<p>Actually I know some alcoholics who have a very low tolerance for alcohol. Something to do with liver damage I believe. I worked on a project with a guy where we knew to get the work done in the morning because he was useless in the afternoon after going to the pub. Always assumed he was drinking a lot at lunchtime till I went on a business trip with him - 2 pints and he was blotto.</p>
<p>Agree with 101, many alcoholics have really low alcohol tolerance. </p>
<p>Its not about how MUCH you drink, its about how OFTEN you get drunk, which makes you an alcoholic in my opinion.</p>
<p>At my school (Duke) its not uncommon for people to go out and drink pretty heavily 2-3 nights a week. I think that prepares them better for 21st birthdays. </p>
<p>I do think that easing drinking restrictions and making sure that college isn’t the first place someone drinks is important.</p>
<p>I think there’s probably more than one way to be an alcoholic. I have a friend who gave up drinking when he realized that although he didn’t drink often, he always overdrank when he did. My father on the other hand functioned very well for years and years and years even though my any normal standards he drank way too much. In the end it led to a lot of serious health problems and as he got older the drinking did seem to have a worse effect on his personality than it did when he younger.</p>
<p>I’m baffled by where the idea you had to drink a birthday’s worth of shots came from. I don’t remember it being a tradition when we were younger.</p>
<p>omg, i never knew people celebrated by drinking 21 shots on their 21st birthday. That’s such a good idea! We gotta make this a worldwide tradition!!! I’m doin it for sure.</p>
<p>maybe the drinking age limit should be lowered, then there wont be any silly people going to these extremes. when simple things like alcohol and tobacco are prohibited then there are bound to be people who want to use them excessively because either they are not allowed to do so or because could not for a long time</p>
<p>"Agree with 101, many alcoholics have really low alcohol tolerance. "</p>
<p>Very high tolerance is a sign of early stage alcoholism. Very low tolerance (after previously having low or average tolerance) is a sign of late stage alcoholism and reflects liver damage.</p>
<p>agree completely with pantrits.</p>
<p>its the government thats killing those kids. you don’t see this ridiculous behavior happening in europe do you? lower the drinking age to 15-18 and many of these problems will go away. not all of them obviously, but these extremes will not be reached.</p>
<p>Are you serious “ajp87”???</p>
<p>Why does everyone assume this isn’t happening in Europe? In Switzerland, I saw 15/16 year-olds out stumbling around clutching bottles of vodka.</p>
<p>And I’ve never seen an easier place for young kids (14-16 years) to get alcohol than Spain. My cousin parties 2 days/week, and he’s in high schooL!</p>
<p>ajp87 - I am from Europe. Believe me there is a problem there also. England has a terrible binge drinking problem and their drinking age is 18.</p>
<p>ajp87 - i am also from Europe, i know what i am talking about. Here, in Greece, there is virtually no drinking age limit. I am not saying that it is a good thing that a 14year old can buy hard liquor but as least we dont have similar problems; i have NEVER heard of someone dying from food poisoning due to excessive consumption of alcohol, NEVER.</p>
<p>padfoot: I partied two days a week in high school, and I lived in Canada.</p>
<p>From a Canadian perspective, despite mini’s assertions that we have significantly higher rate of cirrhosis and so forth (which he has yet to provide statistical evidence for), I can tell you that stories of teens dying of alcohol poisoning and the like (at universities, particularly) are basically non-existent. Take that how you will.</p>
<p>America creates too much hype and glorifies drinking way too much.
I mean, in other countries kids younger than us drink it like soda. They don’t go crazy about it.</p>
<p>Also, drinking to the point where you black out or throw up is stupid. People shouldn’t drink it like it’s gonna run away or something.</p>
<p>A “night of glory,” evil<em>asian</em>dictator? I call shenanigans.</p>
<p>Once, and only once, I did the traditional UAF Friday night bar crawl with my roommates - drink a bunch at the on-campus pub until it closes at 1, then go across the street to the Marlin and drink even more until their last call. We all had too much - way past the usual “have a couple beers” level.</p>
<p>I remember staggering back to my on-campus apartment, puking my guts out, going to sleep… then waking up with a blasting hangover and puking some more. Rinse and repeat. Several times. Lest you think I was some sort of lightweight… all my roommates were doing the same thing.</p>
<p>Please don’t try and fool anyone. There’s not a damn thing glorious about getting totally wasted. Unless you’re some sort of masochist and enjoy ungodly headaches and the taste of your own vomit.</p>
<p>“its the government thats killing those kids. you don’t see this ridiculous behavior happening in europe do you?”</p>
<p>You do. There are MUCH higher rates of binge drinking among 15-16 year olds in every single northern European country. (Not Italy or Greece, however - genetics are different). There are also more alcohol-related deaths, more cirrhosis deaths, more liver disease, more alcohol-related cancers, and more alcoholism in EVERY Northern European country with a lower drinking age.</p>
<p>"Recent surveys of binge drinking patterns among youth are “sobering”:</p>
<p>• In Ontario, 83 percent of Grade 12 students drink, and 45 percent have had at least one episode of binge drinking in the previous four weeks, according to the 2003 Ontario Student Drug Use Survey. While the percentage of students binge drinking increases with each grade, the biggest single increase —from eight to 24 percent—occurs between Grades 8 and 9. “That jump tells us that a significant number of kids are starting really young,” says Edward Adlaf, coauthor of the study. </p>
<p>• A 2003 survey of British Columbia high-school students conducted by the McCreary Centre Society found that 46 percent of males and 43 percent of females in high school who admitted to drinking had engaged in binge drinking in the previous month, a rate that is among the highest in Canada and unchanged since 1998.</p>
<p>• Binge drinking is particularly worrisome on university and college campuses in Canada and the United States. Four surveys of 120 U.S. campuses over the last decade found that 44 percent of students admitted to an episode of binge drinking in the two weeks prior to the survey, a rate that has remained unchanged for a decade. The 2000 Canadian Campus Survey found similar results, with 63 percent of students reporting consuming five or more drinks in a single sitting in the previous year. The Canadian study concluded that campuses are a “risky milieu for hazardous drinking.”</p>
<p>“In Canada, alcohol is the largest contributor to deaths among Canadians 18 and 19 years old, said Robert Mann, associate professor of public health at the University of Toronto and senior scientist at the university-affiliated Center for Addiction and Mental Health.”</p>
<p>I am from Europe and the age limit does not mean much there. Also, drinking (in moderation) is part of the culture.</p>
<p>mini: Mind passing a link to whatever studies you were using please?</p>
<p>In any case, I was not disputing that people in Canada drink more at a younger age. It is a tautology - lower drinking age, more drinking. I simply suggest that the kind of high-risk behaviors (truly excessive drinking, not this incredibly stupid of binge drinking that is used now, which means basically nothing for a big guy who can have 5 drinks in a night and still feel little more than slightly buzzed) that are such killers of young people in America are not as prevalent in countries with lower drinking ages because the drinking is not put on a pedestal and then shoved into dark corners out of sight of the authorities or caregivers who could be crucial in saving a life if something goes wrong.</p>
<p>5 drinks is not binge drinking. That is not much for an evening in the Pub in the UK. England may have a worse drinking problem than some other European countries. A lot - probably the vast majority - of the social life is built around pubs and drinking. It has been forever including many years ago when I was a teenager. But the ‘binge drinking’ among young people seems to be a more recent phenomena. It really is excessive drinking - not 5 drinks. At holidays such as new years the police and ambulance services are kept very busy with carting people to the hospital.</p>
<p>I found the following article to be a pretty well reasoned argument against the highest drinking age in the world (ours of course!): [Responses</a> to Arguments against the Minimum Legal Drinking Age](<a href=“http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/youthissues/1064263072.html]Responses”>http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/youthissues/1064263072.html)</p>
<p>people exaggerate about how much they drink, i can assure you on that. or they dont know how to keep track - maybe a 50 proof liqueur shot is equivalent to a 80 proof vodka shot in their minds.</p>
<p>“Natural selection.”</p>
<p>I’m sure someone has already said something along these lines, but I don’t want to read every post, so I’m just going to say:</p>
<p>Have some compassion.</p>