[aardvarkious]

The thing is that lowering the drinking age doesn't dramatically raise the availability of alcohol for 18-year-olds. I know that when I was underage, I had no problem getting booze. And I work with teenagers now: they still don't have problems getting booze. What the higher drinking age does do is drive the drinking underground. So 18-year-olds have to drive more so that they can drink at bush parties. Or when a friend gets alcohol poisoning, they are afraid to get help.

Also, I would say that 80+% of people have their first drink before they legally can. This means that their parents usually have no clue they are drinking, and so they are less able to give their children guidance.

[zacharye]

I don't deny that 18 year-olds have access to alcohol. I did plenty of drinking well before I was 18. It would be hard to argue however, that lowering the drinking age to 18 wouldn't give them more and easier access to alcohol.

There are tons of laws that I disagree with in this country but this isn't one of them. In fact, I think penalties for selling to under age kids should be much more harsh than they are now.

[krschultz]

You have your head in the sand. I have been on both sides of a crash, my brothers best friend lost his fiancée after she was hit by a drunk driver and a guy I grew up with killed 2 people drinking and driving about a month ago - he saw a cop and was worried about getting pulled over so he sped away and hit two people walking down the road. One was over 21, one under, either way they were still dumb enough to drink and drive. When I was under 21 I didn't drink and drive, and now that I'm over 21 I don't do it.

[aardvarkious]

No doubt that lowering the drinking age would increase access and alcohol consumption. I'm just saying that I would think it would raise these too dramatically.

I do think that the negative effects that driving drinking underground are greater than the effects that increasing drinking would have.