Why underage drinkers are smarter than you think

[darklordoftech]

If someone is an underage drinker, it means that they are aware that the authorities aren't always right and successfully planned how to sneak around authority. They successfully planned how to aquire the alcohol and (if they aren't busted) how to avoid getting busted. People who say, "I'm going to leave politics to the adults because my brain isn't fully developed" scare me far more than underage drinkers do because an obedient and disenganged population is more likely to accept a tyranny than a rebellious population.

[Small L]

What about all those people who drink underage but also don't care about politics?

[RFayette]

What about all those people who drink underage but also don't care about politics?

[Karpatsky]

Underage drinkers don't do so out of a conscious desire to challenge authoritarianism in their political system, they do it because they're young and stupid and want to get trashed.

[°Leprechaun]

Challenging authority is a good thing considering that Trump is POTUS, but there are better ways to do it than doing something that could ruin your own life (not necessarily will, but could).

It is cutting off your nose to spite your face.

Half the people in the world have below average intelligence, drinking isn't going to make them smarter.

[Antonio the Sixth]

makes u think

[LimoLiberal]

What if I'm smart about politics and at the same time bad about chugging fourlokos?

[BundouYMB]

There's an age requirement to drink alcohol for a reason, so all they've showed is that they're either a). too stupid to understand why there is or b). too self-destructive or susceptible to peer pressure to care.

Doesn't exactly make me think "leaders of tomorrow" but Donald Trump is President, so who knows!

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Were your parents particularly strict? You obviously have a “thing” about laws, parental controls, etc.

[Lechasseur]

At anyrate one ''social issue'' I'm very liberal on is lowering the drinking age. I think lowering it to 18 would make young people drink more responsibly because they wouldn't feel the need to binge everytime they got their hands on some alcohol. And one way or the other I think if you're old enough to enlist and to vote, you're also old enough to drink (frankly if anything I think the voting and drinking ages should be switched).

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Binge drinking has increased in the US since the general rise to age 21 of the drinking age. (Not everyplace had 18 at the minimum, or had a split between liquor and beer/wine. (SC was 18 for beer/wine and 21 for liquor.) However, it seems to me binge drinking in general has increased in the west, including in places that haven't raised the minimum, so it seems to me that cannot be considered the cause of the phenomenon and at most a contributing factor.

[darklordoftech]

Were your parents particularly strict? You obviously have a “thing” about laws, parental controls, etc.

My parents sent me to a school that force-fed me awful food, sent me to summer school instead of camp, forbade me from talking to girls, and forbade me from ever leaving their sight when it wasn't school hours.

The reason I created this thread wasn't to argue that the drinking age should be lower, but rather to say that disobeying the drinking age doesn't mean that you're a moron.

[Chunk Yogurt for President!]

Is this referring to people who drink responsibly before the age of 21 (in which case, both I before my 21st birthday and the majority of the under 21 population count) or people who try to get wasted every weekend?

[darklordoftech]

Is this referring to people who drink responsibly before the age of 21 (in which case, both I before my 21st birthday and the majority of the under 21 population count) or people who try to get wasted every weekend?

The former.

[Ban my account ffs!]

Challenging authority is a good thing considering that Trump is POTUS, but there are better ways to do it than doing something that could ruin your own life (not necessarily will, but could).

It is cutting off your nose to spite your face.

Half the people in the world have below average intelligence, drinking isn't going to make them smarter.

No.  Half the people in the world have below median intelligence. 
Underage drinking does by it’s very nature force you to challenge authority.  It opens that debate in your head regardless of your affinity or lack of for politics.  The do gooders and the rule followers are, well, irritating at best, and dangerous at worst.  Of course there are tons of people that are none of those things.

[darklordoftech]

Were your parents particularly strict? You obviously have a “thing” about laws, parental controls, etc.

I've longed to discuss my belief that teenagers should be able to emancipate themselves at will, but I'm not sure what website to share it on.