Lowered Drinking Age
The effects of lowering the legal drinking age to 18 years old would be a great step in helping reduce the crime and delinquency of people (especially college students) between the ages of 18 and 21. This paper will discuss the effects of a lower drinking age on college students - also the effects of the current age of 21.
The current law that sets the drinking age at 21 does not prevent a single college student from getting alcohol if one wants it. What this law does do, however, is makes students that are doing nothing out of the ordinary, into lawbreakers. This also causes students to disrespect other laws.
A huge part of this disrespect comes into play when students are already engaging in "illegal behavior" simply by drinking, the line of right and wrong has already been crossed, and it becomes easier to engage in other forms of illegal behavior, particularly when one's judgment is impaired by alcohol.
Students in the incubation room at the Woodbine Ag...
A Kranz (wreath) of Kölsch beer.
English: Total recorded alcohol per capita consump...For example, when a minor goes to a party where alcohol is present, they are automatically committing an illegal act - without even consuming a drop of alcohol. When a minor is put in that kind of a situation where it is just as illegal to be around alcohol as it is to drink it, then of course it is ok to get really drunk.
But also, if you are trained as a "law-breaker" by doing something perfectly normal for teenagers, then your judgment and respect for the law become jaded.
Lowering the drinking age to 18 would allow larger numbers of college students to drink socially in more supervised settings such as bars, and even on campus. Not as many would turn to illegal parties where rape, sexual exploitation, and fights occur. This promotes safe...