Persuasive Essay On Lowering Legal Drinking Age

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Adolescence is a time for teens to grow and mature into young adults. However, sometimes growing up takes a wrong turn when illegal substances are involved such as alcohol. Underaged drinking increases the risk for academic failure, and illegal drug or tobacco use. Underaged drinking also increases the risk for crime, health problems, and death. In 1984, an act was put in place to raise all fifty states’ minimum drinking age to 21; this act unfortunatley does not completely prevent underaged drinking, however it has helped save approximately 17,000 lives from alcohol related fatalities (Get Involved). Alcohol is a poison, and by lowering the legal drinking age to eighteen, you will be supporting the annihilation of our nation. Lowering the legal drinking age from twenty-one to eighteen is not a new concept, in fact lowering the drinking age has been considered for years. In July of 2008, over a hundred of college professors and other education officials gathered to reevaluate the legal drinking age and start the Amethyst Initiative. The United States has a higher drinking age (twenty-one) than Canada (eighteen), Mexico (eighteen), and European countries (sixteen). The reasoning behind this initiative is that the United …show more content…

The effects that alcohol has on the brain is that it can cause blackouts, memory loss, anxiety and psychological problems. “The brain continues to develop until age twenty-one, and that young brains can be irreversibly damaged by alcohol” (MacPherson). Alcohol may also cause inflammation in the stomach, causing ulcers or gastritis which prevents the absorption of food causing cancer in the stomach. Excessive drinking may also cause infertility in both men and women (The Effects of Alcohol). Alcohol affects almost every part of the body, many times resulting in death; in fact, alcohol is the cause of 75% of suicide deaths

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