As a drug, alcohol is relatively safe for humans, compared to many newer prescription drugs that we routinely give to children. The effects of alcohol on the human body are well-known, with records reaching back thousands of years. However, the effects of newer prescription drugs such as Ritalin, antidepressants and cough medicines are typically either not fully known, or known to be just as bad as those of moderate amounts of alcohol, or worse.

The body also eliminates alcohol very quickly, at a rate of 1 standard drink per hour. Meanwhile, a standard dose of these newer drugs can have effects that last for hours or even days. Many newer drugs, such as antidepressants, have to be taken constantly, which makes them more habit-forming, and can cause withdrawal symptoms when you stop taking them.

There is no medical reason why alcohol should be an over-the-counter drug for people over 21, but illegal for people younger than that. All over-the-counter medications define an adult dose for ages 12 and up, not 21. The simplest way to prove this is to look in your medicine cabinet. If the FDA recommends the same dose of Tylenol, Sudafed, or Zantac for an 18-year-old as it does for a 21-year-old, why do we have a law that suggests that only when people reach 21 are they physically capable of handling alcohol? It is clearly not based on biology.

9. Drinking is no more deadly for young people than for anyone else.

Underage drinkers don’t deserve such a bad reputation. According to the CDC, people aged 12-20 drink our fair share of alcohol, even though it’s illegal. In other words, this 11% of the population also drinks 11% of the alcohol. Yet despite drinking our fair share, teens and young adults account for less than our fair share of deaths from alcohol poisoning (only 5%). Older adults are much more vulnerable. In fact, 75% of deaths from alcohol poisoning happen between the ages of 45 and 54. This could be evidence that young drinkers are in some ways less vulnerable to the risks of alcohol than older drinkers (see Reason #10).

Young people are also unfairly singled out for drunk driving. About 25% of people aged 18-21 do not even have driver’s licenses, let alone cars. Many more have licenses, but either choose not to drive or do not have opportunities to drive. This means that the drunk driving argument for the drinking age does not even apply to at least a quarter of the population.

We often hear this misleading statistic: “Although drivers under the age of 21 represent 10 percent of licensed drivers they are responsible for 17 percent of fatal alcohol-related crashes.” But the actual odds of a licensed driver under 21 being involved in a fatal alcohol-related crash in a given year are in fact tiny: 1 in 11,764 (for over-21s, they’re 1 in 21,686). Even if the odds are double for younger drivers, this is like having double the chance of getting struck by lightning in your lifetime: it’s not a difference that’s worth making drastic changes to our freedoms, or to the way our laws treat entire groups of people.

10. The drinking age does not address the dangers of alcohol for the most vulnerable population: older drinkers.

Although teenagers drink their fair share of alcohol, they suffer disproportionately few deaths from alcohol poisoning. In fact, 75% of deaths from alcohol poisoning happen between the ages of 45-54. Although many factors likely have a hand in this, the simplest explanation is that young people are more physically resistant to large amounts of alcohol. This explanation is supported by research showing that tolerance tends to decrease with age.

On top of this, even the psychological reasons why young people get drunk may be healthier than the reasons many older people get drunk. People of all ages drink to fit in, to cope with anxiety, or to escape. However, young people have one motivation that few older people have: curiosity. Scientists call this “thrill seeking” or “experimenting” and try to treat it as a bad thing. But there is nothing wrong with curiosity or thrill seeking—especially compared to other motivations for getting drunk, such as low self-esteem.

Middle-aged adults are in some ways uniquely vulnerable to the dangers of alcohol. For example, they are often adjusting to new forms of pressure in their careers, their families, or their health. These pressures are often called the “midlife crisis”: a transition that puts more people at risk for alcoholism. On top of these new risk factors, alcohol can no longer be an object of curiosity or experimentation for most middle-aged people. Too often, alcohol has become familiar, routine, like a boring job or a loveless marriage. When older people get drunk, they run a greater risk of doing it without thinking, as part of a routine that no longer interests or excites them. These new psychological risk factors may help to explain why middle age often marks the onset of alcoholism, along with a large spike in deaths from alcohol poisoning. Of course, everybody responds to middle age and to alcohol differently, but our society needs to recognize that age and alcohol can be an even more deadly combination than youth and alcohol.