Being 17 is tough. Not only are there essays to write and tests to take, but your future is looming in the distance, ready to fill up your time with laundry and taxes. Senior year is a time of nostalgia and anxiety, as you get ready to say goodbye to your childhood friends and embark on a quest to finish your college applications by the deadline.
When you’re 17, you’re still a child. Sure, you can’t eat off of the kids’ menu or get in for free at the museum, but you’re still a child.
Yet, when you turn 18, you have to be ready to suit up and defend your country, if need be.
The drafting age is 18. During the World Wars I and II, entire classes of 18-year-old seniors from Stuyvesant High School would be whipped into a bloodthirsty frenzy and thrust into a world of artillery fire and ringing eardrums. This legacy continues even today, with males having to click a little box promising to enroll them in the draft before they can even submit their college application.
What our country is saying is that our youth are allowed to die, for our country of course, but they’re not allowed to live their lives? What can you do when you turn 18? You can get your driver’s license. You can register to vote. You can go live on your own. But you can’t drink, you can’t smoke, you can’t rent a car or a hotel room without a hassle.
Until the 21st Amendment (and before the Prohibition Era), the drinking age was 18. But as soon as people began to think of alcohol as an immoral vice and the 21st Amendment was passed, you had to be 21 to drink legally. What changed during that time? Did people evolve to become more susceptible to alcohol’s effects? Did alcohol become more potent?
Nothing in the composition of alcohol changed. Nothing in the composition of people changed. On the other hand, war has evolved from trench warfare and chemical weaponry to suicide bombers and cyber attacks, making the act of having to enroll in the draft potentially more dangerous. In short, my argument is that alcohol has become no less dangerous, so why should we allow young adults to have the chance to die in combat before they can have their first alcoholic drink?