Thread: Legal Age

Originally Posted by gugi

So here are the questions that have to be answered are: If there is a different or no age limit to drinking, what would be the rate of people drinking? How much higher/lower and how much more/less costly that would be to the society? What about drugs, tobacco?

I have no scientific data to base my opinions on this but i think that if there were no laws about legal drinking age then things wouldn't change much. Maybe first, but soon everything went down to situation we have right now.
I base my opinions for what i've experienced in few other countries i regularly visit where drinking culture is somewhat the same as here but availability is much easier and cheaper. People do not drink much more or less.
As i wrote before i think that most of our yongsters have already learned how to deal with alcohol civilized when they turn 18. Making availability easier it would be not a problem for teens so much but adults who already have problems with alcohol.
Making new harder laws would turn 99,5 - 100% of our teens into criminals. I can't see who would be winner then.

I cannot say if our laws are good or bad. In everyday life police pics up only those teens and adults who are dangerous either for themselves or other people. Being drunk even for underaged is no illegal. Only buying and having alcohol.

Originally Posted by Sailor

I base my opinions for what i've experienced in few other countries i regularly visit where drinking culture is somewhat the same as here but availability is much easier and cheaper. People do not drink much more or less.

Living in a country where underage drinking is legal and generally not frowned upon as long as the kids aren't drunk... I can tell you that we don't seem to have more problems than other countries. One thing that is different is that kids here know their limits by the time they hit college, which is not a bad thing.

And yes, it happens that 16 year olds drink too much and get very drunk. Generally it happens only once because the experience of their first hangover cures them of the desire to repeat that mistake.

Originally Posted by Bruno

Living in a country where underage drinking is legal and generally not frowned upon as long as the kids aren't drunk... I can tell you that we don't seem to have more problems than other countries. One thing that is different is that kids here know their limits by the time they hit college, which is not a bad thing.

And yes, it happens that 16 year olds drink too much and get very drunk. Generally it happens only once because the experience of their first hangover cures them of the desire to repeat that mistake.

That is how it goes here too. Education has taught us within 20 years or so, and nowadays drinking is much more civilized than when i was young. We still have problems but they aren't related to age. I recently saw some studies saying that teenage drinking is not so common than it used to be some years ago.

I just spent 3 months in the US at 20. Drinking underage was a VERY big deal for the organisation I worked for, if you drank underage and got caught, you were out. You were also not allowed to drink, or keep alcohol, on their premisis even if you were 21

Now, in the UK, you can drink at 18 and I've been drinking (not the odd glass of wine) since I was 15 and 16 in pubs. Not very often, but drinking far more than I should have done. I learnt my limits and more or less stick to them like glue these days.

For me, I think drinking in the US has an entirely different feel to here. Here, I quite happily go out to the pub on my own and prop up the bar talking to people I know by sight, name, or have never met before in my life. People in the US seem go out when the happy hours are on, with a group of mates. Much more of a clubby feel to the bars, I felt.

There is also this whole 'hard liquor' thing, like beer is some how not as dangerous a drink as scotch. I don't understand that, if I'm honest. I didn't drink scotch at all in the states because I didn't fancy my chances getting served it.

Do I think it's fair the 21 thing? not really. Do I think the idylic french culture of introducing alcohol early and some how not bringing up people who drink too much is true either? Not a chance, france has big problems with alcohol related illness, maybe not from binge drinking but from chronic use.

I didn't have a problem buying beer, and I enjoyed it. Sat with friends in the yard, soaking up the atmosphere and to hell with the rules - we were just about all European and it's just in the blood, it's part of growing up and becoming an adult. After 8 days without a shower, a cold beer goes down very well indeed. There is no simple answer, but IMO, people are secure enough in themselves at 18 to have a drink if they want to. A lot of my friends don't drink at all.

Enjoy your drinks, gentlemen.