Hi Matthewg,
I had to think of what a high school friend of mine said in a homesick moment while she was a German exchange student, re the no-drinking-age etc over there: "I want to go to a party in the woods again and be scared s@%$less of getting busted. That's entertainment!" LOL
But seriously....
Around 15 years ago, the Federal Highway Funding Act went into effect. This act basically said if a state didn't raise their drinking age to 21, they would be denied federal highway funds. (Insert "violation of states' rights" diatribe here.)
Consequently, in states where the drinking age had been 18 or 19 - you guessed it, college age - drinking a beer at 18 turned from a common and normal thing into breaking the law.
This was a very large societal change, especially on college campuses, especially on college campuses in rural/isolated areas where the only game in town was fraternity parties.
I know that the Greeks have to adhere to the law, but I find it immensely hypocritical to say "I drank at 18 but that was then and this is now, and drinking at 18 now is bad and evil." It may be the law, but sometimes the law is wrong. Giving the right to marry, drive a car, own a gun, vote and be drafted - all marks of adulthood - to an 18 year old, and denying access to alcohol - another mark of adulthood - is wrong. I don't know about you, but I'd rather see an 18 year old with a beer in his hand than with a gun in his hand.
In other words, it's not the Greek world that is hypocritical on this issue - it's U. S. society.
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