LAURA JOHNSON
A&E Assistant Editor
For anyone who has experienced Sonja Sorrell’s Humanities 111 class of greatness, it is known that bread and beer were the first substances concocted by the Neolithic humans when they began to cultivate their own food. This meaning, even since the beginning of time, alcohol has been helping people dance. However, for every kid on the planet, excluding those in Africa, Europe, South America, Australia, Mexico, Canada and Utah, the raging debate of to drink or not to drink, continues.
In an Aug. 12 article by Sean Flynn, in Parade magazine, the question of lowering the drinking age to 18 was thrust into the public forum, again. With a headline stating that “underage drinking has become a dangerous issue,” Flynn lays out the suggested programs of many of the nation’s top research universities, yet fails to come up with an answer to his own question of whether it should be lowered or not.
The topic of underage drinking has been beaten so far down into the dirt it’s in China, but at a Christian university, there can be much more at stake for those under 21 than if they attended a secular university – say like simple expulsion. Because at Pepperdine, many students may deal with not just the health or unlawfulness of underage drinking, but also the moral integrity of it. Although there are many ideas as to how to successfully lower the drinking age to 18, it would be easier to just keep it at 21.
According to John McCardell, a former Middlebury College president, the drinking age should be moved down to 18. Through his non-profit organization, called Choose Responsibly, McCardell is lobbying for a change in the mindset of young people regarding alcohol. He and his team are introducing policies that will effectively empower young adults aged 18 to 20 to tackle mature decisions regarding the place of alcohol in his or her own life. As the group’s Web site says, “Alcohol is a reality in the lives of young Americans. It cannot be denied, ignored, or legislated away.”
But some have tried to legislate it away before. In the 70s, many states began tampering with the drinking laws. Some states had the age at 18 and others at 19. The issue then became that kids from a state with a higher drinking age would cross the border state lines only to drive back late completely intoxicated. As the deaths on the road began to skyrocket, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration in 1982 reported car crash fatalities was up to a staggering 60 percent being alcohol related, President Reagan was persuaded to sign the National Minimum Drinking Age Act, effectively creating a national minimum drinking age of 21.
McCardell’s program aims to incorporate a licensed alcohol course that all 18-year-olds would have to pass before being able to purchase alcohol. He wants to educate America’s young adults before it becomes too late. Although it may come as a shock, people die every day and some of these deaths, 20,687 people, according to a 2003 National Vital Statistics Report, in fact are alcohol related.
Flynn states that because the drinking laws are so universally ignored, it breeds contempt for government within our youth. He says that young people no longer drink the way they did a generation ago. Apparently, the terms “front-loading” or “pre-gaming”, getting drunk before an event, was something that those from the animal house days of college would never have dreamed of doing. We live in an age where all of the fraternity hazing that used to be acceptable a generation ago, has been completely poured down and out the beer-bong tubes, yet somehow things are worse than ever.
With responsibility comes maturity. Underage drinking will never entirely go away. No matter what, there will always be some teenager somewhere drinking himself into a stupor.
As students, we take history classes to learn from our mistakes, so that in a phrase: history doesn’t repeat itself. Yet as the Jackie O. sized sunglasses and early 90s leggings brightening the pages of Vogue can attest to, somehow, it always does. It would be a mistake to lower the drinking age to 18 again. A new approach should be tackled but the question remains, is America, specifically the more conservative minded, ready for such a forward step?
08-27-2007