There’s something missing on the bar scene in places such as Fort Lauderdale, Fla. and Tuscaloosa, Ala.
What is it? Eighteen to 20-year-olds. Both Florida and Alabama legislators have established laws prohibiting anyone under 21 from entering bars. The laws’ purposes are to curb the drunk driving deaths that occur in both states and to try to exert control over the bar crowds. I bet many 18-to-20-year-olds in Fort Lauderdale are less than happy with their unwelcome free time on the weekends.
If some Louisiana lawmakers get their way, many Louisiana 18-to-20-year-olds will be finding themselves with nothing to do on the weekend as well.
Lawmakers are working on passing a bill that also would prohibit anyone younger than 21 from entering bars in Louisiana. Lawmakers who support the bill say it should pass because of the high amounts of alcohol-related traffic fatalities. They are right about the large amounts. There are far too many drunk-driving deaths. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 15,786 people were killed in alcohol-related accidents in 1999. But who is to say these alcohol-related deaths are directly related to those going to bars? Lawmakers do realize other places sell alcohol, right?
If allowing people who are not permitted to drink alcohol to enter places that sell it is hypocritical, as director of the Louisiana Highway Safety Commission Col. Jim Champagne has been quoted as saying, then instead of banning us from bars, the drinking age should be lowered so it is not illegal anymore.
Although the argument that because we are already doing it, it should be legal is an old one, it bears repeating. The truth is, 18-to-20-year-olds have been drinking alcohol for a long time. They drank 10 years ago, they drank 20 years ago, they drank when the lawmakers were that age and, yes, they drank even when George Dubya went to school. When on earth are lawmakers going to wake up and realize they cannot stop us from drinking?
Supporters of the 21 and older drinking age in Louisiana point to statistics that alcohol-related deaths have decreased since the law’s inception in 1987 as proof that the raised drinking age is working. But an equally large body of research points to other factors, such as the increase in drunk driving education, as contributing to the decrease in alcohol-related deaths.
Police and law enforcement spend countless hours of manpower and amounts of money trying to stop teens from drinking. Imagine what they could be stopping if they were not just trying to make sure everyone with a drink in their hand was wearing a wristband. Imagine what could be accomplished if all that money and manpower was spent to educate on responsible drinking.
Just because they cannot keep us from drinking does not mean they cannot control our drinking habits. Lawmakers should make drunk driving laws so ridiculously strict that no one would even have the guts to get in the driver’s seat after just one drink. Rather than kicking out people drinking without wristbands, security guards should be kicking out only those who pose a threat to others around them.
Allowing the drinking age to be lowered would not increase the number of drunk driving accidents, and it would not even increase the number of people drinking. Those who want to drink already do. What it would do is make us drink more responsibly. What if lawmakers and 18-to-20-year-olds compromised? If they give us the right to drink, then we will promise to know when to stop and not to get behind the wheel.
When we drink now, we are already doing something illegal, so what incentive do we have not to be stupid? If the lawmakers made sure we knew it was a privilege, one that could be taken away with even the slightest infraction, then I bet we would all drink a little more responsibly.
Few believe the bill to stop those younger than 21 from entering bars will actually pass, and some supporters claim the bill is just bringing attention to a problem. I agree; there is a problem. But let’s start using our energy, money and resources on solutions that will actually work.