Posted by shyla at 5:28pm Feb 4 '05Why is it that at eighteen years of age we have the right to vote in our leader, to pick up a gun and go to war to be killed or to kill, to buy a pack of cigarettes that have the potential kill us, yet we can not buy alcohol, nor consume alcohol? How does it make sense to have a law telling us that we have reached the age and maturity of adulthood at eighteen (some states seventeen) yet monitor a right given to other adults that happen to be twenty one years of age or older? Is it not a complete contradiction?
The law tells us that when we reach the age of adulthood, we have the mental capacity and maturity to make the choice in voting for the people who will run our country. The law tells us that when we reach that age we can choose to defend our country, and possibly have that choice taken away from us by being chosen for us (military draft). How is it that we can be be taken to court and tried for a crime as an adult, but we are not adults in the eyes of the law? How can we be allowed to do all of these thing and make all of these choices, but we are not allowed to make a mature and adult choice to consume or to buy an alcoholic beverage? Don't you think that going to fight in a war or voting are more monumental choices that will have a greater and perhaps even more lasting effect on us in our adulthood than picking up a can of beer and having a drink?
I say we either move the age of adulthood up to twenty one years old or change the law for the age of drinking to be eighteen years old. What arguement are we given for the law to state that we must be 21 years of age to consume or to buy alcohol? And is the arguement valid?
The law tells us that when we reach the age of adulthood, we have the mental capacity and maturity to make the choice in voting for the people who will run our country. The law tells us that when we reach that age we can choose to defend our country, and possibly have that choice taken away from us by being chosen for us (military draft). How is it that we can be be taken to court and tried for a crime as an adult, but we are not adults in the eyes of the law? How can we be allowed to do all of these thing and make all of these choices, but we are not allowed to make a mature and adult choice to consume or to buy an alcoholic beverage? Don't you think that going to fight in a war or voting are more monumental choices that will have a greater and perhaps even more lasting effect on us in our adulthood than picking up a can of beer and having a drink?
I say we either move the age of adulthood up to twenty one years old or change the law for the age of drinking to be eighteen years old. What arguement are we given for the law to state that we must be 21 years of age to consume or to buy alcohol? And is the arguement valid?