Have We Got the "Teen Brain" All Wrong?

One thing that is commonly accepted as a truism in the USA is that crime, especially violent crime, is a young person's (and especially a young man's) vice.  It typically rises rapidly in the mid-teens and peaks around the late teens and very early twenties before rapidly and then gradually declining from then on, and it is often said that "the best cure for crime is a 30th birthday."  The statistics do indeed bear this out, but it is often accepted without question that the causes of this phenomenon are biological (particularly neurological and/or hormonal) as opposed to cultural ones.

Well, a new study by researchers at Penn State seems to put the lie to the biological determinist theory.    While previous studies tended to look only at Western cultures (which all show a similar age pattern for crime), this one compared the USA to Taiwan instead.  If brain development (or lack thereof) is the cause, then the age pattern for crime should be pretty much the same worldwide, but it turns out that this was not the case for Taiwan.  Over there, crime peaked in the late twenties and early thirties, roughly a decade later than in the USA.  Thus, the researchers concluded, that cultural factors, not biological/neurological ones, are primarly responsible for the crime patterns by age.   Notably, this is true even though the drinking age in Taiwan is 18, compared to 21 in the USA.

It is rare that a single study can overturn such an apparent mountain of evidence.  Unless, of course, that "mountain" turned out to be a molehill all along--and a rather shaky one at that.

Reflections on the Penn State Tragedy

In the wake of the Penn State tragedy which led to the untimely death of 19 year old sophomore Timothy Piazza, Twenty-One Debunked was initially quiet about it lest we be accused of cynically exploiting this tragedy.  But as time goes on, I have decided that as an activist and a Penn State alum myself, I cannot remain silent about it any longer.

First, I must say that the fraternity brothers who were present at the event in which Piazza was fatally injured should not be in any way absolved of responsibility for what happened.  It was bad enough that they gave (or more accurately, force-fed) him ludicrous amounts of alcohol in a short amount of time, enough to reach a BAC of 0.40 (!), apparently as a hazing ritual.   But when he fell down the stairs and sustained a nasty head injury and was barely responsive, they could have very likely saved his life by calling 911 or otherwise getting medical attention for him, but chose not to.  Instead, they basically treated him like a rag doll and subsequently let him "sleep it off".   Regardless of the drinking age and the age of the people involved, what the brothers did, and failed to do, was nothing less than reckless, selfish, and cowardly, and they should certainly never be allowed to get away with it.  So don't even think about putting any sort of words in our mouths.

But then a very ageist article was wrtitten to try to explain this tragedy away as a result of brain development or lack thereof.  And that's when we at Twenty-One Debunked really saw nothing but red.  The article was not only blatantly ageist, but completely missed the point by a long shot.  If the drinking age was 18, for example, this tragedy would have been far less likely to have happened.  There would be less reason for frats to even exist begin with, since 18-20 year old students would readily have more reliable alternative sources for alcohol and parties, and most of all drinking would occur in safer environments in which people would be more far likely to call 911 or otherwise get help for injuries or overdoses without fear of legal reprisals.  Even medical amnesty policies, which are good, are still no substitute for full legalization or at least decriminalization of "underage" drinking in general.  While lowering the drinking age is not a magic bullet, it will nonetheless go a long way towards reducing the problem of extreme and dangerous drinking on college campuses and towns, particularly among Greek organizations and athletes.  Additionally, we need to hold rogue individuals and organizations accountable for their behavior regardless of how powerful or privileged they are.

How many more must die or otherwise have their lives ruined for such an ignoble experiment as the 21 drinking age?   Are we as a society really so pharisaical that we don't even follow our own advice when we selectively say "if it saves one life, it's worth it"?   Because the logical conclusion of that line of reasoning is that the pro-21 crowd has some serious blood on their hands.