Underage drinking

[Thomas]

What's that Mark Twain quote about statistics and lies????

I make it a general practice of not believing any statistics until I find out who did the "research" and why. If Columbia did it, and the results were tied to so-called binge drinking on or off campus, then you can almost bet that Columbia had a vested interest in the outcome of the so-called research.

On the subject of binge drinking, I always thought the word binge referred to alcoholics who stop for a period of time and then go raving mad with alcohol for a period of time, like the illness labeled manic-depressive. What is referred to as binge drinking on campus seems to me more like the weekend bashes that I can remember attending as far back in the stone age when I was young.

Granted, there are young people who are alcoholics, but I cannot believe 25% of them are. I can, however, believe that 25% of them have drinking parties on weekends.

A lot of this goes to the matter of alcohol as taboo in our culture. If young people were raised to respect alcohol instead of to revere it through its "bad" reputation, which is exactly what a young person does for fun, then--maybe--we can get a handle on so-called binge drinking on campus.