Quote:
Originally Posted by DGG
I agree with you, but I suspect one reason is that the law enforcement can prove that you have illegal levels of alcohol in your body in a comparatively easy way. It is more difficult to prove that someone is, for example, too tired to drive.
Personally, I believe the legal drinking age should be the same age as when you become legally adult. In most countries this would be eighteen. In Sweden, you can order alcohol at restaurants from the age of eighteen, but you have to be twenty to buy it in stores, oddly enough.
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In Sweden, first offense DUI is an automatic year in jail(no suspended sentence either), and 10 year loss of license.
The bars have bicycle racks instead of parking lots.
That's what I call directly addressing the problem, I know people who have multiple DUIs, and while it costs them big bucks now compared to say 20 years ago, they still have their licenses, or they lose them for 60 days or something like that.
But I have always wondered at the hypocrisy or just plain idiocy of a system that says driving after a couple of drinks is wrong, and then has gin mills that are open til 2 in the morning, with huge parking lots.
When these places close, and a hundred people head out for their cars, you better believe that 99% of them are over the legal limit, why don't the cops set up a roadblock right outside the parking lot? (stupid question, that would be seen as a direct attack on a place of business).
This is one of those crazy cultural issues, that works itself out by fits and starts based on tragedies. Unfortunately, the subject is riddled with emotional and religious and political interests which make it almost impossible to address it with anything like a logical approach.