Minor in Possesion

The only people that care about this is people who are under 21.

 

Why wouldn't that be an MIP? Unless someone else is in the car who is over 21 and can prove he purchased the alcohol, it's in your possession.

It's about time we consider going back to 18. Only MADD will tell you that raising the drinking age was a good idea.

 

I have no problem with the law whatsover, for two reasons:

1) Kids are ****ty drivers, and more 18-21 years go to college nowadays (75% of high school grads) and are repressed, overindulgent drinkers.

2) I actually think lots of cops were underage drinkers and know exactly when, where and how to bust them; but since you don't see courthouses or holding cells filled to the brim with caucasian 15-20 year olds every single weekend I imagine they're not busting these people as regularly as they could.

 

OR how about people under 21 that are in the military have a special privilege to drink?
More numbers for the military

 

So only whites drink?

 

I think the op is right, if the age of voting and the age of adulthood is 18, so should the age of drinking.

DD

 

My 21?

 

Isn't US the highest drinking age in the world permitted alcohol is legal at all in that country?

And as said before 18-21 is a crappy time but it's only 3 years and you have so much longer after 21. Plus if you are in that age area you are bound to know people that are 21 and will probably buy for you.

 

I had 3 MIPs back in the day in the Houston area. I was never taken in for processing and only one of them required a court appearance before a judge...in which case I opted for a six week class to dismiss the charge. The other two were like traffic tickets which required just paying a fine. A cop or TABC officer ( the infamous cowboy hat suit wearing polk who descend on teenage house parties as often as they are tipped off ) can take a MIP violator in but I bet they rarely do unless there is more to it.

I imagine it would be a huge waste of time and money to take many or all MIP violators in for processing and/or court appearances.

That said...these are only from my personal experiences but I would doubt even 2 out of 10 were hauled in for a basic MIP violation without other charges or circumstances involved.

 

Drinking has negative externalities for other people, mainly in the form of drinking and driving. And since kids under 21 are even bigger dumb-asses than the dumb-asses over 21, we should probably try to limit their opportunities to kill and maim other citizens as much as possible. Kids under 21 in the army also kill and maim, but that's mostly focused on foreginers.

So, I'm not seeing a problem with the law. It's not really there to protect the development of your young bodies nor to protect you from the dangers of your own excesses. It's there to protect others from a public menace, for which young adults have to pay a little in freedoms.

 

This.

But it's easy to drink while under 18...if you aren't mature and smart enough to not get caught then you probably shouldn't be drinking

 

The drinking age was raised to 21, primarily to get it out of High School. My personal experience is that it wasn't very effective. I drank more in HS, than I have since turning 21 (25 now). Granted, I may have drank even more in HS, if the age had been 18, and thus Seniors able to buy, but usually I was able to score booze anyways.

Once I was 18, my dad started buying it for me, since he was such a firm believer in 18 being the drinking age.

 

At one point it was 19, then 21...I think it should be the same as voting etc...18, but if you want it out of HS, then 19 works.

DD

 

Prohibition of any kind = a waste of time and money.

This all shows that if you want a certain 'illicit' substance, you can find it with enough motivation and cash.

 

Texas made it 19 one month after my dad turned 18, but back then the age was 18 on base regardless, so it didn't matter.

The thought is, that 19 year olds are still too close. When the drinking ages were raised to 21, schools were still primarily 7-9 for junior high and 10-12 for HS, so people that turned 21 hadn't gone to school with any current HS student since grammar school (unless of course they were held back, or some similar circumstance).

 

If your old enough to vote you should be able to buy alcohol

 

You want to see 18 year olds at the bar?

 

Yeah, go to England, or France, or Germany - that is exactly what you would see.

And most young men would not mind seeing 18 year old girls drinking at the bar.

DD