Roughly six months ago, over 100 university presidents around the nation signed a petition encouraging the lowering of the national drinking age to 18. There hasn’t been much talk about it since then, other than the addition of a few signatures here and there, but huge coverage or not, I think this is an issue that needs discussing.’ Just to clear the air, I am already 21 so there is no personal gain in me promoting a lowered drinking age. If anything, it would sort of annoy me since I had to wait to be 21 instead of just 18, but ultimately there is sound reasoning behind having a lower drinking age. First off, most people are 18 before they go to college for their freshman year, so they will already know what it is like to drink with people legally. Before I turned 21, people kept telling me once I turned 21 I wouldn’t really care about drinking as much, and in all the infinite wisdom of an 18-year-old jackass, I told them that wouldn’t happen to me. Sure enough, I turned 21 last summer and since then, I still drink often enough for a college student, but I don’t seek it out as though I was still underage. If it happens it happens. This same epiphany would happen for incoming freshmen as well, and in one fell swoop it would take a major burden off universities being flooded by these 18-year-olds because it would no longer be the responsibility of the university to police underage students for drinking in the dorms, offering classes that tell the dangers of binge drinking and just being drunk period. Having the drinking age at 21 was primarily to avoid high school kids having legal access to alcohol.’ However, those of us who have been in high school since the law was passed to raise the legal age know that just because it is illegal for anyone under 21 to have alcohol does not mean they won’t get their underage hands on it anyway. Within reason, people in high school can get hold of virtually anything, regardless of the product’s legality.’ Marijuana is completely illegal in America, not just to a certain age like alcohol, yet I would wager an American greenback that at least 50 percent of high school students have smoked the ganja at least once in their lives.’ Regardless of it being illegal, underage people will still drink, and usually it is in the form of dangerous, binge drinking at house parties. These underage people don’t know when they will be able to get more alcohol, especially within that night, so they drink as much as possible just to make sure they get their money’s worth. Also, the fact that they are underage and can get in serious trouble for drinking usually deters most underage people from getting help if something serious happens such as an injury or someone getting alcohol poisoning.’ Once people turn 21 and can legally drink, they will usually stop going to so many house parties, usually dominated by people who are two or three years younger. Instead they go to local bars where, because of having to spend money per drink instead of just buying alcohol in bulk in cases and cubes, they usually drink in more moderate amounts.’ There are still exceptions to this rule, but for the most part – and I know this from experience – people don’t get so stupid drunk from binge drinking at the bars, mainly because most college kids simply can’t afford to do that all the time. And of course, there’s always the argument that if people who are 18 can vote for a president and go kill people in war, why can’t they order a beer at a restaurant or bar? We all know the voting and enlistment ages aren’t going to be raised anytime soon, so why not just lower the drinking age? These sorts of things go hand-in-hand as a passage of rites into adulthood anyway, so why separate them by three years when the rule is being widely abused anyway? To some, this may sound like an apathetic logic to a problem in America, but in reality, by lowering the drinking age, there would still be some problems with people going over the top with binge drinking. It goes on today with people over 21, but the vast majority of people affected by this would have some fun at first, and then the novelty would wear off, and they would just be another group of people who can legally drink. The ‘underage drinking problem’ is only a problem because legislators in our country have allowed it to be a problem. It is a problem that can be solved by giving these kids the right to drink and taking the novelty and thrill out of underage drinking.