In recent weeks this newspaper has run stories with titles like "Alcohol Use a Concern," and the growing atmosphere of worry has caused some people to fall back upon the argument that lowering the drinking age would help remove the motivation to binge drink, and thus save lives. Or at least trips to Parkview Adventist Medical Center. But espousing such a view without considering the consequences on a scale larger than Bowdoin is foolish.
On many evenings out on the town in Germany with my friends, in order to distract ourselves from the close-approaching moment of reckoning when we would be forced to confront the bill, my friends and I would cast our minds around for things to toast with our drinks. We raised our drinks often to people's health, to school work being over (or not), and to the joy of being downtown on a weekend. In the midst of all of this, though, there was one topic which almost always presented itself, and was duly toasted: our joy of not being in the United States, where we would not be able to enjoy such an evening.
As 18-year-olds drunk on—among other things—the exhilaration of being out in the Big City on our own, we scoffed at how ridiculous a drinking age of 21 would be. We were younger than that, and we were doing fine, weren't we? Indeed, we would raise our glasses and laugh at the misfortune of our trans-Atlantic peers, then drain the last of our drinks, argue about the bill, and gradually make our way to the nearest bus or train stop. The worst thing that ever happened to us—or indeed, reasonably could have happened—was being forced to wait for an hour in icy midnight air for the next bus, or perhaps being beguiled into paying for someone else's drink.
Until I was making my way to Bowdoin last summer, I had assumed nights out in the U.S. would be rather similar. Then, while winding our way up the coast from Boston, my father and I stopped at a restaurant, and I idly, perhaps subconsciously seeking to torture myself, opened the drinks menu. I was impressed, my friends would have enjoyed sampling the array of beverages on offer, but in the midst of my musings, I put down the paper and glanced around. There was no bus. There was no train. Somewhat confused, I actually asked my father how people would get home after they drank, so foreign was the idea of someone actually choosing to drive while intoxicated.
Of course, there was no Amtrak line lurking around the next bend, and as I mused on the subject more, I recalled figures which I had previously dismissed as useless. While it is somewhat contentious, there is fairly strong data that suggests that driving fatalities have markedly decreased since the drinking age was increased. While we can debate the accuracy of such claims, the truth is that if one chooses to drink at a bar in the U.S., there is usually no other way home save four wheels, and it's futile to argue that drunk driving is a good idea. Especially considered in light of the shoddy levels of driver training offered in the U.S., perhaps it is necessary for people to get years of experience behind the wheel before they can survive trips out on the town rather than just getting quietly drunk in homes when parents are away.
Of course, at a place like Bowdoin, where everything is a short walk away, the American drinking age makes even less sense than it would somewhere with public transportation. However, what proponents of a lower drinking age often forget is that most Americans between the ages of 18 and 21 don't live at a residential college. They live off campus, with their parents, or are out working on their own. For all of them, being able to get drunk at a bar would mean a hazardous trip home that could end in death. Yes, the idea of a "designated driver" is a good one, but in the real world I seriously doubt it is practiced often, especially by those most at risk for drunk driving.
I am not arguing that we should leave the drinking age at 21 and stop debating the issue. Indeed, a refusal to look deeper into the issue is exactly the kind of mentality that is making this an issue.
Lowering the drinking age would put many people's lives in danger, perhaps more than would be saved by reducing the pressure to binge drink due to alcohol being an illicit substance. Yes, the law is ridiculous in an environment like Bowdoin's, but to argue for a wide-ranging change in the American drinking age without considering the wider world is, if anything, more ridiculous.
A law that allowed residential college students to drink while maintaining the current drinking age for those who have to drive to parties would be nonsensical, unfair, and impossible to enforce. Anyone who wants to seriously consider the issue must acknowledge that there are valid, rational arguments for keeping the law the way it is. Too often people dismiss the "other side" as merely social conservatism, and real debate is crushed. While all too common at Bowdoin, it is ridiculous to hold views on policy decisions without considering that there is a world outside of the Bowdoin bubble. Many laws—such as a lowered drinking age—that would solve many local problems could have disastrous consequences on the national level. We need to remember this before we start blaming the law for our own problems; a home-grown solution would be far preferable.