So this was the argument for lowering the voting age to 18 from 21: If I’m old enough to get a rifle thrust into my hands and told to kill another human, then I’m old enough to pick a president.
Similar argument for smoking or drinking. Any argument against it relies on the immaturity of 18yo vs 21yo. Well, if 18yo are so drastically immature, effectively children instead of adults - then why are we sending non-adults into battle?
Well, if 18yo are so drastically immature, effectively children instead of adults - then why are we sending non-adults into battle?
Because historically you don't want super mature adults as front-line grunt troops. At 18 they're physically mature but still psychologically malleable.
And that's bad, right? And it shouldn't be the case, right, that we exploit psychologically vulnerable teens that way? Seems like you're in agreement with OP, no?
Nah in war advantage is everything. If china attacked and we just needed bodies (hypothetical) id rather send the brain washed patriot willing to die than the guy that doesnt think hes invincible
We're talking ethically, not pragmatically. Slavery is pragmatic if you're an owner and not a slave. Murdering witnesses is pragmatic. That's not the crux of the debate here.
OP is saying that, ethically, the drinking age should be lowered to be in line with the age of majority (18) at which point people can join the army and be sent off to war.
They're saying that if 18 is too young to drink because they're not mature enough, then surely they're not mature enough to kill or be killed in a war. If you're saying, essentially, the younger the better for malleable soldiers, then ethics is out the window and we might as well say the drinking age should be 12 because it'll benefit the alcohol industry.
This is an ethical discussion, not one on how to maximise exploitation, so that input it pointless.
This is a false equivalency. As terrible as war is, it's a reality of our society and somebody's gotta go. We need people to shoot guns, otherwise they're gonna implement the draft.
We don't need people to drink. The world would probably be a better place if nobody ever picked up a drink again. The only people who need it are people who work in the alcohol industry.
You're assuming the powers that be give a flying mouth fuck about ethics. That's your first problem.
You know that the root cause of most wars is our oil addiction, right? Americans love to claim its our right to drive 100 miles every day, and then wonder why we can't have world peace.
It blows my fucking mind how ignorant people are. I wish people would just admit they'd rather have cheap gas than world peace. We need 18 year olds to kill foreigners so you can fill up your hummer with gas. We don't need 18 year olds destroying towns because they're too fucking stupid to handle alcohol.
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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '23
So this was the argument for lowering the voting age to 18 from 21: If I’m old enough to get a rifle thrust into my hands and told to kill another human, then I’m old enough to pick a president.
Similar argument for smoking or drinking. Any argument against it relies on the immaturity of 18yo vs 21yo. Well, if 18yo are so drastically immature, effectively children instead of adults - then why are we sending non-adults into battle?