=39502
Cary, Mary Kate. "Time to Lower the Drinking Age." US News. U.S.News & World Report, 7 May 2014. Web. 01 Apr. 2015.
"Fact Sheets - Underage Drinking." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 31 Oct. 2014. Web. 13 Apr. 2015.
Griggs, Brandon. "Should the U.S. Lower Its Drinking Age? - CNN.com." CNN. Cable News Network, 4 Jan. 2015. Web. 01 Apr. 2015.
Komoro, Kelli A., and Tracy L. Toomey. "Strategies to Prevent Underage Drinking." Strategies to Prevent Underage Drinking. National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, n.d. Web. 29 Apr. 2015.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The Surgeon General’s Call to Action To Prevent and Reduce Underage Drinking: A Guide to Action for Communities. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Surgeon General, 2007.
Windle, Michael, P.H.D., and Robert A. Zucker P.H.D. "Reducing Underage and Young Adult Drinking: How to Address Critical Drinking Problems during this Developmental Period."Alcohol Research and Health33.1 (2010): 29-44.ProQuest.Web. 18 Mar. 2015.
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