Underage drinkers, take note. Your anathema has a name. And it's Jack Bauer.
Well, actually, it's Kiefer Sutherland, Emmy Award-winning star of the TV series "24" and the latest in the infamous line of Hollywood drunk drivers granted absurdly lenient punishments. The whole sordid affair of his recent DUI showcases inconsistent enforcement of laws among the rich and powerful. That in itself is nothing new. What makes his case even more astonishing than those of contemporaries Lindsay Lohan and Nicole Ritchie is that after pleading no contest to charges, he was granted an individually-tailored 48-day jail sentence that he gets to serve in between shooting this season's show. Thanks, law enforcement. I'm sure we're all glad to hear that finding out whether Bauer saves the world from fictional terrorists is more important than saving, you know, actual humans.
Fine, Sutherland is either an alcoholic or a jackass (probably both). Why does that make him the arch nemesis of potential underage drinkers?
Think back to the last party you attended that was broken up by the cops. The neurotic door checking, the horror when you realized IDs were being requested, the final no-holds-barred sprint to a thick, leafy hiding spot. What if you'd been legally allowed to drink at 18? Wouldn't that have made things a lot better?
One of the most salient reasons for America's high minimum drinking age is prevention of road deaths due to drunk driving. In the 1970s, minimum drinking ages were lowered along with voting ages to 18, 19 or 20 in a number of states, but the lowered ages carried with them increases in the number of alcohol related accidents, causing advocacy groups to pressure lawmakers to officially raise the minimum age back to 21. This actually decreased DUI related mortality, and, because young Americans have shown few signs of responsible drinking around motor vehicles since, likely as a result of high profile instances of inconsistent punishment and American laws that only tenuously connect conscientiousness to DUI, we've never had a chance to prove otherwise.
To begin, the law focuses more on circumstance than on individual decision-making. The severity of punishment for a DUI depends on whether an accident occurred or someone was injured, which is more a function of chance than of the autonomous decision to get behind the wheel and risk others' lives.
American laws also focus more on drinking itself than on reckless driving. In some European countries, young adults can drink practically as soon as they can see over the bar, but they can't drive until they're 18. This gives people time to become accustomed to drinking sensibly before they have the opportunity to endanger others. It also puts the emphasis back on driving responsibly rather than on abstinence, which is especially oppressive for American college kids and often leads to binge drinking.
The extant laws and their dubious enforcement among celebrities combine to create a situation that breeds irresponsibility, thus confirming the hypothesis that young adults can't handle their liquor and making you vulnerable to arrest for having a beer at a party. (You can slap Bauer now.)
While none of us can reasonably expect to influence stars' partying habits, or turn the gin-shy United States into the pleasantly sauced European Union, at the very least, we can try to convince others that drinking among teens and twenty-somethings doesn't have to be an all-or-nothing situation we can't control, even if big stars are totally unwilling to get on the wagon.
We can do this by focusing on the impact of a decision like Sutherland's, like the guilt and pain that would have transpired had he actually injured someone or the selfishness implicit in choosing to drive under the influence rather than shell out a measly $20 for a cab.
Which brings me to the most puzzling question of all-and the reason I'd most like to backhand this column's namesake-why in hell doesn't a two-time DUI veteran who makes $400,000 an episode have a freaking chauffeur?
(In other news, I am on probation for flagrant punning on show titles. I'll be serving time in between episodes of "24.")
Jacqui Detwiler is a graduate student in psychology and neuroscience. Her column runs every Friday.
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