College binge drinking on the rise

[mrdutton]

Our youngsters certainly are not binge drinking.

Quite frankly I think some organizations are overstepping their bounds. MADD is no longer Mothers Against Drunk Drivers, it is now Mothers against drinking. And don't read me incorrectly, no one should drink and drive. It is just too dangerous and foolish.

My parents taught me about alcohol and about being responsible over its consequences. I was allowed to drink in our home from about the age of 14. That means an occasional glass of wine at a "special occasion" dinner and a beer or two in the summer when we had a family cook-out or a clam bake on the beach (Yeah, I am old enough to remember when it was okay to have fires on the beach and actually cook clams and lobsters and veggies and such in the fire pit made from rocks and seaweed.)

However, that education did not prevent me from going out on a number of occasions with my friends and getting plastered. But isn't that part of the learning experience? I think it was. As a youngster, I had the attitude: If it doesn't hurt me why shouldn't I try it?. Well that has since been tempered by experience.

I tried to do the same for my daughter. Today she does not drink at all. That decision is based on some life-time experiences and a very large hospital bill. But has nothing to do with me trying very hard to teach her to drink responsibly. (Just as I refused to learn that lesson from my parents; she had to find out for herself.) She went out one night, as a young adult, with her "friends" and drank too much. She survived the alcohol poisoning, the stomach pump and came to the realization that she needed to face up to her own actions. My wife wanted us to pay the hospital bills. I refused; my wife and my daughter later thanked me for refusing.

The problem today is not so much with young people trying things out for themselves as much as it is with population density. When I was young and got plastered and drove home from the school dance with one eye shut, there were maybe a half dozen cars on the road and we were all heading in opposite directions. Back then, if I hit anything it would be a neighbor's mailbox or trashcan along the side of the road, which I would replace or repair the next day or face the wrath of Dad (which in those days was worse than the the wrath of God). In my day, if I was two-sheets-to-the-wind, I'd pull over and sleep it off in the car. Wake up at 0500 with the roosters and plod back home with some lame-brain excuse about where I was.

Well we can't do that today - but our children haven't changed that much and they still need their space. But that space is just not as large as it used to be. I think that is where some of the problem lies and where the anxiety comes from. I could go out and stand alone and scream my head off in teen angst-frustration, but how many of our children can do that today? Because today we have to be so very politically correct amongst other things.

I sure don't have the answers, but I think I have a bit of a grasp on the problems.