Should the drinking age be increased to 21?

Zombienosh

Should drinking in Ireland be 21+?
After a visit to the west and seeing it being 21+ there, and wonder why isn't it 21's here? We have a bigger drink problem than everyone else no?

Would it lose too much money? would it encourage something else? Would it have any effect at all?
I'd be all for it. Week after week I see too many drunk young ones wreaking havoc.

AnonoBoy

Pipe down Grandpa!

We need our Barcadi Breezers to put up with your reminicising and storytelling.

Lumen

The west of what?

IMO, the drinking age and humping age should be the same.

Mark200

Well there's plenty of countries that have a lower drinking age than us but don't have the same problems. So I don't really think there's any reason to believe that raising the drinking age by a few years will have any significant impact.

Peoples attitudes towards drink need to change. Somehow.

seamus

Would it have any effect?

It should be 16 here and alcohol awareness included in the national curriculum from the age of 12 instead of "Alcohol is bad mmkay", and some laughable religious "pledge" to not touch it till we're 18.

We need to make alcohol consumption a more open and normal thing rather than a sordid adult pasttime.

The West of where? Do you mean America?

God no, it's fine the way it is.

starbelgrade

Zombienosh wrote: »

After a visit to the west and seeing it being 21+ there, and wonder why isn't it 21's here?

The age limit for drinking is the same in the west as it is in the east.

It's even the same in the midlands.

Zombienosh

Lumen wrote: »

The west of what?

IMO, the drinking age and humping age should be the same.

the west of the camp site.

Cheap Thrills!

The west? What west?

No leave it as it is. How are the young folk supposed to get match fit for the sport of drinking unless they get practicing early!?

Look at the state of them in Americay, smell of a wine gum and they're locked and that's the adults.

tut! :rolleyes:

m@cc@

Zombienosh wrote: »

Should drinking in Ireland be 21+?
After a visit to the west and seeing it being 21+ there, and wonder why isn't it 21's here? We have a bigger drink problem than everyone else no?

Would it lose too much money? would it encourage something else? Would it have any effect at all?
I'd be all for it. Week after week I see too many drunk young ones wreaking havoc.

Would be about as effective as the law prohibiting the use of cannibis.

Sanjuro

The problem in this country is not the age at which people drink. It's how people drink. We're stuck in a culture that thinks drinking as much as you can as fast as you can is the way to have a good time. Binge drinking is the problem, and that's not a problem that is just with younger people.

Kimono-Girl

i say raise it to 21!



but only because i'm 24....

Zombienosh

Mark200 wrote: »

Well there's plenty of countries that have a lower drinking age than us but don't have the same problems. So I don't really think there's any reason to believe that raising the drinking age by a few years will have any significant impact.

Peoples attitudes towards drink need to change. Somehow.

Yeah this is true, how do you even begin changing peoples attitudes... nearly everyone i knew growing up functioned in life by hanging on til the weekend and getting so messed up they cant remember anything.

drunkmonkey

The current legal drinking age is 8 as long as you have a parent with you.

phasers

Raise it to 45, and lower the smoking age to 9

prinz

Sanjuro wrote: »

Binge drinking is the problem, and that's not a problem that is just with younger people.

Precisely. Sort that problem out first and then we can think about the age limits.

Sanjuro

Sanjuro wrote: »

The problem in this country is not the age at which people drink. It's how people drink. We're stuck in a culture that thinks drinking as much as you can as fast as you can is the way to have a good time. Binge drinking is the problem, and that's not a problem that is just with younger people.

It is absolutely horrible when you have about 2 drinks in a night and someone comes up to you and asks, "are you OK? You didn't drink very much".

Yeah, it might be because I am not a binge drinker?

fakearms123

Its 16 in France and you don't see many French hooligans hammered out on stags in eastern europe flashing their testicles to cars driving by, I've yet to see a program called Boozed Up French Abroad so I think we're alright at with 18 here in Ireland.

FreudianSlippers

If you're talking about the US (Canada is 18 and 19 in some parts, Mexico is 18) - you have to consider that the US has a much bigger problem with binge drinking than we do here.

Also, from experience firsthand, the illegality of drinking under 21 is dangerous in the US.
It brings out more drink driving, more theft, more dangerous drinking etc.

Then when one finally turns 21, they go out and get absolutely shítfaced for a year straight and do stupid ****.


I think "responsibility" with drink is actually much higher here because of the lower drinking age. It's less of a big deal here tbh.

Zombienosh

m@cc@ wrote: »

Would be about as effective as the law prohibiting the use of cannibis.

hmm thats a different debate but im pro cannabis over drinking.

starbelgrade

Zombienosh wrote: »

nearly everyone i knew growing up functioned in life by hanging on til the weekend and getting so messed up they cant remember anything.

I don't remember any of that type of carry on when I was younger.

Princess Peach

I was in the US before and everyone I knew under 21 had a fake ID, bought drink and went to bars. So it really made no difference. And they also had no sense of "know your limit."

Ahhh beer pong.

AnonoBoy

phasers wrote: »

Raise it to 45, and lower the smoking age to 9

I'll check that 45 and raise you 57 on the smoking age.

I gots me some pocket rockets, gonna take the whole pot!

prinz

fakearms123 wrote: »

Its 16 in France and you don't see many French hooligans hammered out on stags in eastern europe flashing their testicles to cars driving by, I've yet to see a program called Boozed Up French Abroad so I think we're alright at with 18 here in Ireland.

It's actually becoming more and more common in France too. Monkey see monkey do.

starbelgrade

Binge drinking is just a wankery PC term for having a good night out on the lash.

blaze1

You'd just get older knacker drinkers..

aDeener

i've noticed, and it's just in my own experience, that people who start drinking later in life seem to be a lot more mental with it

starbelgrade

I know a bloke who didn't start drinking until he was 22.

A year later he was dead.

Got ran over by a lorry.

Zombienosh

My aul fella didn't drink for years growin up, then became a raging alcoholic....

Rabidlamb

What difference would it make by changing the legal drinking age ?.
This is Ireland where we have statute books full of laws but no enforcement.

Another political football for the Helen Lovejoys to get all upset about.
Like fannying about with mg's of alcohol allowed in the blood or closing time in off-licenses.

m@cc@

starbelgrade wrote: »

Binge drinking is just a wankery PC term for having a good night out on the lash.

Sure we're only having the craic.

starbelgrade

m@cc@ wrote: »

Sure we're only having the craic.

I'm off to smoke some crack.

ClareVisitor

Zombienosh wrote: »

My aul fella didn't drink for years growin up, then became a raging alcoholic....

Maybe you've answered the question then, let them get it out of their system early. I don't (and can't!) drink half as much as I used to.

starbelgrade

ClareVisitor wrote: »

I don't (and can't!) drink half as much as I used to.

Wuss.

Zombienosh

so the age bearing has no point really?
we're in a ****country that can't enforce any regulations or educate people.
and its just ourr "culture"?

yeppydeppy

It should be lowered and the whole licensing system should be deregulated to get rid of enforced closing times, which would appear to be the main cause for binge drinking!

I'm tellin' ya - Prohibition is the way to go.

ClareVisitor

ClareVisitor wrote: »

Maybe you've answered the question then, let them get it out of their system early. I don't (and can't!) drink half as much as I used to.

Every one of the biggest messes in college didn't start until college.. Everyone else who started at 15 had a lot more cop on.

Wompa1

Deleted User wrote: »

I'm tellin' ya - Prohibition is the way to go.

"When prohibition came in things were great, people were having more fun, drinking more..."

I'd support stricter regulations on drinking...don't think raising the age in this country would help. I think most people start drinking nearly every weekend here when they are 14 or 15 anyway...

Princess Peach

Deleted User wrote: »

Every one of the biggest messes in college didn't start until college.. Everyone else who started at 15 had a lot more cop on.

You've obviously never met my friends. Your taxes will pay for their liver transplants.

starbelgrade

Princess Peach wrote: »

You've obviously never met my friends. Your taxes will pay for their liver transplants.

If you drink so much that you need a liver transplant, the tax you've paid on the booze more than covers the cost of it.

Michael 09

Could it be staggered like Germany?

i.e. Legal age for drinking beer is 16, but legal age for vodka and spirits is 18

Would that help?

jimthemental

Deleted User wrote: »

Every one of the biggest messes in college didn't start until college.. Everyone else who started at 15 had a lot more cop on.

Too right. I can name three or four people off the top of my head like this.


I voted to increase it though so we can clear out the teenybopper crowd from the country's nightclubs. It's going well for Kilkenny anyway, a lot of the places are over 21.

Timmaay

starbelgrade wrote: »

If you drink so much that you need a liver transplant, the tax you've paid on the booze more than covers the cost of it.

Not to mention the fact that ya will probably die younger, and save the government having to pay your old age pension!

Sanjuro

Deleted User wrote: »

It is absolutely horrible when you have about 2 drinks in a night and someone comes up to you and asks, "are you OK? You didn't drink very much".

Yeah, it might be because I am not a binge drinker?

A mate of mine took a month off drinking as solidarity to a friend of his who was doing a 'Year Off Booze' for charity. The looks he got off people when he told them what he was doing were ridiculous. You'd swear he'd told people he only drank cold piss. And that's another problem with our attitude towards alcohol. If you don't drink, there must be something wrong with you.

Princess Peach

Sanjuro wrote: »

A mate of mine took a month off drinking as solidarity to a friend of his who was doing a 'Year Off Booze' for charity. The looks he got off people when he told them what he was doing were ridiculous. You'd swear he'd told people he only drank cold piss. And that's another problem with our attitude towards alcohol. If you don't drink, there must be something wrong with you.

My friend's are hardcore drinkers, but I'm a bit over that myself. I'll sometimes go out and not drink and they HATE this! Cause me being sober is going to ruin their night?? And they'll spend all night saying, ah sure go on, have a few, won't hurt you. Friend of mine didn't talk to me for a week once because I didn't drink on her birthday

kincsem

OAPs only, and free. And they should be allowed to drink on the bus.

silverspoon

martin000 wrote: »

Age should be increased as it is matured age when kids can understand they should drink or not

Aha. Ahahaha.

Our problem here is not that our drinking age is too low, it's, as someone earlier rightly said, the issue of how we drink. By increasing the age threshold, the idea of alcohol becomes more subversive to underagers. I know that not being 18 didn't stop me drinking, and raising the age to 21 is not going to stop people under that age drinking.

It will however mean that their drinking will not occur in a relaxed, grown-up environment, that their measures poured will be much bigger than the ones they'd get in a pub, and it will generally lead to higher levels of d!ckheadery surrounding drinking.

Raising the age to 21 in the U.S. did not create legions of pioneers and teetotallers, but made alcohol a much bigger deal to kids.

Anyway, 'binge drinking' and our hyperactive drinking culture is not isolated to young drinkers. The idea of alcohol is sexed-up enough as it is without making into more of a big deal by raising the age.

starbelgrade

Sanjuro wrote: »

If you don't drink, there must be something wrong with you.

Most people who don't drink are alcoholics.

bnt

I don't think it's the specific age that's the problem, it's the attitude of parents and legislators. One day you can't drink at all, so drink takes on this mystic "forbidden fruit" quality, a milestone to be reached in your life. Then the clock hits midnight on your birthday, and you can drink yourself in to oblivion?

If you ask me, parents should be starting kids younger but under controlled conditions. Half a glass of wine or beer - with a meal - at 14-15 is not an incitement to alcoholism. This is how they get away with it in Europe: drinks go with food, and there's less "going out to drink". I was fortunate in that my first exposure to drink at 16 was while I was trying to learn to play Snooker: you soon learn to drink slowly. (I don't know how "Hurricane" Higgins managed to play while drunk!)

Lumen

bnt wrote: »

I was fortunate in that my first exposure to drink at 16 was while I was trying to learn to play Snooker: you soon learn to drink slowly. (I don't know how "Hurricane" Higgins managed to play while drunk!)

I play better as I get drunker. FACT! :pac: