Should the Drinking Age be lowered to 18

(MLDA) Minimum Legal Drinking Age It seems that most of your argument is based upon the direct and indirect damage that alcohol can do to not only to the user but also the users family and innocent people. To apply some historical context to why the drinking age is as high as it is, id like to introduce the fact that Mothers against drunk driving campaigned and lobbied on a federal and national level in 1984 to change the drinking age to 21. The government at the time meet their demands and this is why the drinking age is 21. (1) Yes not everything is unlocked at the age of 18 but the rights you are given are those that impact the individual rather than society. The concept of legal paternalism is reliant on the basis that everyone follows the laws. Just go to a college or high school party and you'll see underaged teenagers drinking alcohol. Why they drink when they're clearly breaking the law. They do it because doing so is a forbidden or rebellious act that gives youth the thrill of breaking the law. (2) with the lowering of the drinking age from 21 to 18 would remove said thrill, normalizing alcohol consumption and teaching youth to consume alcohol within moderation. The website you cited your info from also had many pros to lowering the drinking age that perfectly combat the statistics given on the impact of drinking age on drinking and driving. But for the sake of the debate i will reiterate them for you. "In 2009, the 21- to 24-year-old age group had the highest percentage of drivers in fatal crashes with blood-alcohol concentration (BAC) levels of .08 or higher " 35 percent."(2) this proves that newly aged drinkers were the most responsible for fatal accidents involving alcohol. This statistic proves that regardless of how long you make adults wait until they drink they will continue to make the mistake of taking the wheel while under the influence of alcohol. "Although the United States increased the MLDA to 21 in 1984, its rate of traffic accidents and fatalities in the 1980s decreased less than that of European countries whose legal drinking ages are lower than 21". This proves that the increased drinking age did not impact the decrease of fatal accidents involving alcohol. to respond to the allegations of high suicide rates and violence due to alcohol consumption, id like to quote the studies upon the MLDA. "A 2002 meta-study of the legal drinking age and health and social problems, 72% of the studies found no statistically significant relationship despite claims that lowering the MLDA to 18 would increase suicide and criminal activities by adolescents."(2) To address the claims of injury and illness related the the MLDA "Lowering MLDA 21 would reduce the number of underage people who are hurt from alcohol-related injuries or accidents due to fear of legal consequences if they sought medical attention." I would also like to state that drinking and driving is illegal and morally wrong. There are very few people who would challenge that. But laws pertaining to drinking and driving are already within The criminal code and U.S. code if you wanted to prevent drinking and driving you'd make laws that punish and publicly denounce the act of drinking and driving rather than implementing an MLDA of 21. Its been proven that statistics given in your arguments are both miscued and unreliable which proves that there is no correlation between the raised MLDA and less fatalities and related issues. It's obvious that the high MLDA of 21 encourages extreme behaviour in those aged 15-21 and treating it like the forbidden fruit of society is no way of solving issues that surround alcohol "Drinking Age ProCon.org." ProConorg Headlines. Web. 22 Sept. 2014. . "Mothers Against Drunk Driving." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 9 Feb. 2014. Web. 22 Sept. 2014. .