Reversing Age Restriction For Drivers Licenses, And Alcoholic

[White Knight]

Okay, reguardless of the times you live in, teenagers have always seem to be drinking under age, however studies show, that teenagers often drink and drive, and cause the most traffic problems, lethal or non lethal. So what would be proposed to this problem, making drivers licenses harder to obtain? what else needs to happen?


Debate..

[ardillacid]

Drinking is like sex. Its gonna happen so why not teach safe-drinking classes in school and give out anti-hangover pills to minimize the suffering the kids go through. I mean if my daughter/son went drinking I wouldn't want them punished with a hangover. The schools have the responsibility of being the first teachers, so they must help protect them when they can't control themselves

[Justin86]

The driving age is never going to be changed to 21. Why? Because many states have rural populations and those kids are going to have to drive to support their families regardless of what the law says. I know back when I was coming of age to drive Virginia was going through a big hoopla debating whether or not to raise the age to carry a permit from 15 to 16. Most of the representatives against it were from the rural districts of the state. After I got my permit they finally decided to compromise and raise it to 15 and 3 months (seriously, after all that fighting they raised it a whole three months). The state legislature had acted like it accomplished something huge.

Anyway, as for drinking I think 16 is too young. However, if you can take a bullet and die for your country I don't know why you can't have a beer. Make it 18 with parents having the right to determine if their children can drink in their homes.

Edited October 7, 2008 by Justin86

[Archaeology cat]

[quote name='Justin86' post='1671927' date='Oct 7 2008, 08:32 AM']The driving age is never going to be changed to 21. Why? Because many states have rural populations and those kids are going to have to drive to support their families regardless of what the law says. I know back when I was coming of age to drive Virginia was going through a big hoopla debating whether or not to raise the age to carry a permit from 15 to 16. Most of the representatives against it were from the rural districts of the state. After I got my permit they finally decided to compromise and raise it to 15 and 3 months (seriously, after all that fighting they raised it a whole three months). The state legislature had acted like it accomplished something huge.

Anyway, as for drinking I think 16 is too young. However, if you can take a bullet and die for your country, I don't why you can't have a beer. Make it 18 with parents having the right to determine if their children can drink in their homes.[/quote]
I pretty much agree with you here. Well, don't know that 16 is too young necessarily, but perhaps that they could drink at 16 if with their parents. And yes, I think they should be able to drink at home if their parents allow it and supervise.

And I grew up in a rural area with lots of farmland. You can get your permit at 16 and license at 16.5. I don't see it changing much more than that in KY.

[Justin86]

[quote name='Archaeology cat' post='1671931' date='Oct 7 2008, 04:46 PM']I pretty much agree with you here. Well, don't know that 16 is too young necessarily, but perhaps that they could drink at 16 if with their parents. And yes, I think they should be able to drink at home if their parents allow it and supervise.

And I grew up in a rural area with lots of farmland. You can get your permit at 16 and license at 16.5. I don't see it changing much more than that in KY.[/quote]
I say leave it up to parents to determine if their children can drink in their homes regardless of their age. The whole 18 thing was just who should be allowed to walk into a bar and have a drink.

Edited October 7, 2008 by Justin86

[Archaeology cat]

[quote name='Justin86' post='1671932' date='Oct 7 2008, 08:47 AM']I say leave it up to parents to determine if their children can drink in their homes regardless of their age. The whole 18 thing was just who should be allowed to walk into a bar and have a drink.[/quote]
Oh I agree with that. I was just contemplating the possibility of having 16-year-olds be able to order a drink in a restaurant as long as they were accompanied by their parents/guardians. And then 18 to order a drink on their own. I don't know, kinda makes sense in my head.

[Snowcatpa]

[font="Georgia"][quote name='Justin86' post='1671932' date='Oct 7 2008, 04:47 AM']I say leave it up to parents to determine if their children can drink in their homes regardless of their age. The whole 18 thing was just who should be allowed to walk into a bar and have a drink.[/quote]

[color="purple"]I definitely agree with you. Not saying that we should follow what Europe does on anything or most things, but that's the law in most countries over there I believe. Some parents like it so they can give some in a small amount medicinally; others just so they can get their children used to being exposed to alcohol without it having the glitter effect.

In Germany, they actually mix Coke and beer for children depending on their age level. An 8 year old might get an almost full glass of coke, with a little beer. A 15 year old has almost all beer with just a little coke. When my husband visited over there when he was little, he ordered a coke and that's what they gave him automatically. Too funny [/color][/font]

[Justin86]

[quote name='Archaeology cat' post='1671942' date='Oct 7 2008, 07:15 PM']Oh I agree with that. I was just contemplating the possibility of having 16-year-olds be able to order a drink in a restaurant as long as they were accompanied by their parents/guardians. And then 18 to order a drink on their own. I don't know, kinda makes sense in my head.[/quote]
I get where you're coming from, but I think that can have the effect of undermining parents who choose not to let their children drink: "If Johnny is 16, and his parents obviously let him drink, why won't you let me?" You know kids, they'll throw out anything.

It should remain in the privacy of their own homes, I think.

[scardella]

My opinion is this: I think that there should be less uptightness about drinking in general, so that it's not glorified amongst teenagers. I do think that the drinking age should be lowered.

However, I have much more feedback to say about the requirements for getting a driver's license. I don't have a problem with 15 and 16 year olds getting driver's licenses. However, I think that the bar for granting people a DL is very low. In Louisiana at least, if you get your permit/DL before 18, you do need a driver's ed course, which is fairly basic. You also need to pass a test requiring you to identify laws, signs, etc. and a driving test which is woefully inadequate. It's been more or less drive around the block with a stop sign or light or two. If you get a real piece of work, you have to parallel park.

My criticism is that testing like that assumes that safety features will save your butt in an emergency. I have long thought that, looking back, I was not ready to drive unsupervised when I got my license. I did not have the driving confidence I needed, nor the familiarity with driving that I should have had.

A proposed list of changes to driver's testing and training:
- training: panic stops, avoidance maneuvers, at least 30 hours of supervised driving instruction; in general get the person familiar with not just the rules and regulations, but also help them get a feel for driving and what happens in extreme situations.
- testing: add highway merging and navigation, add panic stop or avoidance maneuver in controlled environment, add car-related physics (inertia, weight transfer, effects of which wheels are driven, etc.)

[Archaeology cat]

[quote name='scardella' post='1671982' date='Oct 7 2008, 02:38 PM']My opinion is this: I think that there should be less uptightness about drinking in general, so that it's not glorified amongst teenagers. I do think that the drinking age should be lowered.[/quote]


[quote name='scardella' post='1671982' date='Oct 7 2008, 02:38 PM']However, I have much more feedback to say about the requirements for getting a driver's license. I don't have a problem with 15 and 16 year olds getting driver's licenses. However, I think that the bar for granting people a DL is very low. In Louisiana at least, if you get your permit/DL before 18, you do need a driver's ed course, which is fairly basic. You also need to pass a test requiring you to identify laws, signs, etc. and a driving test which is woefully inadequate. It's been more or less drive around the block with a stop sign or light or two. If you get a real piece of work, you have to parallel park.

My criticism is that testing like that assumes that safety features will save your butt in an emergency. I have long thought that, looking back, I was not ready to drive unsupervised when I got my license. I did not have the driving confidence I needed, nor the familiarity with driving that I should have had.

A proposed list of changes to driver's testing and training:
- training: panic stops, avoidance maneuvers, at least 30 hours of supervised driving instruction; in general get the person familiar with not just the rules and regulations, but also help them get a feel for driving and what happens in extreme situations.
- testing: add highway merging and navigation, add panic stop or avoidance maneuver in controlled environment, add car-related physics (inertia, weight transfer, effects of which wheels are driven, etc.)[/quote]
Yes, I would say the bar is very low in a lot of states. Driver's ed wasn't required, but I got a discount on car insurance that way. And it was a fairly basic class. Definitely the hardest thing I had to do was parallel park.

My dad decided I needed to know what to do if the car skidded or I somehow lost control, so he took me out on the backroads to teach me what to do with that. Came in handy since I later hydroplaned at an intersection, and I also had a tire blow out on I-75 one time (and I'd just checked my tires that morning before getting on the road).

I need to take the driver's test here so I can drive in England, just haven't done it yet. . .

[Justin86]

[quote name='scardella' post='1671982' date='Oct 7 2008, 10:38 PM']However, I have much more feedback to say about the requirements for getting a driver's license. I don't have a problem with 15 and 16 year olds getting driver's licenses. However, I think that the bar for granting people a DL is very low. In Louisiana at least, if you get your permit/DL before 18, you do need a driver's ed course, which is fairly basic. You also need to pass a test requiring you to identify laws, signs, etc. and a driving test which is woefully inadequate. It's been more or less drive around the block with a stop sign or light or two. If you get a real piece of work, you have to parallel park.

My criticism is that testing like that assumes that safety features will save your butt in an emergency. I have long thought that, looking back, I was not ready to drive unsupervised when I got my license. I did not have the driving confidence I needed, nor the familiarity with driving that I should have had.

A proposed list of changes to driver's testing and training:
- training: panic stops, avoidance maneuvers, at least 30 hours of supervised driving instruction; in general get the person familiar with not just the rules and regulations, but also help them get a feel for driving and what happens in extreme situations.
- testing: add highway merging and navigation, add panic stop or avoidance maneuver in controlled environment, add car-related physics (inertia, weight transfer, effects of which wheels are driven, etc.)[/quote]
I actually seem to remember most of what you say being required for me in Virginia, although I forget whether or not the Driver's Ed course I took just lowered my insurance rates, or if it was actually required. I definitely didn't have to parallel park though. Where in VA would I have to do that?

[scardella]

I figured it'd be a bit much to require the person to be able to do this:
[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9itxkKRTKIw"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9itxkKRTKIw[/url]

[CatherineM]

Where I was raised in Oklahoma, you got your learner's permit at 15 1/2 if you had driver's ed, and license at 16. When I turned 14, my mom told me that if I wanted to be able to drive the family car when I turned 16, I had to be able to pay for my own insurance. She knew that if I had a job to pay for insurance, I'd just buy my own car, and she was right. I bought one at 15, and was driving by myself illegally long before I got my license. There were a lot of dangerous things I did with that car, but got away with them because of a combination of really good reflexes, and not near as much traffic as we have today.

I did the same thing with my boys. Told them if they wanted to drive, they had to pay for their own insurance. In Florida, if someone living in your home has a driver's license, you have to have them on your insurance unless they have their own insurance. So I told them that they couldn't get their licenses unless they could pay for their insurance. The older boy just didn't get a license. He preferred to walk or ride his bike. He's 23, and as far as I know, he still doesn't have a license. The younger boy was so upset, that he went to live with his dad and step mother who abused and neglected him when he was a small child. Driving was that important to him, and his dad promised him a truck.

I did have one rule about driving they both really hated. They were not allowed in a car with a teenage driver. Tampa Bay is very congested, lots of traffic, and it seemed like not a month went by without a teenager getting killed from driving too fast, showing off, not paying attention to the road because the car was too full or too loud, or just inexperience. Driving ages were set in a time when kids went to work. Now it seems to be more about kids being able to take themselves places to hang out or extra curricular things so that mom, who's working, doesn't have to.

Drinking ages were also set in a time when kids were frankly more mature. There was a time when 16 year olds were going off to war, were working not to pay for new iPods, but to help support their families. Now lots of kids live at home into their late 20's. I think alot of the debate about driving age and drinking age is centered on what people believe they are "entitled" to. I'd be more open to hearing people debate from a place of what they have earned. That's how the voting age got lowered to 18. During Vietnam, the average age of the combat soldier was 19, so people realized that if they were old enough to die for their country, they were old enough to vote.

[homeschoolmom]

fwiw....

I think the parents should be allowed to allow their own teens to drink in their home-- but no friends, cousins, etc. Their own, period.

For public drinking, imho, it should stay at 21.

I think the driving age should be raised to 18.

[Slappo]

I think driving laws in USA are actually kind of funny. I went to China this past summer and the driving there is absolutely CRAZY, and at the same time, VERY LOW accident ratio. Why? It is so crazy that everyone HAS to pay attention while driving otherwise they won't get 10 yards without hitting someone/something.

I say we change the roads to a free for all! Not really.. I think the drinking age should be lowered to 18, driving tests should definitely be much harder and there should be multiple tests required every year up until a certain age (18?). Like.. 3 tests a year or something, driving in different conditions (for those who get snow and ice in the winter, they should be required to take a driving test in those conditions).

In the phillpines though the rule of thumb is turn first look later =).