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September 2, 2010
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Keep drinking age at 21
Published September 3, 2008
The presidents of about 100 colleges and universities recently called on federal lawmakers to consider lowering the drinking age from 21 to 18.
That’s right. The leaders of the some of the nation’s largest and most respected educational institutions believe their campuses would be safer places for students to attend if those students could start legally getting blitzed as freshman rather than having to wait until their junior or senior years.
Really?
According to a recent published report, University of Georgia President Michael Adams has not seen the information provided by the Amethyst Initiative, and as a result has not decided whether or not to endorse its findings.
However, the presidents of Georgia Southwestern State University, Morehouse College, Oglethorpe University and Spelman College, all here in Georgia, are already on board with the proposal, joining the leaders of places like Johns Hopkins, Duke, Syracuse and Ohio State in seeking at least a discussion on reducing the legal drinking age.
Proponents believe lowering the drinking age will help prevent binge drinking by students who now illegally consume large quantities of alcohol. Opponents fear having even younger legal drinkers will lead to a multitude of problems, including increased chances of fatal car accidents.
Now I’m not a teetotaler myself. I like to have a beverage while I watch a ballgame just like most people I know, and we’ve argued for liquor by the drink in this paper.
However, I can’t, in good conscience, endorse a reduction in the drinking age. I can’t believe I just wrote that last sentence considering how I acted when I was in college, but now that I’m looking at the issue through the eyes of a parent rather than the eyes of a student, to me this is a no-brainer.
And only someone in the academic world, rather than the real world, would actually argue lowering the drinking age would reduce, rather than increase, the consumption of alcohol.
I can hardly see how adding under 21-year-olds to that equation would be beneficial.
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