Drinking+Age

CBS 60 Minutes "We'd find a party where we know there's underage drinking. We would seal the house. Surround the house with officers and we would write every single underage person coming out of that house. We wrote hundreds and hundreds of tickets those years. All we did is we pushed it further underground," Beckner told Stahl.

For that reason, he is one of the few chiefs of police in the country who publicly agrees with McCardell, and supports lowering the drinking age.

Asked what the advantage is to lowering the age to 18, Beckner said, "The overall advantage is we're not trying to enforce a law that's unenforceable. The abuse of alcohol and the over-consumption of alcohol and DUI driving. Those are the areas we've gotta focus our efforts. Not on chasing kids around trying to give 'em a ticket for having a cup of beer in their hand."

Political Cartoon - Jeff Stahler - Columbus Dispatch

John Stossel – Who’s Afraid of Four - Loko - Fox News Opinion article

Nick Gillespie from Reason Magazine

"What we should be having instead of bans (of) beverages that people like and ... consume responsibly is ... a national conversation about how, after a couple of hundred years of the American experiment, we can get past the prohibitionist mindset and teach people how to drink responsibly like they do in France, Italy, Spain and many other parts of the world."

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"People need to take responsibility," said Barbara Ferrer, executive director of the Boston Public Health Commission. "There's a law and it's there for a reason - to protect young people who often don't drink responsibly." Nearly 7 in 10 high school students in Boston reported in a health commission survey taken last year that they had drunk alcohol at some point, Ferrer said. Close to 40 percent had done so in the previous month, and 18 percent reported downing several drinks in one sitting. "This is one of those areas where the data is overwhelmingly clear. Many, many young people are drinking ," Ferrer said. "This isn't just occasional access to liquor. This is easy access. They are getting alcohol from adults in their lives." The privately funded campaign will include messages in English and Spanish on more than 50 billboards around the city. The chief message will remind the public that the legal drinking age is 21 and thank people "for not providing alcohol to teens." Since laws established 21 as the minimum drinking age in the early 1980s, the likelihood that a driver between the ages of 15 and 20 will be involved in a fatal crash has dropped by more than half, the campaign reports. Still, nationally, most teens report that alcohol is easy to get, including 64 percent of eighth-graders and 81 percent of 10th-graders, according to the "We Don't Serve Teens" campaign. In many cases, they are obtaining alcohol through older relatives and even parents, who consider it an important rite of passage despite the risks. "A lot of parents are ambivalent," Evans said. Peter Schworm //Boston Globe// [Boston, Mass] 02 Jan 2011: pp. B.1.

An estimated 5,000 people under age 21 die each year of injuries related to underage drinking, according to figures from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The problem isn't just drinking and driving--although that is a major part of it. Underage drinkers also die in other accidents, such as drowning. They succumb to alcohol poisoning--a greater risk because binge drinking is more prevalent among youths who drink than among older drinkers. Underage drinking also contributes to homicide, suicide and assaults, including unwanted or unprotected sex. Because teen brains are still developing, alcohol can have long lasting harmful effects. Furthermore, those who begin drinking as a young teen are four times more likely to become an alcoholic as someone who doesn't drink until adulthood, according to the National Institute on Alcohol Awareness Alcoholism.

"Teens, alcohol a deadly mix; don't ignore it." Indian Life July-Aug. 2009: 4. Student Resource Center - Gold. Web. 6 Jan. 2011.

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 * Figure 2. Percentages of Persons Aged 12 to 20 Reporting Past Month Alcohol Use or Binge Alcohol Use, by Gender: 2001 **

Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) is a nonprofit organization in the United States that works to prevent drunken driving and underage drinking. The organization also provides assistance to the families of drunken driving victims. Such assistance includes providing emotional support and helping families to understand the criminal justice system. MADD also helps families to get involved with victim support groups. The organization has several million members. Candy Lightner, a California woman, founded MADD in 1980. She started the organization after her 13-year-old daughter was killed by a repeat drunken driving offender. Since its founding, MADD has worked with federal and state legislators to increase the number of anti-drunken driving laws. Members also work to strengthen existing drunken driving laws. MADD conducts a variety of prevention programs for children and adults. The group also sponsors national media campaigns to educate the public about the dangers of drunken driving and underage drinking. MADD is funded by individual donors, corporate support, and government grants.

"Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD)." //World Book Student .//. World Book ,2011. Web.6 Jan. 2011.

Alcohol is the number-one drug of abuse, according to NIDA. More than 75 percent of eighth-graders admit to having tried alcohol, 55 percent of them by the time they had reached sixth grade. More than 30 percent of eighth-graders have had five or more drinks at one sitting, which is binge-drinking for the sake of getting drunk. According to a 1992 report in the Journal of Addictive Diseases, a study that followed 4,145 Hispanic, white, and black teen-agers in the United States over a four-year span found that those who regularly smoked cigarettes, drank alcohol, or took such pills as amphetamines were more likely to graduate to illicit drugs than were teens who did not use these substances. Hales, Dianne. "Special Report: Talking to Your Kids About Drugs." //World Book Advanced.// Abington Senior High School library, Abington, PA. 6 Jan. 2011 .

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"Drinking Myths - Health & Counseling Services- Cal Poly." //Health & Counseling Services: College Drinking Myths//. Web. 06 Jan. 2011. .
 * Grade Point Average || Average Alcoholic Beverages per Week ||
 * A || 3.6 Drinks ||
 * B || 5.5 Drinks ||
 * C || 7.6 Drinks ||
 * D/F || 10.6 Drinks ||

// The Minium Drinking Age Should Be Lowered //. Rep. 2007. Teens In Danger. // Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center //. Web. 6 Jan. 2011.



Europeans Drink Alcohol at Younger Ages
Recent research published by the World Health Organization found that while 15- and 16-year-old teens in many European states, where the drinking age is 18 or younger (and often unenforced), have more drinking occasions per month, they have fewer dangerous, intoxication occasions than their American counterparts. For example, in southern European nations ratios of all drinking occasions to intoxication occasions were quite low—roughly one in ten—while in the United States, almost half of all drinking occasions involving 15- and 16-year-olds resulted in intoxication. Though its legal drinking age is highest among all the countries surveyed, the United States has a higher rate of dangerous intoxication occasions than many countries that not only have drinking ages that are lower or nonexistent, but also have much higher levels of per capita consumption.

 · Prohibition didn't work in the past, and it's not working now. My experience in working with college students has convinced me that making alcohol a "forbidden fruit" is counterproductive. (This strategy has failed since the time of Adam and Eve.) It would be better to allow it, while creating a culture in which it is socially unacceptable to abuse it.

Quote from Dennis Tamburello, a Franciscan friar and a professor of religious studies at Siena College, in Loudonville, New York.

(I couldnt get the MLA citation for this so if we cant make it work just delete it and forget it. Sorry Eli. I love you. -Konrad)