Why when children are more wordly wise these days do we still have an age limit of 16 and 18 for sex and drink

Question

Most 16 year olds these days are a lot more knowledgable than I ever was at that age and yet we tend to treat them as though they dont know anything.
At 16 my daughter was more than capable of making a descion to have sex (or not) with her boyfriend than I did. She has a mature head on her shoulders and is well aware of the dangers that life hold.
Teenagers have a lot more information at their fingertips and more help is available for them in all types of situation.

The age limit doesnt seem to be stopping underage sex or drinking. The bad behaviour you see on streets (gangs etc) has nothing to do with age limit its to do with bad parenting

Answer 1

Firstly while I agree most teenagers are more wise,not all are and they need protecting as always...

Secondly, as far as the legal age for alcohol is concerned, it gives young peoples bodies a chance to fully develop, ie... liver and kidneys, before they start destroying these vital organs with the consumption of alcohol...

Young people grow up fast enough these days, the least we can do as adults is offer them a little protection from their selves by allowing their bodies to fully develop before they start destroying it, as adults they will have a life time to do that if they choose to

Answer 2

Look, the question you're asking is a fair one but I'm sure nobody is denying that some age limit for sex, alcohol and tobacco is necessary. The real question is where should the line be drawn.

There are some very mature 16 year olds capable of making well thought out and intelligent decisions. There also many immature 30 year olds incapable of doing the right thing.
Do we apply a maturity test on every individual, denying them their rights, regardless of age, if they're not mature enough?

The other side of the coin is that we cannot give rights to one mature 16 year old and deny another. What age would you prefer? 15? 13? 10? 8? There is a line for each person where they say "that's too young!"

Those ages (16,18) are a reasonble choice as they represent a statistical measure of maturity and also make the fewest people cringe about how young they are.

Answer 3

Although most teenagers are more worldly wise, the simple fact is that at this time in there lives they are not emotionally mature enough to cope with the complications that these life decisions bring. You only have to think back to when you were that age and believed that you could cope with anything. It`s only as you mature that you can look back at all those wise words that your parents threw at you and realise that they actually may have known what they were talking about (to a degree).
Leading by example is the best thing any parent can do for there children. The fact that we live in an age where information is readily available is no substitute for demonstrating right and wrong.

Answer 4

The teenage pregnancy rate would suggest otherwise. Some teenagers are very mature for their age, others are not. At the end of the day they are still children, and are often very impressionable and can easily be talked into doing things whether they have the information at their fingertips or not.

I know several women who had children in their teens, some were younger than sixteen. A few of them have had serious issues, mostly relating to the fact that they had to grow up so quickly, others just regret that they missed out on things, no matter how much they love their children. Kids are growing up too fast these days as it is, why shorten their childhood even more?

Answer 5

It is because the prefrontal lobe in the brain isn't fully matured yet in the late teens, this part of the brain helps you make decisions that are logical and rational, which is one of the things teens don't all have a good grip of at that age. In fact, sometimes the lobe isn't fully developed until the early 20s, which is why college students are known for undeveloped behavior, like binge drinking and so on.

During your late teens your decisions are still mainly made by your hippocampus region of the brain, which is part of the emotion center of the brain (the limbic system). If a teen is making decisions based on emotions it won't be looking out for the well-being of the child. This explains why teens give into peer pressure, because peer pressure acts against your emotions activating your hippocampus and letting you make decisions that aren't in best judgment, like drinking, sex, and the things that come with those things like driving or protection.


Summary: Children, although they are more knowledgeable now then they were in the past, don't have the mental ability at that age to make logical and calculated decisions that look out for your well-being before anything else. Also, just because some children are more mature than others you can't make one or the other an exception to laws and rules, because what does that teach your children? Is shows them that the law doesn't apply to them and not breaking the set laws shows true mature and cognitive thinking from your teen's side.

~~Also, it's not because you body isn't fully developed, because either way alcohol is bad for your liver and actually at a younger age your body can heal from drug damage better than if you were older and suffering from drug damage. (Younger organs vs. older organs; it seems logical that the younger active organ will beable to recover from the damage to your body faster)

Answer 6

At 16 your daughter may have been very mature, but that doesn't mean that all 16 year olds are, I am sure you will have noticed hanging about your town centre groups of 16+ yr old kids, finding it hilarious that they can throw bottles off cars and verbally abuse people who walk past - would you really want them to be given more responsibility.

As for the drinking side of things plenty of kids drink underage, but you cannot trust them to know how much drink they can handle. It is far too easy for people to take advantage of drunken young women without them having access to legally drunken school kids.

On top of this there is the issue of sexual abuse cases I wouldn't like to think that if the ages of consent were dropped that this would give people some sort of defence whereby for example they could claim that sex with a 14 year old was consensual.

Answer 7

A lot of things that have been said here are absolutely correct. Bad parenting is out of control. Role models are horrendous examples. Respect for authority is dimming daily. But how do we change it? There are so many good kids out there who don't get any credit for being good kids, and I think that we have to do our very best to encourage them and to support them for not falling victim to today's popular standards. The change in society in our lifetimes has been monumental and we don't understand some of the pressures that kids are under these days because those pressures didn't exist in our day. The sixties, where we tried to make some good changes are long gone, and the leaders that we had then have disappeared into the mainstream for the most part. There are no young role models or leaders out there encouraging our young people to make this a better world. We have to hope that soon, someone of these good young people will have the courage to step to the forefront and try to teach their peers that there is a better way to live. That they have to take charge of their lives and make this a better world for their own children. I have to believe that the world will turn again someday, and that lives will be better for everyone. We can't give up hope for their futures.

Answer 8

Since kids that age seem to know everything, we should let them start screwing up their lives legally. It doesn't matter that accidents involving alcohol were reduced by over 35% when the drinking age was raised to 21 and that women who bear children in their teens have a greater chance of being on welfare for the most part of their lives than do women who have thier first child after the age of 20.

Why stop at lowering the consent age and drinking age. Let's allow children to drive at 12 and get married at 10. I think they're mature enough, don't you??

Answer 9

Kids are kids. At 16 and 18 they are still very much impressionable. Peer pressure can make them do things they normally shouldn't. At there young age the body recuperates much faster than a 35 year old so they don't get the full negative effects.

Personally I would like the age limit for minor sex to be raised to 18 and Drink in My state is 21 a good age.

Answer 10

wisdom mostly dawns at old age. a decision with purity of knowledge and a decision as a matter of need, makes lot of difference. most of the rules and regulations are made with hard thinking. as you say, old generations were not having the same exposure the new generations have now. probably age limits are fixed considering more of physical structure than one's capacity to take decision. sexual urge starts even much earlier to age of 16. that does not mean that the age limit for attaining majority to be reduced to the age when sexual urge starts. a decision taken to satisfy the urge need not necessarily be correct. a person in urge is always in haste!