Over the last two decades, the Vans Warped Tour has evolved from an annual summer celebration of punk rock (along with a handful of other artists from various genres) and skateboarding to whatever you want to call the mishmash of DJs, unknown acts, and kids too busy on their phones to watch the festival that happened this year.

Due to the grueling and generally raucous “summer camp” nature of the tour for its performers (and a couple of incidents that occurred this year), Warped head honcho Kevin Lyman said he’s going to “take a hard look” at only allowing bands (and crew members) over the age of 21 on the tour.

While that might make all the difference in the world, there’s a lot of reason to think that it wouldn’t. Plenty of young bands have played Warped Tour without issues (the people who most notably got in trouble this year were all over 21), and hitting the age of majority doesn’t mean additional maturity.

Here are five reasons Warped Tour shouldn’t switch to a 21+ rule for bands.

If Warped Tour Gets Rid Of Its Teenage Appeal, What’s Left?

 
In the past, Warped has been a touring summer festival that appealed to everyone from 13 to 35. The main targets were always teenagers and early-twentysomethings, but there were usually a handful of bands with histories that the older crowd would want to see. With the biggest “older” name on the 2015 bill being Yellowcard, this year’s rendition of the touring festival was almost exclusively based on appealing to a teenage crowd. Although there would be no age limit on the crowd, one of the joys of Warped Tour was always seeing the best underground young bands play half-hour sets at noon before the bigger bands were even awake.

Putting Restrictions On Bands Ruin Part Of Warped Tour’s Magic

 
A key piece of the Warped puzzle is the diversity and sheer number of acts you’ll see on any given day. Sure, it might suck when an awesome band only gets to play 30 minutes, but where else are you going to see dozens of performers from all different backgrounds and genres on (at least) a handful of stages if you don’t live near the home of a major music festival (Coachella, Bamboozle, Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, etc.)? Part of what makes Warped Tour unique is that it brings bands, young and old, to parts of the country that would never otherwise get to see them. By putting an age restriction on which bands can go on the tour, it limits the spontaneous “free-for-all” environment that teenagers have been looking forward to for the last 20 years.

There’s Nothing Like Warped Tour For A Band To Cut Its Teeth

If you’re a group of 18-year-olds in a band with little outside of a van and some instruments, Warped Tour is essentially the dream way to spend a summer taking a chance and seeing if you really have what it takes to be rock stars. It’s an opportunity to go on a national tour, learn from some of the best in the world, and possibly have the time of your lives, all wrapped into one. It’s the last of its kind, and there’s no reason to take it away from young bands looking to pay their dues.

Minors Who Want Drugs And Alcohol Are Always Going To Find A Way To Get Drugs And Alcohol

 
Of course no one wants to be the facilitators of the under-21 crowd getting their hands on booze (and a wide variety of drugs), but it’s going to happen somehow regardless. Forget being on Warped Tour, teenagers who want to find illicit substances will do so whether they’re in a band or not. Hell, getting into the rock ‘n’ roll party scene with a bunch of guys who have already been there for a while might be less dangerous than experimenting with a group of other teenagers. At least if something goes wrong at (or after) Warped Tour, there are plenty of people on-site who have all sorts of experience in the music and party worlds. 

Warped Tour Has Always Been About The Youth

  
As stated earlier, Warped Tour’s main target is always the young crowd. If teenagers and college students stop getting Warped every summer, it’s going to die out twice as quickly as it was built up. From the time spring hits, Warped Tour is one of those summer days that high schoolers daydream about during biology class. Part of the fantasy is that it could be the daydreamers’ high school band playing Warped Tour that year. Take it from someone who got to play the Kevin Says Stage a few times, it’s the kind of thing that can change a teenager’s life.