College binge drinking on the rise

[Thomas]

As for drinking age: in Italy there is no drinking age, and that is the civilized answer.

On the so-called binge drinking issue: I get crazy when language is abused to advance a cause.

It used to be that the word binge applied to alcoholics who went through long drinking spells--days, complete with black-outs--often in-between long spells of no drinking.

Our anti-alcohol culture has taken a loaded word like binge and applied it to college heavy drinking and partying which, incidentally, has been the domain of foolish young people since alcohol was put into the class of "forbidden fruit," the thing towards which every young person gravitates.

Whenever I write about college drinking I refrain from using the phrase "binge drinking" 'cause that isn't what it is, unless the kid is already an alcoholic.