In Defense of "Underage" Drinking

Mercurial Times ^ | March 1, 2002 | Aaron Armitage

[A.J.Armitage]

The situation is already bad enough. Every state in the union has already been forced by federal blackmail to raise the drinking age to 21. Now a group called the Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse is trying to whip up hysteria about the evils of people drinking a few years before they get government permission. They came out with attention getting claims that 25 percent of alcohol consumption is by "children", which to them apparently includes a number of potential voters. It turns out the real number is 11 percent, including, it should be noted, people over 18. The headlines ought to be shouting the shocking news that college students account for less than 25 percent of the drinking in America. My generation is a bunch of slackers.

The 25 percent figure was what Thomas Sowell calls an "Aha! statistic". Like the bogus statistic that domestic abuse increased on Super Bowl Sunday, it existed to boost a particular political agenda; whether it happens to be true is fundamentally beside the point. In this case, the political agenda is more warfare on substances (as if the war on drugs wasn't insane enough). The organization's web site, which greets visitors with an alternating graphic of someone smoking the devil-weed, a middle aged corporate manager type having what, by the looks of him, is a well deserved drink to relax after a hard day at the office (they're evidently so inhumane as to begrudge him this), and a girl smoking a cigarette, quotes their head control freak as saying, "This report is a clarion call for a national mobilization to curb underage drinking," while calling for various authoritarian measures such as holding parents legally responsible, "stepping up" enforcement, and, of course, higher taxes on alcohol. What fun.

One of the arguments advanced by opponents of the 21 year old drinking age is that you can't expect people to learn to drink responsibly by not letting them drink at all and then one day letting them drink all they want. Instead, children should learn to drink wine or beer with meals, as they do in Europe. There's a lot to this argument. You wouldn't expect a 16 year old to drive perfectly without practicing in parking lots first. But it's not my reason. These are my two main reasons for opposing the drinking age.

First, the government has no business telling anyone, whatever his age, what substances he can consume. Yes, that includes crack cocaine. Yes, that means no drinking age whatsoever. I got drunk on champaign on New Year's Eve when I was one year old with no ill effects. Restrictions on what a peaceful person can own, consume, sell, or produce are simply outside the proper sphere of government. Government necessarily operates by force, so the proper sphere of government is the proper sphere of force. Drinking before a certain age is not a reason to use force against someone, but if it is, which age? What sets drinking at the age of 20 apart to a degree that requires force, which is to say violence or the threat of violence, to stop it? Does it apply to 20 year olds in Canada? Did it apply to 20 year olds before the federal government imposed the 21 year drinking age? The truth is, nothing whatsoever except the law itself sets drinking by 20 year olds apart. That law is groundless; it exists as arbitrary will and nothing more. If it had pleased the makers of the law, the age would be set at 30.

Second, drinking is fun. Here, I suspect, my reason for supporting it is the very reason they oppose it. There's a significant proportion of the population that instinctively regards anything enjoyable as a sin and something the government ought to do something about, at which point they resemble the "Islamo-fascists" we've been at war against, who also hate drinking. H.L. Mencken defined Puritanism as "The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy." Now, this is grossly unfair to the Puritans, and the Reformed tradition as a whole, but that type of person existed in Mencken's time, and exists now. Far from being theological Puritans, they tend to be social gospellers or non-Christians altogether. In place of a Christian zeal for salvation, they have a zeal for social perfection.

Unfortunately, a zeal for coercively achieved social perfection always ends badly.

[Illbay]

The Alabama Constitution has provisions for referendum. We also have it in Texas, and most of the Southern states.

[Illbay]

I always thought the "bloodbath", as you call it, occurred because the kids suddenly went wild when they lowered the drinking age. If it had been 18 all along the spike wouldn't have happened.

I guess you've just solved the problem of paedophilia, then. Just drop all laws against child molestation, and after a period where the paedophiles go a little wild, it should settle down to something more manageable.

[Virginia-American]

It is when people believe that humans are innately good, when Marxism, Communism, Socialism, and wacky Utopian governments come about and fail

Agreed, never forget that state power will be wielded by sinners, sometimes by the insane.

[FreedominJesusChrist]

"Agreed, never forget that state power will be wielded by sinners, sometimes by the insane."

Agreed back, people who believe that humans are innately good are in for a lot of self-imposed trouble. Not to mention that they are usually either insane or extremely delusional.

[max61]

Back in the mid-70s, the states nearly all lowered the age to 18 (or 19 in some instances). The result was a BLOODBATH. Kids were killing themselves right and left and taking lots of innocent bystanders with them.

The drinking ages were lowered to 18 in the 70's as a result of the fact the persons were considered to be an adult at that age and not a minor.

You overexagerate the results, the large majority of DWI's are adult's in their 20's.

THAT is the reason the limit went back up to 21 after a few years. Something the Libertines will ignore or deny. But it is FACT.

More bull$hit, at least get your facts straight. The drinking age was raised to 21 as a result of federal law's blackmailing the states into raising the age to 21 or otherwise they would forfeit their federal highway funds. However, those drinking laws were not applicable to military installations.

Yet another pontificating control freak heard from.

---max

[Illbay]

You overexagerate the results, the large majority of DWI's are adult's in their 20's.

Sorry, but it has been illegal for minors to drink for a couple of decades now. So of course "the large majority of DWIs are adults in their 20s," genius.

[Virginia-American]

Why make a BoR that only applies to the Fed gov

uh, because they were defining the federal gov't? There was an established church in Massachusetts until the 1840s

[Texaggie79]

uh, because they were defining the federal gov't?

Oh, so, nowhere in the articles of the USC does it dine states' roles?

[JoeGar]

How else explain the logic that at 18 one is a legal adult and may own property, enter the workforce without the gubmint's permission, and "die for one's country", but may not buy beer on a Friday night?

It boggles my mind that we trust an 18-year-old with a multi-million dollar tank loaded with a wide array of explosive ordnance, but we cannot trust him with a beer -- even on a military base!

Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) has led Congress down this stupid path. A pox on MADD!

[tpaine]

Reductive absurdity.

[A.J.Armitage]

So, if a police officer sees an eight-year-old drinking, smoking, or taking drugs, it's none of his business?

He could take them home to their parents (and I see no reason any other adult from the community couldn't do the same thing).

Your argument would also require that a three-year-old who accidentally kills his baby brother be arrested and charged with manslaughter or murder.

And why's that?

It's just common sense, that you need an official age of majority. The unavoidable imperfection of such a convention is no more a convincing argument against it, than it would be against any other social convention.

Sure, you need an age of majority for voting and consenting to sex and contracts, but not for drinking.

[A.J.Armitage]

The Alabama Constitution has provisions for referendum. We also have it in Texas, and most of the Southern states.

And where does the Alabama constitution get its authority from?

[A.J.Armitage]

I always thought the "bloodbath", as you call it, occurred because the kids suddenly went wild when they lowered the drinking age. If it had been 18 all along the spike wouldn't have happened.

I guess you've just solved the problem of paedophilia, then. Just drop all laws against child molestation, and after a period where the paedophiles go a little wild, it should settle down to something more manageable.

Let me ask you a question. Do you think of the above as a serious reply?

[Ace's Dad]

...in the mid-70s, the states nearly all lowered the age to 18 (or 19 in some instances). The result was a BLOODBATH

And the 18 year olds were buying for their 16 year old friends, who gave it to thier 14 year old girl friends. Sad, but true. Some spoiled it for the responsible.

[OrthodoxPresbyterian]

Joel Miller on Razormouth.Com is lovin' ya, dude. (Check his recent articles on underage drinking).

Beer at Supper, and Wine at Communion.
Let the Parents be the judge as to quantity.

[A.J.Armitage]

Joel Miller on Razormouth.Com is lovin' ya, dude. (Check his recent articles on underage drinking).

He read it?

[metesky]

I thought you were smarter than that, sickbay.

[FreedominJesusChrist]

"Turn-ons: the doctrine of enumerated powers; Roman history; slow, seductive readings from The Law."

It must not take a lot to turn you on.

[A.J.Armitage]

What can I say? I'm easy.

[FreedominJesusChrist]

"What can I say? I'm easy."

You didn't have to say anything, your profile page says it all.