Tow 22 "Get real, lower drinking age to 19"

Underage drinking in America has skyrocketed recently and continues to be a growing problem. It is evident that something must be done but what could the solution be? In this article, William D. Conhan argues that the answer to this problem is to lower the national drinking age from 21 to 19. Although Conhan does provide numerous stats about college drinking, his hasty generalizations and faulty reasoning leave some gaping holes in his argument.

Conhan introduces his article with an allusion to an event that occurred eight years ago at Duke University where three male students were convicted of rape, sexual assault and kidnapping at a party that was filled with alcohol. Conhan concludes that the poor decision made by these three individuals was a result of the underage drinking and therefore national law should be changed to prevent instances like this from happening again. Although alcohol may have impaired their judgement, in this situation how can it be proven that alcohol was the sole cause of their actions and the students weren't just sick individuals to start with? In addition, the author seems to portray this isolated occurrence as something that happens to most people when drinking underage. This one example is not enough to convince the audience. Perhaps it would have been more effective to include stats on how underage drinking incidences like this have resulted in crimes instead of on the percentage of college students that drink underage.

Furthermore, Conhan's claim to his argument is that lowering the drinking age will make underage drinking less enticing and students will stop "lusting after the forbidden fruit of alcohol". However, the author does not follow up with any evidence or statistics and leaves the audience doubting. This is the main hole in the author's argument, especially because he can not validate any of his other minor arguments before defending his main argument.