Almost every obstacle that young people face is diminished by having someone at their side guiding them along the way. From the very first step that a child takes, to when they first get behind the wheel of a car, their parents are with them guiding and coaching them along the way. Children are more influenced by their parents than anyone else, and their parents are the best guides because they have experienced nearly everything their children will face. However, something that too many parents fail to teach their children is how to drink alcohol.
In America, drinking among teens is thought of as being a dangerous thing, and the facts support that assumption. A statistic that is often repeated is that car accidents are the No. 1 cause of death among teens, and even worse, nearly 25 percent of those accidents involve alcohol. Unlike nearly everything else in their life, Americans learn about drinking first from their friends or through experimenting themselves. Without any real guidance or knowledge as to how alcohol affects them, this can lead to life-altering mistakes. The problems that occur with the misuse of alcohol by college students start long before they ever leave home. Eighty percent of high school students have tried alcohol, and about 30 percent of them admit to binge drinking.
The current laws are not effective and have not been proven to fix the problems related to alcohol misuse. Before the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984 was passed, lawmakers worried that teens would drink in large amounts, drawing their younger peers into drinking as well. Today, problems associated with drinking are worse than they were before 1984. Students drink quickly and in large amounts to avoid being caught. The argument that a higher drinking age stops younger kids from drinking is in dispute. Having the drinking age set at 21 has not stopped high school students from drinking during their teenage years.
The U.S. stands alone in having a drinking age of 21. No other Western country has similar drinking age restrictions, and arguably the U.S. has the most problems with drinking getting out of hand. Parental involvement with drinking is essential to help curb the need to overindulge in alcohol.
Most other countries in the world treat drinking as something that is done at a young age in the home. Drinks are often paired with different foods, and drinking is something done with the family. We would benefit immensely by promoting similar practices. If the legal purchasing age were lowered to 18, young adults would be able to learn the appropriate way to drink. Parents must be able to teach their children the proper way to drink in the home before they are 18 so that they know their limits. The best way to keep students from sneaking out to drink with friends and endangering themselves and others is to bring drinking into the home. It is better to have one or two drinks at the dinner table than 10 to 12 at a friend’s house. It can be expected that teenagers will want to experiment and learn how different things will affect them. Alcohol consumption laws encourage students to not enjoy the alcohol but to get as drunk possible as quickly as possible without consideration for themselves or others.
Currently there is a bill being proposed by more than 100 college chancellors and presidents to lower the drinking age from 21 to 18. The movement is called the Amethyst Initiative and states that current laws encourage binge drinking. The bill has the opportunity to improve the lives of college students across the country. If the drinking age is lowered, then hopefully students will begin to learn their limits at an earlier time. The problem is that many groups oppose the bill, and it needs support to be able to survive. MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon has given her support to the bill but has not added her name to the list of presidents. MSU students and their parents need to petition to support this bill. It will take the support from a large number of people in order to pass.
Drinking in the U.S. is thought of as being something forbidden that is done in secret and in large amounts. Our current practices involving alcohol cause grim repercussions, and we have obviously not yet found the solution.
Gerard Ruskowski is a State News guest columnist and political theory and constitutional democracy sophomore. Reach him at
ruskows1@msu.edu
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