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Sunday, January 2, 2022

Long Past Time To Lower The Drinking Age To 18

It's 2022 now, and this year may be a golden opportunity to finally lower the legal drinking age to 18 after so many decades of it being 21.  As the ignominious Covid regime continues to unravel and collapse faster than formerly healthy young athletes on the field after being injected with you-know-what, more and more people are questioning not only that, but the whole entire concepts of statism, safetyism, paternalism, and authoritarianism in general.  And with all the many parallels that can be drawn between the illiberal lockdown restrictions and mask and vaccine mandates and passports on the one hand, and the illiberal and ageist abomination that is the 21 drinking age, one can easily draw a straight line between these illiberal policies.

The Overton window has finally been cracked open.  Let's get the drinking age lowered to 18 before it slams shut once again.  What better time than now?

Also, be sure to check out some great videos from the legendary Allistair Cooke as well as Leon Louw in regards to arguments against the drinking age.

8 comments:

  1. Well said. A drinking age of 18 is a more reasonable drinking age than 21. A drinking age of 18 in the U.S. would allow people who are 18-20 years old to drink responsibly.

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  2. Agree. Ironic how in America it used to be that to be 'liberal' was to be statist while to be 'conservative' was to be libertarian. I once argued in one of my books that in this context, authoritarian policies weren't 'illiberal' but 'liberal'.

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  3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKy2DlMARes&ab_channel=FOXCarolinaNews

    South Carolina lawmaker Todd Rutherford (D) filed a bill to lower the drinking age to 18 (for beer and wine) but hard liquor would remain 21. Bill could be debated in an upcoming legislative session. Thoughts?

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    1. That is indeed a good start. I think it should be 18 across the board, but I guess we gotta start somewhere. Hopefully it will pass.

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    2. Yes. It is a good bill. Hopefully, the bill will pass the legislature.

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    3. I mean I guess they're doing a tiered system because hard liquor consumed in excess can harmful, but couldn't the same be said of beer, wine, or those fancy seltzers?

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    4. Indeed, I have never fully understood the idea of a tiered drinking age between beer/wine and hard liquor, as you can get just as drunk on one as on the other. Some European countries famously make that distinction, of course, but in their case, it is more like 16 for beer/wine and 18 for hard liquor. And before the drinking age was raised to 21 in the 1980s, there were several states that set it at 18 for beer and/or wine and 21 for wine and/or liquor. Either way it is still a major step in the right direction though.

      One idea that Twenty-One Debunked officially supports is a tiered purchase age based not on beverage type, but on quantities purchased. For example 18 for all alcohol generally, and either 19, 20, or 21 for bulk quantities such as kegs, cases, and large bottles of liquor, or for making more than one off-premise alcohol transaction per day. That would help somewhat alleviate fears of increased high school keggers, or of 18 year olds buying for their younger friends.

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