Americans for a Society Free from Age Restrictions

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Americans for a Society Free from Age Restrictions (ASFAR) is an organization dedicated to changing the status of youths under the law. ASFAR is associated with the youth rights movement, which advocates to remove restrictions, privileges, and protections for minors of all ages by making them equal to adults under the law.

[edit] Original purpose of ASFAR

ASFAR opposes laws that limit the freedom of minors (such as voting age limits, curfew laws, compulsory education, child labor laws, minimum driving ages, age of consent laws, minumum drinking ages, and minimum ages for firearm possession).

ASFAR was founded in 1997 by Matt Walcoff and Matt Herman, two individuals that felt that the role of age in society, socially and legally, should be removed. Their ultimate goal is to completely abolish age restrictions, but they seek the relaxation of age restrictions until this can be accomplished.

[edit] Reconstruction and reform

Within a year of its founding, the original founders left to form their own organization, the National Youth Rights Association (NYRA), due to internal dissent. NYRA evolved to focus more specifically on certain issues. This has effectively split the youth rights movement. ASFAR president Svend la Rose, secretary Susan Wishnetsky, and director Kelvin Oliver are currently restructuring the organization to give it broader goals.

ASFAR pursues the reform of age-based laws through its magazine, Youth Truth, and through public awareness and education. ASFAR believes there is a non-age-based alternative to every age-based law. They also believe that the rights of all people to freedom and self-determination outweigh the cost of implementing non-age-based laws.