Amethyst Initiative: Debate of Lowering Drinking Age Has MADD Ready to Fight

A Call for Responsibility or an Abdication of Responsibility?

The Amethyst Initiative, a call for the debate over lowering the 21-year-old drinking age, has got a few people slightly perturbed. Over 100 presidents from the nation's colleges have signed the petition, which suggests that the age limitation is not working as well as the public believes and is actually promoting unethical and dangerous drinking behaviors among America's young college students. On the other hand, organizations like Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) say that the laws prohibiting people under the age of 21 from drinking have lowered the number of alcohol-related deaths since their enactment.

The Amethyst Initiative Argument

The Amethyst Initiative statement maintains that the legal drinking age of 21 is actually promoting unethical behavior in that its existence produces a culture of young people who break the law by obtaining illegal false identification cards, then purchase and consume alcohol. The contention is that the laws do not encourage responsibility but produce its opposite. The petitioners believe that the age limitation has fostered an increase in "binge" drinking.

Using the historical cautionary milepost of Prohibition as an example of failed government interference in the consumption of alcohol, the Amethyst Initiative also falls back on the argument of legal majority. In every major life decision, the legal age is 18: buying and owning cars and houses, making legally binding decisions, joining the military, voting, etc. The Amethyst Initiative also maintains that promoting alcohol abstinence as the only legal option to drinking has not had a visible effect upon student alcohol consumption.

The MADD Argument

MADD officials, according to the Associated Press, have been quick to rise to battle against the Amethyst Initiative, stating that the college presidents are simply looking for "a way out of an inconvenient problem." MADD also says that the petitioners are misrepresenting science and that lowering the drinking age would not only encourage more underage drinking but result in more drunk driving fatalities.