Driving, smoking, drinking age etc...

But experience per se is not necessarily to do with NUMERICAL AGE. If it was all down to experience, then a 25 yo or a 35 yo who happened to just start driving would also be of the same driving inexperience as a 15 yo. So it is perfectly possible that a 15 1/2 yo might have gained 6 months more experience than a person who just started driving when they were 45 yo.

Another thing with "experience" is that it is not necessarily fool proof in terms of being less prone to being involved in accidents. I think that many people through their experience are often prone to become careless, complacent and cocky about their driving skills. I use myself as one example of that. When I was 10 it was illegal for me to drive on public roads, so I drove out the back roads with my father in the passenger's seat supervising. On my 15th birthday I sat my driving exam and passed with flying colours. As soon as I was issued my drivers license that same day, all my passengers commented to me how such a good and defensive driver I was, and even thought I was a better driver then they were (even though they were several decades older then I was). But over time I became more and more confident of myself and gradually let down my guard and became more careless and complacent by the time I was in my mid 20's. During that time a had an accident with a truck that really put the wind up me and served as a real good wake up call.

The statistics that you mentioned to do with high rates of teenage road accidents is NOT to do with any inherent inadequacy in their driving skill due to their AGE. It is one of CULTURE OF INANITY and the social expectation that youth are "MEANT" to be hooligans. I blame pop culture a lot on marketing idiocy in young people. Actually statistics in different areas give quite different readings. There was a recent study in my country that actually showed people in their 40's were much statistically higher than teenagers to be in road accidents. This age group represented the worst drivers of the lot and they were also responsible for the highest occurrence of drinking and driving!

My opposition to age laws does not begin and end with sexuality. It goes right across the board in all realms of day to day life. I am totally opposed to drinking, smoking and driving age laws altogether (as well as everything else). For any activity that requires a license, then THAT should be the one and only prerequisite, PERIOD. If you can pass the test, then you get issued your ticket.