I see the need for increase diversity in type of bars. For one thing someone who is a "professional" out of college may not want to hang out to bar targeting just out of the house teenagers and visa versa. Which could be a good thing or bad depending where you are at.

by Rj on Aug 19, 2008 3:37 pm  

Well, let's not kid ourselves here.

College kids don't binge because they can't drink, they binge because they can. There are no repercussions (read: parents) and alcohol is very easily available. Anyone who's been to a Hoyas game at the Verizon Center knows most of those kids woke up and downed a 6-pack at 9AM to "pregame."

I think changing the drinking age is appropriate, it really is arbitrary and unfair, but I don't think it will change behavior. Also, I doubt it will significantly affect the bar scene. Most of these kids - being college students - don't have a ton of money and they realize they'll get more bang for their buck from a case of Natty lite for the price of a couple of mixed drinks at most bar around here.

by B on Aug 19, 2008 3:55 pm  

Interesting ... I remember arriving at Georgetown as a frosh ... and being greeted with an orientation party that included beer trucks and free beer (within a cordoned off area.) The DC area drinking laws were a bit pecular at the time. While most states made 18 the "legal" age for everything, DC only allowed beer and wine at 18, 21 for everything else, and Virginia only allowed beer for 18 yr olds, 21 everything else. This lead to drinking establishments that were naturally segregated by age group. Additionally, many restaurants (e.g., 1789 in Georgetown ... across from some dorms) had "21 to enter" signs posted. I don't remember this same segregation in the state where I'd come from where it was 18 for all kinds of drinks ... and no "21 to enter" signs. I also remember there seemed to be more "less responsible" drinking here where the 18 yr olds were supposed to be drinking only beer. (I.e., they were getting a hold of harder stuff ... and ending up abusing it.) I think there're a lot of good arguments for returning the drinking age to 18. Not the least of which is that it will encourage more responsible drinking since that which is lawful is easier to observe and influence than that which ends up being hidden. Additionally, the same argument can be made now that was made back then to lower the drinking age to 18. If someone is old enough to go to war and be prepared to die for their country, they are also old enough to be trusted with drinking alcohol if they so choose.

by Lance on Aug 19, 2008 3:58 pm  

There are no repercussions, not because there are no parents around. These "kids" are actually adults, they can vote, join the army etc. There are no repercussions because there really is no responsibility. It was easy to party on a Tuesday night in college or law school when I was fully funded and I didn't have a class until 3 the next day. Have to make it to work on Wednesday at eight to earn the beer money? = no partying on Tuesday night, or at least a little less :).

I was glad to see my undergrad on that list!

by local on Aug 19, 2008 4:03 pm  

Wasn't the drinking age raised because there was too much drunk driving going on and raising the drinking age would reduce it? It stands to reason then that lowering the drinking age would result in more drunk driving. I'm pretty sure I've seen this exact argument made in opposition of lowering the drinking age. Ultimately part of the job of government includes providing for some level of public safety, which includes roadway safety. As such if mandating a certain drinking age significantly improves roadway safety then it's reasonable for goverment to mandate it. My opinion on the matter is that the drinking age should be set at the lowest age at which the imposition of this restriction on a portion of the adult population is justified by the increased safety for the population at large resulting from this imposed restriction. To some extent this is obviously a judgement call, and I certainly don't have any information from studies pertaining to the correlation between the drinking age and drunk driving and hence do not have an opionion as to what the exactly the drinking age should be. Certainly having this data would help out with this discussion. It does seem to me that this discussion has ignored the reason the drinking age was set to 21 in the first place. Of course, if I am wrong about why the drinking age was set to what it was, then please feel free to correct me.

by Mario on Aug 19, 2008 4:25 pm  

Mario,

Yes, cutting down on drunk driving was the justification used for raising the drinking age, however the politics of the time (i.e., the beginning of conservative Reagan era and the end of the liberalism of the prior 2 decades) were probably more responsible for the drinking age being raised (and made uniform throughout the country) than were any substantive statistics that the drunk driving would be reduced. In hindsight, I think it's safe to say that it's the efforts of organizations such as MADD that have reduced drunk driving. Where drunk driving was once given the same penalties as speeding, legislative pushes from organizations such as MADD made the punishment for drunk driving today far more punitive than a speeding ticket. It also pushed for traffic stops and other stricter enforcement as well as causing a change in view toward the abuse of alcohol. I.e., my guess is that MADD et al. would be much more responsible for lowering drunken driver fatalities than any lowering in the drinking age. One thing for sure though is that from what I've read there is far more binge drinking on campuses today than there was back then.

by Lance on Aug 19, 2008 4:38 pm  

To me, lowering the drinking age means more business for establishments that serve alcohol, both from people who already patronize them, legal or not and from people who would patronize them if the repercussions of doing so didn't seem so harsh. (Sure, they say most bars in College Park don't card you, but some people would rather not take that chance.) And more business means more places that serve alcohol - which, surprisingly, I think College Park is starved for - which would attract other kinds of stores (which College Park is especially starved for), both chains and local establishments, thereby strengthening the local economy and (hopefully!) creating more of a Place in our Downtown. A more vibrant business district will encourage even more students to move to College Park, further changing the face of what has long been a commuter school. And like David said, if students are spending more time in their community - both drinking and doing other things - they might want to become more involved.

Dan Mote probably couldn't care less about "building community" here, but I bet lowering the drinking age might do just that. Maryland's already known as a place to go and get wasted - why not take advantage?

by dan reed on Aug 19, 2008 4:45 pm  

Before lowering the drinking age, legalize marijuana.

There is absolutely no good reason to allow alcohol and not marijuana, which is a far far far safer substance.

by Douglas Willinger on Aug 19, 2008 5:14 pm  

Oh I have so much to say on this that I probably shouldn't even start. Point is, you can't use the physical maturity argument, because the brain at 18 isn't that much different than at 21 -- it's above 25 that it truly changes, so you're killing immature brain cells either way if you keep it below 25 -- and anyway, I'm pretty sure that's never been the main claim for keeping the age at 21 anyway.

Yes, US college kids (and high school kids!) binge drink b/c it's forbidden. Yes, kids in countries where the drinking age is loose if not nonexistent grow up, often, to appreciate wine, beer, and spirits as a complement to food and celebration, not as something to get one as f***ed up as possible as fast as possible. No, lowering the drinking age to 18 won't completely solve the issue of binge-drinking on campus, but it will go a long way towards legitimizing something, which automatically renders it less compelling to the teenage brain.

I'm all for it...but the country goes through this every so often, 18 to 21 to 18 and back, so who knows?

by leigh on Aug 19, 2008 6:52 pm  

I have been opposed to the 21 cut off since I was, well, 21. Given I am much older than that now, I can say that being "legal" in high school and then going to college and not was a complete joke.

I had gotten "it" out of my system, but saw the numbnuts away from home for the first time fail out of school because they couldn't handle it.

Lower it to 18, heck lower it to 16 and raise the driving age to 18.

by William on Aug 19, 2008 7:38 pm  

If I remember correctly, the problem was with an 18 year old law, a lot of 16 year olds got to drink, and then drive. Not good. So here is what I propose, lower the drinking age to 18, and raise the driving age to 21.

by kenf on Aug 19, 2008 7:47 pm  

Hey, I agree completely with Lance. With kenf too. The driving age is enforceable, and the drinking age isn't. If you really want to stop teenage drunk driving, it's the driving age that should be 21.

And if a higher driving age isn't practicable in areas without transit, why not only allow local residents (residing within the area of the high driving age) to drink if they're under 21. That way you wouldn't worry about kids driving to Vienna and taking the Metro into D.C. to drink, then driving home wasted.

by tt on Aug 19, 2008 8:05 pm  

I'd agree with some of the earlier posts that MADD's efforts made drunk driving a national issue in the 1980s and turned drunk driving from being oft-ignored and joked-about to being shameful and well-recognized. But it's an organization that's outlived its usefulness. What's absolutely infuriating about MADD is that they only focus on the drinking part of drunk driving, and not the driving.

I would imagine that the reason drunk driving hadn't been recognized as a problem before MADD is that it really wasn't a problem until a sufficiently large fraction of Americans were living in ways that required them to drive to get anywhere. You can avoid driving drunk if you can walk/stagger home from your drinking instead of getting in a car in the first place. But civic walkability and transit are nowhere on MADD's radar screen.

I really think we'd be better off in a society where drinking was an acceptable, everyday sort of activity and driving was a somewhat shameful activity done on occasion and in moderation, than the reverse, which is the vision that MADD continues to push.

by thm on Aug 19, 2008 9:42 pm  

Why not just lower to 20 and raise legal age from 18 to 20 I would like to know what is the reason for the two to not be the same.

Lowering the age to 18 will still do nothing for one reason the underaged 16 and 17 year olds in colleges will still drink regardless; what needs to happen is for people to get off there lazy asses and actually enforce the present laws that are on the books but no one has the resources, money or plain just doesnt want too. No one will follow laws if there are no consequences if caught.

The legal age should be 20 and at that age how many of them do you know hang around with highschool aged children; your not a teen anymore should had passed the unruly faze and if not its your own damn problem and you suffer for what ever happens.

The part of having them use transit to get home holds no valid reasoning, what are you going to do card people by zipcode. There are sections of every city and county in the region (DC, Alexandria, Arlington, PG, Montgomery, Fairfax) that all lack transit options what are you going to do go on wmata's,rideon's,fairfax connector's,dash,the bus's websites or something and found out what neighborhoods and zipcodes are served by transit.

by kk on Aug 19, 2008 10:33 pm  

To finish up my comment above

I would like to know any other reason for lowering the voting age to 18 except to get about 20 million new voters, any reasons for lowering the drinking age has nothing to do with safety and real benefits but profits or no blame.

I bet some of the colleges just want to sell alcohol on campus and make money from it instead of the students going somewhere else and buying it there or they just want it lowered so they dont get the blame anymore.

You can not stop anying illegial from happening, its a losing battle you just have to make sure it doesnt become widespread and just coup with it.

Its easy for a minor or underaged adult to get anything they want if there is a want theres a way. I had plenty of chances to get alcohol and cigareets while I was a teen I just chose not too.

The age should really be raised and not lowered you can not name any benefit alcohol (excluding wine) has for anything or anybody. The age should really be like 25 but no one would agree to that 21 & 22 year olds do all the same stuff 18-20 years do when it comes to drinking.

This is just dumb people just want to get rid of the law because they cant enforce it with that reasoning should stealing or murder not be against the law since you dont catch the people most of the time for 5 or 10 years down the road.

by kk on Aug 19, 2008 10:50 pm  

"As such if mandating a certain drinking age significantly improves roadway safety then it's reasonable for goverment to mandate it."

A drinking age set at 75 would dramatically improve roadway safety, wouldn't it?

MADD's fight was the photogenic struggle of a few grieving mothers to "fix" society. Reagan's fight was an attempt to establish executive power over every facet of society - and the War On Drugs That The Drug Companies Aren't Bribing For has had the same impact as the first US Prohibition: generating vast amounts of organized crime, electing people who believed that stomping on other people's rights was a tool to increase their popularity, drastically expanding the power of the US government, and forcing something we believe we have a right to into a dangerous underground situation.

We can't afford to continue to allow this unjust, unconstitutional crap anymore. Not only is it bankrupting our society, not only has it resulted in the highest imprisonment rates (more than 1%) of any power since Stalin & Hitler, not only is it destroying our attempt to stabilize places like Afghanistan, not only has it created a justice system that fails to catch actual rapists & killers, and not only has it created decades of violence & millions of lives lost in drug wars local and international, but the real threat is starting to come into view.

Our expectations of privacy are becoming obsolete in the face of advancing technology. If the government has the right to prosecute victomless "crimes" it's created, if it has a right to seize property and shoot first and disappear people, and it has the technology to do so, then it has an obligation to enforce the laws that we never expected to be enforced - and you've broken enough of them to put you away for a long time, I assure you.

Imagine our swearing laws in a land where every sound is recorded. Imagine our sodomy laws in a land where backscatter radar can make pornography through a brick wall. Imagine jaywalking becoming something on your record that can be used against you whenever the government wants something from you. Imagine what happens when an omniscient government that's merely been enforcing idiotic laws finally decides to break its own rules, and use the justice system to pursue its own objectives. Oh, wait...

We're on the verge of giving up on privacy entirely. Those of us who are still open to reason (and not grieving over their dead children like MADD) need to ensure that we scale back the laws to a place where we're all comfortable with them being enforced in a non-majoritarian manner, before law enforcement become our de facto rulers via selective enforcement. The specter of consensual, victimless crime (of all types) has to end. "Because it's illegal" and the sanctimonious rants of moralizing politicians are not good enough anymore.

Remove the drinking age entirely, and all the other anti-vice prohibitions while we're at it. This is no longer some far-off libertarian goal, it's a common-sense measure, one of the things necessary to bring our world back to some semblance of sanity. A Nanny State that would make Orwell shit himself is rapidly becoming possible - and we've had Bush to conveniently illustrate how much is already possible when you don't care about the American people, the rule of law, or the Constitution.

by Squalish on Aug 20, 2008 12:13 am  

I have two areas of expertise from which to comment on your proposal - and both cause me to oppose your proposal. First, my brother was the very person upon whom John Belushi's role in Animal House was actually based, so I know more than a little about binge drinking, up close and ugly, It isn't pretty, and it doesn't stop when the film comes to an end. Our family was affected for years afterwards. We know personally how binge drinking leads to alcoholism and terrible stress on families.

I served for a dozen years before I retired as this city's only Patient Advocate for all persons in alcohol and drug rehabilitation programs, both public and private. As a certified professional in the field, with particular expertise on kids and drugs/alcohol, I had plenty of opportunity to interact with kids doing binge drinking. And I know the best thinking in the field. Any additional years in which kids could access alcohol before their brains are finished maturing would be a crime in my eyes - the supporters would have more deaths for which they would be responsible than those who have just beaten gun control in this city. The last part of an adolescent brain to achieve maturity is the part that understands consequences for one's actions, and that part is damaged by the effects of serious drinking, especially by binge drinking in teenagers. That's just the way alcohol is - it arrests the development of maturity, with serious consequences not only for the drinker, but that drinker's loved ones, colleagues, neighbors,etc. Binge drinking is poisonous, sometimes literally, and often causes a lifetime problems for a lot of folk whose lives get ruined. Don't do it.

by Susan Meehan on Aug 20, 2008 12:22 am  

Our brains, strictly speaking, are never mature. They're pumping out new neuron pathways as long as we're alive.

Alcohol can destroy a 40 year old's life(creating untold stress etc etc) just as easily as it can destroy a 19 year old's. We *claim* that both are equally liable for crimes - society has to have a cutoff point where responsibility can be ensured, and it's chosen 18 - it's just that the 19 year old has a few more crimes he's able to answer to. There is something fundamentally wrong with that assertion.

Your right to have standards and judgment about what you put into your body shouldn't interfere with someone else's control over their own their body. It's as applicable to alcohol as it is to cocaine, refined sugar, trans-fats, aspartame, or caffeine: your concern is admirable, but not your support for forcibly taking away a fundamental freedom.

by Squalish on Aug 20, 2008 12:42 am  

Raise the driving age to 21? How about we stop trying to discriminate against a minority age group by taking away rights from them?

If i could have gone out to bars when i was 18, i would have. "College students don't have a lot of money" argument? No, they don't, but i just graduated from GW -- turns out that the kids parents DO have a lot of money, and they give it in truckloads to their kids. I'm 23 now, and i can say that i've noticed a lot less binge drinking at bars then in dorms. It's a totally different environment.

and if you want to reduce drunk driving, sure, you could try prohibition, or you could try banning say, automobiles. but wouldn't that be cutting off the nose to spite the face? How about we focus energies on FIGHTING DRUNK DRIVING instead of fighting alcohol.

by jared on Aug 20, 2008 9:41 am  

"Any additional years in which kids could access alcohol before their brains are finished maturing would be a crime in my eyes - the supporters would have more deaths for which they would be responsible than those who have just beaten gun control in this city."

Yep, lowering the drinking age to 18 would be responsible for more deaths than removing the ban on handguns. That is to say, no increased deaths whatsoever. Look, I understand this is personal for you, and that binge drinking is bad in the same way that handgun violence is bad, but if civilization's experience with prohibition has shown us anything, it's that wishful thinking and good intentions are not an effective solution.

Legalize drinking for 18 year-olds; but hold bar owners accountable for the drinking that goes on in their establishments. It's infinitely better to have people drinking in a supervised environment than in the basement of a frat house.

"Just don't do it."

'Just say no,' is not the most novel approach.

by ibc on Aug 20, 2008 10:49 am  

As someone who didn't drink before age 21, I can assure you that the drinking age is way too high. You can be drafted to go to war at 18 (or enlist voluntarily at 17). I think you should be able to drink if you're old enough to die for your country. America has the highest drinking age for any country where it is legal to drink, and to me that is a bit absurd.

From an urbanist standpoint, I agree with some of the above comments about lowering the drinking age and raising the driving age. Personally, I'd like to see them switched (16 to drink, 21 to drive). This would force our culture to rely on alternative transportation to an older age, which would certainly evolve our usage of automobiles to something more practical. Additionally, it encourages a traditionally social activity among people who would be unable to drive to partake in said activity. This would cut down on drinking and driving while encouraging people to go out while not using cars.

And leave it up to the bar owners to set the minimum age of their clientele and what they are willing to serve them That way, bars won't have to sacrifice their character to allow high school kids into their establishment.

by Dave Murphy on Aug 21, 2008 1:06 am  

As someone who didn't drink before age 21, I can assure you that the drinking age is way too high. You can be drafted to go to war at 18 (or enlist voluntarily at 17). I think you should be able to drink if you're old enough to die for your country. America has the highest drinking age for any country where it is legal to drink, and to me that is a bit absurd.

From an urbanist standpoint, I agree with some of the above comments about lowering the drinking age and raising the driving age. Personally, I'd like to see them switched (16 to drink, 21 to drive). This would force our culture to rely on alternative transportation to an older age, which would certainly evolve our usage of automobiles to something more practical. Additionally, it encourages a traditionally social activity among people who would be unable to drive to partake in said activity. This would cut down on drinking and driving while encouraging people to go out while not using cars.

And leave it up to the bar owners to set the minimum age of their clientele and what they are willing to serve them That way, bars won't have to sacrifice their character to allow high school kids into their establishment.

by Dave Murphy on Aug 21, 2008 1:06 am