Millersville University freshmen talk about lowering the drinking age. They are (from left) Lisa Horna
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Suggest lowering the drinking age to 18. Then be prepared for a firestorm of reaction.
Schools, law enforcement personnel and college students have widely differing views on a move this week by 100 college presidents, including Elizabethtown College's Ted Long, calling on lawmakers to discuss lowering the drinking age from 21 to 18.
The college presidents say that current drinking laws are not working, encourage dangerous binge drinking and force colleges to become enforcers rather than educators on the topic.
But others say changing the drinking age is a horrible idea.
"I find it appalling that they would even consider that," says Robert Frick, a local school superintendent whose high school seniors would be affected by such a change.
"It sounds like the primary reason is that it's tough to enforce and makes them police people, makes their job tougher," the Lampeter-Strasburg School District superintendent says. "The bottom line is what's best for 18-year-olds. Are they responsible enough to be given the freedom to drink whenever they want?
"I only deal with them until we graduate them. Until then? Definitely not."
Janet Bauer, a partner in the Bauer Beverage beer distributor business in Lancaster, could see an increase in business if the drinking age were lowered. But she agrees with Frick.
"I am totally opposed to it. Totally," Bauer says. "They can't handle the liquor at 18. They just can't handle it. I don't even think they should talk about it. I'm a hard-liner."
College kids — and this will come as no surprise to anyone who has ever been 18 — think lowering the drinking age makes sense.
But their reasons are fairly sobering.
Students on drinking ageRyan Forster, 19, of Lansdale, a Millersville University freshman, says, "It's not going to bring more people into drinking. They're drinking anyway. It will just reduce the legal consequences. Younger kids who are going to drink already do."
Says Katie Ashman, 18, an MU freshman from Philadelphia, "If you can go into the military and die for your country, you should be allowed to drink at a younger age."
Long has gotten a taste of this debate since the Amethyst Initiative, the group calling for a national debate on the drinking age, unveiled its ideas this week.
But the response has been muted, said campus spokesman Barry Freidly. Elizabethtown College has gotten only about 15 calls about the issue.
"Hopefully people were listening that the Amethyst Initiative is calling for a dialogue," he says, noting that 20 more college presidents signed onto the initiative this week.
Those who would be affected by a change in drinking laws — college students — say a loosening of the law could result in fewer problems.
For starters, a lower drinking age would take away the thrill of rebellion that some students feel with underage drinking.
"Everyone thinks it's the 'in' thing to do," says Wisdom Eguzouwa, 18, an MU freshman from Lancaster. "If you drink before 21, it's like, 'Look what I can do.' "
Ashman agrees, citing the first rule of adolescence: "You don't want to do it as much if you're allowed to do it."
Sometimes a person's responsibility is not tied to their age, says Sara Kennel, an MU freshman from Quarryville. She notes many 40-year-olds act irresponsibly by drinking and driving.
"I think people underestimate how responsible 18-year-olds can be," she says. "It's a person-to-person thing."
Ricky Armellino, a 22-year-old MU senior, says that society needs to de-emphasize the importance attached to drinking. His parents allowed him to have a glass of wine at the holidays and drinking has not been a major issue for him.
Many of the students agree too much is made of drinking here, saying it does not seem as big of an issue — or problem — in Europe and other countries where there are freer drinking laws.
But Penn Manor High School principal Jan Mindish said lowering the drinking age would just push the problem of underage drinking further onto high schools.
"If you made it legal for over half of everyone's senior class to drink, you don't have parties where there are just seniors," she says, adding, "I could see kids on a sporting team — some would be eligible to drink legally and some would not be eligible to drink."
The part of the brain that controls impulses is not fully developed in teens, she says. Even when alcohol is not involved, teens make bad decisions.
Allow drinking earlier, she says, and you have problems waiting to happen.
Millersville Police Chief John Rochat agrees, ticking off those problems: drunk driving, public drunkenness, disorderly conduct.
"Traffic fatalities are not a pretty sight," he says, adding, "Most of the times in drunk driving, the person who gets killed is not the person who doing the drinking and driving."
Magisterial District Judge William Reuter of Mount Joy says 60 percent of the cases he sees have alcohol as a factor. He does not understand the rush to introduce alcohol to younger people.
"Do individuals need it?" he asks. "Is there a pressing need for people to quickly get into utilizing this substance? Does it serve some social purpose? I'm not sure."
Education should and can be done and does help, Reuter says. He sends underage drinkers to a youth alcohol education program, which has greatly reduced the reoccurrence of underage arrests.
That program is offered by the Council on Drug and Alcohol Abuse. Executive director Dave Bender says he welcomes the debate that college presidents are calling for, but only if it includes the facts.
He would like to see the research, for example, that shows that lowering the drinking age would decrease binge drinking, vandalism, sexual assaults and drunk driving. He has not seen it.
Another fact he would like to see discussed is the issue of alcohol use in Europe, where there are more relaxed laws on drinking age.
Binge drinking is worse in France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Italy and almost every other European nation with freer laws, Bender says.
Yes, young people are going to drink even though it is against the law, but no one is suggesting we loosen restrictions on murder, rape or even speeding because some people are going to do that anyway, he says.
"Our focus," he says. "should be on increased self-responsibility."
Staff writer Cindy Stauffer can be reached at cstauffer@LNPnews.com or 481-6024.
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