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Legal drinking age?

What should the legal drinking age be?

  • Bring back Prohibition.

    Votes: 4 4.3%
  • Older than 21. Raise it even higher!

    Votes: 2 2.2%
  • Leave it at 21 (in the USA).

    Votes: 17 18.5%
  • 20

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 19

    Votes: 1 1.1%
  • 18

    Votes: 44 47.8%
  • 17

    Votes: 2 2.2%
  • 16

    Votes: 4 4.3%
  • Below 16.

    Votes: 3 3.3%
  • Other (please explain).

    Votes: 15 16.3%

  • Total voters
    92
Did you purposefully ignore the word "generally." We use the age when the majority of people are matured. You are talking about outliers, and no one is talking about them. There are outliers with everything.

You didn't use the word "generally".

I don't agree. Different people mature at different levels. So you must go with the oldest age in order to be sure. You always err on the side of caution. That is a good rule to follow.

I don't know how else that statement can be interpreted other than catering to the lowest common denominator and banning everything until everyone is mature enough to use it.
 
You didn't use the word "generally".



I don't know how else that statement can be interpreted other than catering to the lowest common denominator and banning everything until everyone is mature enough to use it.

I've used the word generally throughout this discussion. I didn't realize I had to use it every single time.

That's foolish. Waiting until 21 is not catering to the lowest common denominator in any way. You should really brush up on the latest data about the teenage brain and its capabilities and limitations. Then maybe you could participate in the discussion in a productive manner.
 
Raising the drinking age to 21 lowered traffic accidents and related deaths all over the USA.
Got any proof to support that ridiculous assertion?
 
Got any proof to support that ridiculous assertion?




Don't need any proof, it's a well known fact.

Lets see you prove that it didn't happen.

Anyone who wants to lower the drinking age in the USA will go to their grave unhappy, because that won't be happening any time soon.
 
I've used the word generally throughout this discussion. I didn't realize I had to use it every single time.

That's foolish. Waiting until 21 is not catering to the lowest common denominator in any way. You should really brush up on the latest data about the teenage brain and its capabilities and limitations. Then maybe you could participate in the discussion in a productive manner.

Yes it is. I was a grown ass man by the time I was 17, when I enlisted in the Army, married at 19, and went to Afghanistan 2 weeks later. By the time I was 21 I had more life experience than a lot of people get in their entire lives. To try to tell me I wasn't responsible enough to make my own decisions is the height of the paternalistic bull**** that you're pushing. You do not know what is best for everyone, so stop trying to act like you do.

Luckily I was stationed in a country that didn't have draconian drinking laws governed by MADD and was able to responsibly consume some alcohol like the adult I was. And if you think virtually every 18-21 year old American teenager isn't drinking, you're obviously out of touch.
 
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Another terrible idea. Freedom isn't intended to promote and encourage self destruction.

Yes. Freedom is having the choice to live your life the way you want. If I want to drink myself retarded every night thats my business. Freedom is not being told not to do stuff just because you decide it is not good for me.
 
Don't need any proof, it's a well known fact.

Lets see you prove that it didn't happen.
Why???

You made the assertion, and now another one..You doubled down on your unsupported assertion. Logically the burden of proof is on you, not me.

Again, got any proof?
 
Why???

You made the assertion, and now another one..You doubled down on your unsupported assertion. Logically the burden of proof is on you, not me.

Again, got any proof?




If you want to deny reality, that's your business. Carry on.




The legal drinking age will not be lowered in the USA.

Deal with it.
 
If you want to deny reality, that's your business.
So you cannot provide any logical argument to support your ridiculous assertion.

Gotcha:roll:
 
Like a legal drinking age stops kids from getting their hands on alcohol, anyway. It never stopped me or anyone else I ever knew. It's ridiculous that you can die for your country in battle, get married, have kids, leave school, vote, secure employment and drive a car, but you can't have a pint. Completely absurd.

Not really, though times have changed. 18 used to be an entry into adulthood, sort of like a driver's permit instead of a driver's licence. Adults with training wheels. Then Nixon signed in the 18 year old vote and spoiled the training period.

Btw, before that and a bit after, you could drink in any bar, purchase any alcohol with an active duty military ID no matter how young you are.
 
You're the one that's wrong.
Wrong about what?

You made a specific claim and I challenged you to back it up.

Instead you refuse. Most likely because you can't.

Your concession is respectfully accepted.
 
You're the one that's wrong.

Wait and see-the USA will not lower its drinking age.

Agreed. In fact some states used to allow 18 year olds to drink. That ended in 1984 when congress passed the National Minimum Drinking Age Act. Penalized the hell out of any state still allowing 18 year olds to drink.
 
Wrong about what?

You made a specific claim and I challenged you to back it up.

Instead you refuse. Most likely because you can't.

Your concession is respectfully accepted.




Everything in general.

You are so wrong that you will never be right.

In any case, carry on and have a nice day.
 
If alcoholism is largely genetic, then lowering or raising the age isn't going to have much of an impact on the incidence of alcoholism:

There is a growing body of scientific evidence that alcoholism has a genetic component, but the actual gene that may cause it has yet to be identified.

Studies of laboratory animals as well as human test subjects indicate that genetic factors play a major role in the development of alcoholism, but just how much a factor remains undetermined.

Children of alcoholics are four times more likely than other children to become alcoholics, according to the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, but environmental factors could be a factor in many of those cases.

link
 
"Other."

In the past, in some states at age 18 a person could buy 3.5% beer (or wine) at a bar, but not take it off-site. The idea was to let kids gradually move into liquor. I think that was a good idea. I also think a valid current military ID should allow a person to buy liquor (at a bar consumed on-site) at ANY age.
 
Agreed. In fact some states used to allow 18 year olds to drink. That ended in 1984 when congress passed the National Minimum Drinking Age Act. Penalized the hell out of any state still allowing 18 year olds to drink.

I would favor an age 21 voting age unless in the active full time military and then any age.
 
I think a few states did or still do allow parents/legal guardian to buy liquor for their kids at bars/restaurants provided the parent/guardian is present.
 
My wife knows folks of a very old culture that treat age 17 as the age a person becomes an adult for both the purpose of sex and liquor. They have massive tracts of land including even their own road system and own small towns/cities. Very wealthy. They don't care what government laws are in relation to their own and their own land, and it takes permission to come on their land - meaning to their houses and towns too - and a search warrant for police - which have to be at least on the state level as they ARE the local and county law enforcement down to their own courts and government - since 100% of the population is them. However, they also have very strict and unusual rules of social, personal and professional conduct, very clannish. They do not advertise their existence. I won't go into it but not everyone has the same concepts of propriety, society, government or ethics.
 
Yes. Freedom is having the choice to live your life the way you want. If I want to drink myself retarded every night thats my business. Freedom is not being told not to do stuff just because you decide it is not good for me.

I guess I misunderstood the motivation behind the Declaration of Independence. I thought it was to give people more of an opportunity to be successful instead of being indentured servants to the king. I thought it was to allow people to practice the religion of their choice. I didn't realize that the subjects living in the American colonies were disappointed because they couldn't buy heroine, cocaine, alcohol, candy, soda, tobacco or carrots.

I thought the Revolutionary War was fought for the purpose of giving us the freedom to succeed. Your version is more popular. I'm disappointed in a nation that holds drunkenness, laziness, feasting and drug addiction as our greatest achievement for mankind.

What happened to the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? These are much better goals than death, bondage and the pursuit of drunkenness. People truly misunderstand freedom. That's why we are losing so much of it because we don't understand it or appreciate it.

Stop worrying about making a better life for your children. Go have a beer. :bravo::2usflag:
 
I guess I misunderstood the motivation behind the Declaration of Independence. I thought it was to give people more of an opportunity to be successful instead of being indentured servants to the king. I thought it was to allow people to practice the religion of their choice. I didn't realize that the subjects living in the American colonies were disappointed because they couldn't buy heroine, cocaine, alcohol, candy, soda, tobacco or carrots.

I thought the Revolutionary War was fought for the purpose of giving us the freedom to succeed. Your version is more popular. I'm disappointed in a nation that holds drunkenness, laziness, feasting and drug addiction as our greatest achievement for mankind.

What happened to the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? These are much better goals than death, bondage and the pursuit of drunkenness. People truly misunderstand freedom. That's why we are losing so much of it because we don't understand it or appreciate it.

Stop worrying about making a better life for your children. Go have a beer. :bravo::2usflag:

If the government is telling you what your success is, and dictating how to achieve it then you aren't really free. Your idea of success may not be mine. People should have the freedom to live their lives as they see fit, not how the president determines you should.

Stop worrying about making a better life for your children. Go have a beer

Yes because making a better life for your children cant happen if you drink beer. :bs
 
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