I agree with you about the wars and ADHD drugs. Do you really think legalizing a drug will make it less used? Look at your own example. They legalized giving stimulants to children and what happened?
But, what is wrong with a drug being more used? The question is whether or not it will be used responsibly, and whether or not irresponsible use would be a valid reason to violate an adult human being's bodily autonomy. Some of the new use will be responsible, some will not be, but I have hard time beleiving that the rate of irresponsible use would be significantly higher than it already is. I figure most of the new drinkers will be the kids (like myself back then...
) who aren't daring enough to break the rules very much, and who won't be prone to too much wild and reckless action. Though, I admit that's just a guess. As it stands, any underage kid who wants to drink already can and does (not to mention the underage adults...
) without too much getting in their way.
In any event, arguing against lowering the drinking age because more people will drink irresponsibly is not a particularly strong argument against keeping the drinking age the same as much as it is an argument for alcohol prohibition. Afterall, people older than 21 quite frequently drink too much as well, so you may as well do away with alcohol altogether.
My stance on the issue is that there probably is some sense in keeping children from drinking, but that when a person becomes an adult the state shouldn't be telling her what she can put in her body. We can still punish certain irresponsible behaviors without blanket prohibition (I mean, public drunkeness and such is illegal for those of any age group).
Well, those are my thoughts on the matter. I guess I really just think that there should be one age at which a person attains adulthood and then that's that.
As for the OP, I don't think breaking the law is necessarily immoral, as the law is often opposed to justice, though I think breaking the law when this is not the case is probably not a good thing. But, doing something that is not illegal in Mexico (or wherever you're going) that is illegal in the US (or wherever you live) is definately not immoral unless the act itself is immoral (accoding to whatever moral code you care to apply). So if you think having a few beers responsibly is immoral, don't drink. If you think it's not immoral, and you want to do it, then drink. And if you don't want to do it, don't drink. I hope you have fun on your trip, whatever you decide to do.
Have a good time!
