#6: Dangerous Decisions
You ever see something that’s funny and sad all at the same time, so you laugh when you see it, but you also shudder a little? That’s me with this next image. Because this is absolutely true. We cannot seem to make up our minds as to when someone becomes an adult and can freely make harmful choices about themselves.
Now, as someone who is not a big fan of anything that encourages young people to take up smoking, and who is also definitely not a big fan of military recruiters pressuring young people into making a decision they don’t necessarily understand all the repercussions of, I think it’s pretty clear what we ought to do to make these two ages more equitable: we move the military age and the smoking age up to about 50.