Why can't an 18 year old go to a bar for a night out but they can enlist in the armed forces?

Question

You are allowed to sacrifice your life at 18 for your Country but not drink till 21? This makes no sense - there are plenty of 30,40,&50 + year olds not capable of handling their alcohol intake. This seems disciminatory to me? what do think about this matter ? If you are old / mature enough to fight for your Country then you should be able to consume alcohol legally.

Answer 1

I agree with you. When I turned 18 and signed up for the draft, I was able to take my card and buy my first drink(S!).
But the Gov. found a steep increase in alcohol related car deaths in the 18-21 year group, so they changed the age back to 21.

Answer 2

Although some of the rules are unclear/confusing there have to be some rules. The answer to your question is straight forward, if you are 17 years 364 days old you cant buy a cigarette and if you are 18 years and 1 second old you can actually buy a cigarette. Now all this rule seems stupid, if this rule wasn't made all kids from 8 years to 18 years of age would be found smoking on the streets, not that there not any right now but if there was no rule at all everyone would be doing it.

Yes, in America an 18 year old can have wife and kids and cant drink. You can sacrifice your life for the army but cant consume safe proportions of alcohol, maybe you can bring down the drinking age to 18 too(also gambling). But in order to change signs in bars in the entire country and also on labels of alcohol bottles, etc the country would have to spend billions of dollars, so in order to save so much money they wouldn't change the legal drinking age.

To finish this answer, do not worry if you are under-21, there is not much time before you turn 21 and then you can drink responsibly. So good luck.

Answer 3

The same reason that males under 25 get screwed on car insurance. They are playing the odds. If 18-20 year olds were allowed to drink legally, there would be a LOT more trouble (DUI, car wrecks, bar fights). Don't get me wrong, I am sure there are under-21's that are very responsible, and, like you, I know that there are plenty of people of legal drinking age that act like they are not even 12 yet, let alone 21. But, like I said, they are playing the odds.
Now, there is no draft, so it is my understanding that people in the military, and this would include said 18-20 year olds, are there of their own free will. So it is their choice to "sacrifice their life" as you put it. I can not prove this, but I have heard that underage members of the military, in times of war, were actually allowed to drink. But maybe that was in the past (I know I did hear it somewhere)

Answer 4

Quit your whining. It has to do that at 21 you (in theory) are more mature than at 18. Since the revolutionary war, 18 has been the legal age to be an adult, if not 17. This has nothing to do with handling the alcohol, it has to do that at 18 you still act about the same as a 15 year old, as evidenced by this question.
Most 18 year olds that enlist aren't mature enough to make a good decision like joining the army, but we certainly aren't going to turn people away when we need an army to protect ourselves.

Answer 5

And what about the fact that you can vote when you're 18 but can't go in a bar.

Why don't all the 18-21 year olds start a movement to be able to drink legally at 18?

Answer 6

It’s because the decisions that have been made in the past by those 20 and under have caused many deaths, injuries, and destruction; resulting in the harm of other people that were at the wrong place at the wrong time. It's a fact that a lot of teenagers make bad and wrong decisions, and this is what caused the 21 and over ruling. So, go to Mexico or Europe and you can go into a bar at 18,17,16,15, etc and do what you want.

Answer 7

Because at 18 you can go across the border, either one and drink till you puke. Or if you are afraid to fight then you can again cross the border to avoid getting drafted. By the way, I don't see a specific need for a draft, yet. Also, imagine if 18 year olds were allowed to drink, how many of them do you think would end up driving while intoxicated? Do you see the light now?

Answer 8

Because the 18 - 20 yr-old voters have not created a voting block and gotten behind the issue. This is not federal law, but the federal government has pressured state governments to enact legislation by threatening to withhold money from the states. First step would be to make this a states rights issue and separate the issue of alcohol consumption by young adults (not minors) from that of federal funding of things like highways. Then, it comes down to reversing years of state statutes enacted to protect the states from losing federal funding. It's not impossible... look at the federally "encouraged" 55mph speed limit... it's gone.

That's not to say whether the drinking age should or should not be set at 21... but it should not be decided at the federal level since this is a states' rights issue. Of course, the downside to having varying drinking ages by state is that, as in the late 60's & early 70's between NY & NJ, underage drinkers in one state will cross the border to get drunk and then drive home.

Answer 9

Yeah, makes no sense really. You can smoke, have sex, get aids, fight and die for your country.. but you cant go out with your soldier buddies and get smashed after a tour of duty.

Frankly. Its because some odd years ago, when my dad was a kid, a few states had a law where you could drink at 18. However, they ran into a problum where 18 year olds from other states would drive across state borders, get tosted out of their minds then drive back home smashed.

Lots of drinking and driving

So they just made it a blanket rule that you cant drink till your 21.

Answer 10

Because young adults are irresponsible at 18... when the government had the drinking age at 18 there were more drunk incidents and they changed it to 21. Our government is already thought of as weak without having that they keep wavering on the drinking age. Not to mention 18 year olds are in college and will most likely have more access to beer and alcohol.