Quote:Original post by POLSKASH
China, great country. HAHA, yeah freaking right. 1.3 billion people putting up with bullcrap. They must like it, otherwise they would have gotten rid of the government if they had the guts.
Quote:Original post by kSquaredQuote:Original post by Raduprv
Yeah, and people under 21 in the US are not allowed to drink a beer or a glass of wine. How is that better?
I don't think that analogy is valid. If you play some Super Mario 64 for four hours straight and then get behind the wheel of a car, your reaction time is not going to be impaired. Compare this with drinking for four hours and then getting behind the wheel of car, where you will almost certainly endanger yourself, to say nothing of the hundreds of other people you will encounter on a road.
Quote:Original post by xMcBaiNx
Having a legal age for drinking IS dumb, partly because it can't be enforced and partly because it serves no purpose.
Quote:Original post by MaegaQuote:Original post by xMcBaiNx
Having a legal age for drinking IS dumb, partly because it can't be enforced and partly because it serves no purpose.
No it isn't. If there was no legal age, people who drink at a very young age and damage their bodies during prime growth time.
The legal age also serves as a life knowledge marker. By the time you're 21, you have learned more about life than you had at a younger age. You are better able to decide what is really right for you.
Granted, some people don't care and just do it anyway. I know people who drank before 21. By 21, they realized drinking is stupid and don't do it anymore.
Quote:Original post by Maega
No it isn't. If there was no legal age, people who drink at a very young age and damage their bodies during prime growth time.
Quote:Original post by Yann LQuote:Original post by Maega
No it isn't. If there was no legal age, people who drink at a very young age and damage their bodies during prime growth time.
Define "very young age". Here in France, it's perfectly normal to have your 10 year old son drink some wine during dinner. Legal drinking age for beer is 16 in most EU countries. And no signs of an excessive amount of "damaged bodies" so far, at least not for the last 1000 years...
Of course, excessive drinking is bad for you, and it's certainly worse if you're younger. So I agree with a legal drinking age on hard alcohol.
In the US, it is widely considered a bad thing to show nudity to minors (mainly because of religious reasons). I completely disagree with that, but it's not my job to judge this. If the American people like to think this way, well, it's their right to do so.
Now, China apparently came to the conclusion, that violent video games are bad for people under 18. So be it. Whether this conclusion matches our way to see the world or not is completely irrelevant. It's not our job to judge this.
It's all about the culture framework, folks.
Quote:Original post by xMcBaiNx
Winner.
Quote:Original post by xMcBaiNxQuote:Original post by kSquaredQuote:Original post by Raduprv
Yeah, and people under 21 in the US are not allowed to drink a beer or a glass of wine. How is that better?
I don't think that analogy is valid. If you play some Super Mario 64 for four hours straight and then get behind the wheel of a car, your reaction time is not going to be impaired. Compare this with drinking for four hours and then getting behind the wheel of car, where you will almost certainly endanger yourself, to say nothing of the hundreds of other people you will encounter on a road.
So that danger magically disappears at 18/21 ? Having a legal age for drinking IS dumb, partly because it can't be enforced and partly because it serves no purpose.
Quote:Slightly OT: I'd also like to see some numbers pertaining to the age of people pulled for driving under the influence of alcohol. I'm pretty sure > 30 years old do it more often.
Quote:Of the 686 cases submitted, 67 were determined to be not prosecutable either because only urine was submitted or no alcohol or drugs were detected in a concentration that would warrant prosecution. Of the 619 prosecutable cases, 537 (87%) were males and 82 (13%) were females. Of these, 108 males and 47 females were involved in automobile accidents (see Figure 1). The 19-24 year old age group was determined to have the highest incidence of DUI arrests with the 25 to 30 year old range being the second most common group (see Figure 2). The average age of those arrested for DUI was 33 with a range of 15 to 79 years old. Three hundred and eighty four (62%) of those arrested for DUI were found to have ethanol in the blood. The drug found in the second highest frequency was the marijuana metabolite 11-nor-Delta9-THC-COOH which was detected in 32% of the perpetrators. In 21% of the cases, the primary cocaine metabolite, benzoylecgonine was the third most common substance found (see Figure 3). Cocaine was determined to be the most common drug co-administered with ethanol. Morphine / codeine follows with nordiazepam and marijuana appearing as the third and fourth most common, respectively (see Figure 4). It was determined from the data that most often the individual arrested for DUI was under the influence of a single substance, ethanol being the substance of choice, although a significant number of individuals were found to have two or more substances in their system at the time of arrest (see Figure 5).
Quote:Original post by kSquaredQuote:Original post by Raduprv
Yeah, and people under 21 in the US are not allowed to drink a beer or a glass of wine. How is that better?
I don't think that analogy is valid. If you play some Super Mario 64 for four hours straight and then get behind the wheel of a car, your reaction time is not going to be impaired. Compare this with drinking for four hours and then getting behind the wheel of car, where you will almost certainly endanger yourself, to say nothing of the hundreds of other people you will encounter on a road.
