Should the age be increased?

[markfiend]

More and harsher regulation certainly isn't going to solve the problem. What's needed is liberalisation of drug / drink / smoking / whatever else laws combined with better education.

(I hear all the teachers in the audience going "oh great, more work for us" but ideally education in general would get far better resources.)

But like the man says, "you can't get there from here". The Daily Mail crowd would go spare at the idea of drug and drink education in schools. It's similar to the situation with sex education where the discredited idea of ignorance-only (oops I mean abstinence-only) education is promoted.

Face facts, young people are going to drink, take drugs, have sex. Personally I think it would be far better if they did so after having been properly educated about the risks and how to minimise them. Telling young people to "just say no" is never going to work.

[silentNate]

I was smoking pot and drinking at thirteen- don't try to tell me that the legal age limit means jack...

[Pista]

Maybe there should be a drinking test, in the same way as there's a driving test.
Actually, scratch that.
A lot of people still drive like tw@ts even after a test.
I can't really see the point of raising the age.
If young drinkers get so bladdered that they puke their innards up, I think it should make them think about how far to go next time right?
How long to we need to be "nannied"?
What I think should happen is that young people should be educated on alcohol a bit more.
For example, I was never told that alcohol was a poison when I was at school.
I was taught how to have babies, put on report for smoking, but never got so much as a detention for rolling in totally shedded in the morning.
I guess it might have been because the teachers were always 3 sheets to the wind by 9.30 anyway.

[6FeetOver]

As for marriage, I was too young at 28.I'm still too young now.

edit..Anne informs me I was 34 when we were married.....feels longer.

I'll always be "too young" for that kind of thing, I think. I still can't fathom my friends, cousins, and siblings being married with kids, and most of them aren't much younger than I am... *Boggles*

And Pat, that's really unfortunate... Are you ok?

[psichonaut]

in italy the legel age to drink alchol and smoke is 18, but so when we were 15 we did everything and we drunk without any problem in bar/pubs, we bought sigarettes everywhere and none asked our age...and my pusher did the same...when i had enough money

[James Blast]

how did I miss this and why did it drop from the HL Hit Parade?

fags and booze are fantastic - FACT!

now gimme an ASBO

[EvilBastard]

Which reminds me...

One day the school truant officer rang the doorbell of a house of a family where the child hadn't been to school in a week or so. The door was opened by a 14-year old boy with a towel round his waist, a martini in one hand, the other arm draped around the waist of a semi-naked hooker, a huge doobie protruding from his lips, and AC/DC's 'Dirty Deeds Done Done Cheap' blasting out of the stereo.

The truant officer said, "Hello, sonny - is your mum or dad at home?"

The boy replied, "Does it fcuking look like it?!"