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Drunk driving kills, so why is the blood alcohol limit typically 0.08%, and not 0.00%?
Brains continue to develop over a lifetime, and not merely into our 20s. And surely alcohol's deleterious neurological effects are not limited to just young brains. Alcohol causes ungovernable behavior, strife and excesses of all sorts. How many women are assaulted by unruly drunk men? How many windows are smashed, property destroyed, bystanders harassed? Well then, let's save lives and go the Islamic route, banning all alcohol outright!
And while we're at it, because every highway fatality is regrettable and preventable, let's lower the speed limit to zero.
Folks, sometimes the right to engage in stupid behavior trumps the supposed sanctity of life, or society's supposed interest in enforcing some prevailing set of values. At my present age, many people already have offspring who have turned 21. And I still resent having to produce identification to gain "permission" to buy alcohol.
I think we should lower the drinking age, but increase the driving age. It's pretty silly we don't trust teenagers to vote, get married or own a handgun, but we trust them with a 2000+ lb machine which kills more than the other three combined (yes, even more than voting for/marrying the wrong person ).
Not quite the same thing. War is psychological trauma (plus any physical injuries), which is different than the chemical effect of a substance on a brain that is still physically developing. The alcohol debate is about how significantly the substance may alter or retard brain development. The war debate is more about socialization and personal behavioral/emotional reactions.
OK emotional trauma is OK for an 18 year old but physical isn't?
P.S. when he gets shot in the head it's more than emotional.
But it is. The argument has been an 18 year old mind is still developing so it's a bad idea to introduce alcohol. So I am asking how is it then O.K. to introduce a developing 18 year old mind to war? Seems to me that if we are saying they can handle war, surely they can handle alcohol.
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Originally Posted by sade693
Not quite the same thing. War is psychological trauma (plus any physical injuries), which is different than the chemical effect of a substance on a brain that is still physically developing.
I'm not so sure. We're starting to understand how things, such as trauma, affect the brain. Experiences represent the growth of new neuron branches and the atrophy of others, and variations in how neurotransmitters (chemicals) work. Experiences can physically alter the brain. I mean, I'm not sure the impact of exogenous chemicals on those processes and the impact of endogenous chemicals due to extreme stress and unprecedented trauma are necessarily so different.
On a different note, I mentioned early in the thread that I experimented with alcohol at a fairly young age -- pre-teen. I would like somebody to give me a list of the deleterious effects such experimentation had on my still-developing brain. I'm not challenging the assertions -- I'm genuinely interested to know how I may have hobbled my poor mind.
OK emotional trauma is OK for an 18 year old but physical isn't?
P.S. when he gets shot in the head it's more than emotional.
Nobody said that one is okay and the other isn't. We're just saying that these are two completely different debates.
There is the reason that I listed in the post you quoted, and also the fact that lowering the drinking age would affect a population far greater than the relatively tiny number of people who volunteer for the military.
When Minnesota lowered the drinking age for a short while, the young men entering the bar acted like 14 year olds and many patrons in their 20's left and found bars that didn't appeal to kids.
Many bars actually lost money when the drinking age was lowered because the immature kids ( who had very little money) drove away the customers who did have money.
Nobody said that one is okay and the other isn't. We're just saying that these are two completely different debates.
Not based upon the arguments used. If if wrong to inflict trauma on a developing brain, how is it simply not wrong?
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There is the reason that I listed in the post you quoted, and also the fact that lowering the drinking age would affect a population far greater than the relatively tiny number of people who volunteer for the military.
I don't think scale of harm is a very good argument. There is harm or there isn't.
Drunk driving kills, so why is the blood alcohol limit typically 0.08%, and not 0.00%?
Brains continue to develop over a lifetime, and not merely into our 20s. And surely alcohol's deleterious neurological effects are not limited to just young brains. Alcohol causes ungovernable behavior, strife and excesses of all sorts. How many women are assaulted by unruly drunk men? How many windows are smashed, property destroyed, bystanders harassed? Well then, let's save lives and go the Islamic route, banning all alcohol outright!
And while we're at it, because every highway fatality is regrettable and preventable, let's lower the speed limit to zero.
Folks, sometimes the right to engage in stupid behavior trumps the supposed sanctity of life, or society's supposed interest in enforcing some prevailing set of values. At my present age, many people already have offspring who have turned 21. And I still resent having to produce identification to gain "permission" to buy alcohol.
It depends upon where you are at. Many European countries it is "zero tolerance." No measurable alcohol at all in your blood system and I agree with this. It should be the same in the US. Many countries are as low as .05% and, in California for anyone under age 21 it is zero tolerance.
You may resent the laws and think they are "bad." However, respond to your first DUI Crash where a 7 yr old is dead and you give CPR to a 3 month old baby, and they die in your arms, because someone had "two drinks." Tell me your mind wouldn't change and/or it was your kids killed. Its always "ok" if its someone else. Until it happens to you or your family, people want "their freedoms."
You shouldn't be able to drive with ANY alcohol in your system. Zero drugs, be it prescription or otherwise.
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Why can't the drinking age be lower?
