Policies on alcohol in your home for the HS grad

Parent Cafe
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@doschicos:
It is interesting the history of 18 and 21. The kids fighting in WWII and dying in WWII and Korea and later Vietnam at 18,19 and 20 could not vote for the politicians sending them off to fight, that ended up with a constituional amendment. I looked up the history of drinking ages, and in a lot of places, prior to the 1880’s there wasn’t one in many places, and then most places were at 18 or 21 (some were 16). After prohibition, almost everyone was 21, until the early 70’s when the drinking age went to 18 with the passage of the 18 voting age. It went back to 21 in the mid 80’s thanks for federal coercion (a state doesn’t have to have a 21 drinking age, but if they make it lower than that, they lost 10% of highway funds).

The reason for 21 wasn’t that kids under that age will be harmed by drinking, it was made 21 because kids 18-21 had a much higher rate of drunk driving and accidents, and also that 18 year olds are still in high school and were supplying booze to younger kids.

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Plenty of high school kids have no problem getting access to alcohol. My kids say they were in the slim minority of kids prior to 21 who didn’t have access to a fake ID.

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Considering the number of bottles I confiscated tonight at a * high school freshman* party I can assure you doschico’s right.

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Thank you.

I am frequently bemused by the parents who seem to think that it’s of the utmost importance that their teenage kids begin to drink before the legal age; as if it somehow improves their lives to get in lots of practice with alcohol before they reach true adulthood. It’s especially odd when all the scientific research available shows that the adolescent brain is negatively affected by exposure to drinking. All the time spent putting kids in car seats, worrying about what’s in the food they eat, spending time and money on academic enrichment; then suddenly it’s just fine to hand them beer, wine, or a bottle of whisky as long as car keys are confiscated. I just don’t get it.

http://pubs.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/arh284/213-221.htm

Believe it or not, while many kids in their teens will do virtually anything to get their hands on booze, there really are many kids who just don’t care to drink. After all, there are many adults who don’t drink and have never cared to. Why is it unbelievable that there are kids who feel the same way?

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Whoops! I posted in wrong thread.

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@jobblue:
I can’t speak for other parents, but I think there is a difference between allowing kids to occassionally have beer or wine with dinner and binge drinking.I have read studies like the link you gave, and there is no doubt that alcohol interferes with brain function, not surprising, given that it is a drug that operates on the brain. However, there is a big difference between binge drinking and a kid occassionally having wine or beer with dinner at home, the study doesn’t say anything about the effects of occassional alcohol consumption is. If a kid gets drunk in high school once, that isn’t going to scar them for life or make them disabled, but continual use of alcohol (or any drug) is likely to cause damage. This kind of reminds me of alcohol and pregnant women in some senses, for years there was this mania that any alcohol a pregnant woman ingests is going to hurt the baby, yet from what I can tell all the work on this deals with fetal alcohol syndrome, and with that the studies all focus on women who drink regularly and a lot during pregnancy, not on a woman who might have an occasional glass of something. Yes, erring on the side of caution is to say “a pregnant woman shouldn’t drink” or ‘an underage child should not drink’ (said child being as much 18,19,20 years old, I wonder how the gis during WWII didn’t come out brain damaged, given how much those soldiers often drank), but that kind of thing also can devolve into scare tacticts out of reefer madness, rather than being sensible about it.

My own take, which I put in a prior post, that it is up to the parent to decide, and that while I personally don’t have a problem with a kid under 21 having a glass of wine or beer with dinner occassionally, talking very moderate intake of alcohol, that is up to each parent to decide. If a parent lets a kid get drunk to see what it is like, while I wouldn’t do that with my own kid, I also don’t think that if they let them do it once to see what it is like that it will damage them irreperably, studies like the brain study cited above are talking about long term, relatively heavy exposure.

In terms of the 21 drinking age I am torn. I had exposure to the consequences of an 18 drinking age, I was on a rescue squad in late high school and saw more than my fair share of accidents involving 18,19,20 year olds, and each year it seemed kids were lost to drinking and driving. On the other hand, I don’t think there necessarily is any magic number where suddenly a kid gets wisdom and ‘can handle his/her booze’ so to speak, 21 is not a magic number where "you hit 21, you are safe to drink responsibly’, science actually works against that in that the brain doesn’t fully develop until 25 or so (and personal evidence is that some people’s brains never develop!).21 was chosen in part because that was the old ‘age of majority’ that set drinking ages after prohibition until the 1970’s, and partly because statistically that is the point at which drunk driving incidents/fatalities ‘broke’ compared to 18-20 year olds, where the slope of the decline became significant. In the end, I would keep the 21 drinking age in terms of buying booze, but legally I think laws that make it illegal for a kid under 21 to have alcohol under the supervision of a parent go too far IMO, that is intrusive and frankly serves no purpose other than to enforce a moral stance, given that unless a parent is a foul up they likely would make sure any drinking was done occassionally and in moderation.

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@Joblue - agreed. My kids have no desire to drink, they have refused when offered and stand by their decision. Definitely think there are A LOT of kids who don’t drink.

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Of course there are a lot of kids who don’t drink, and that is how it should be, it has to be an individual decision. To me it has to come down to individual decision, and I think there are a lot of kids who don’t drink. I was a weird one, my family was not exactly Carrie Nation when it came to alcohol, yet to this day I am a very, very light drinker, occassionally a beer or two or a glass of wine. I can count on one hand and have enough fingers left to flip someone the bird the times I got drunk, and all those happened in college or as an adult, when I was of legal age. And there were a lot of kids like myself who either drank sparingly or not at all. I’ll give you another interesting thing about stats, when they raised the drinking age to 21 because of the stats on drunk driving (the federal government got away with it because it affected highway safety, which is their domain, came under the ICC likely), one of the things that statistics showed about drunk driving of those 18-20 that it was a relatively small percent of kids that age causing the problem, that often kids who ended up drinking and driving and getting into accidents also routinely did it more than once. Not a big surprise, and based only on my personal experience, I would bet that the binge drinking percentage of underage kids is relatively small, that while a lot of kids prob try booze, the number doing it to any level is relatively small.

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I don’t know if this has been covered, but I like this theory…
Clavin’s buffalo beer theory

One afternoon at Cheers, Cliff Clavin was explaining the Buffalo Theory to his buddy Norm. Here’s how it went:

"Well ya see, Norm, it’s like this… A herd of buffalo can only move as fast as the slowest buffalo. And when the herd is hunted, it is the slowest and weakest ones at the back that are killed first. This natural selection is good for the herd as a whole, because the general speed and health of the whole group keeps improving by the regular killing of the weakest members. In much the same way, the human brain can only operate as fast as the slowest brain cells.

“Excessive intake of alcohol, as we know, kills brain cells. But naturally, it attacks the slowest and weakest brain cells first. In this way, regular consumption of beer eliminates the weaker brain cells, making the brain a faster and more efficient machine; which is why you always feel smarter after a few beers.”

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I was in my late teens back when the drinking age started to change. From my pretty vivid memories of the time the federal government didn’t use their ‘coercive’ tactics until many states had already started to increase the drinking age.

The issue at the time was if there was a young adult of 18, 19, or 20 in a state where the legal drinking age had been increased to 21, but a neighboring state was still 18, they would drive across the borders to do their drinking and then drive back. The federal governments tactics were to force a uniform age to prevent that situation.

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I don’t support having the drinking at 21. I think it should go back to 18.

Situation is different in my house this summer. 3 of the 4 of are legal. Since we are in state where the law allows it, we are allowing our underage child to have beer/wine with us when the rest of us partake.

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My two older daughters had on occasion some beer or wine coolers when they were underage. Neither of them are big drinkers at all and weren’t in college either.
Our youngest has no interest whatsoever , although most of her friends do partake.
I am a little surprised that one of her friend’s parents allow their own son and his friends to drink in their home……he is a retired state trooper

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@dietz199 's story really illustrates to me how culturally different it is possible to be in the US. While your son’s idea of a good graduation party does not resonate with me, I wouldn’t allow my kids to participate, and it’s definitely not for me, I have no issue with it being his idea of a good time and you choosing to facilitate it as long as they’re not flat out breaking the law in their state (and I have no desire to find out).

@musicprnt potable water was not easily found in time’s past. Alcoholic drinks were often the only safe option. It’s not good to conflate what people liked to drink back then with what wouldn’t kill them.

As for smoking, I feel very bad for the nicotine addicts. That’s how I’ve always referred to them. I’ve never smoked, but I understand how nicotine works in the brain and the deeply, deeply addictive nature of that drug. The kids have always looked at smokers like they were addicts who were chained to their cancer sticks, and it’s never been cool or subversive for them. Plus, it smells disgusting. It’s such a bummer to be driving behind a smoker and have to shut the sunroof and put the air on recycled.

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Beer was also comparatively weaker for much of human history. In the early days people didn’t know what yeast was and fermentation just came from airborne yeast. Now, yeast is added in so there’s more to ferment.

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Our daughter had the occasional glass of wine at dinner. She had a couple of very good friends who had parents that allowed a glass of wine when having dinner at our place. Drinking for drinking’s sake, a beer after a run or whatever, did not happen at our house until she and her friends were over 21.

Interesting…I just looked at my state’s current law and it seems that what I did was illegal. I could swear that at the time I checked and it was not…perhaps the law has changed. One way or the other we would have exposed our underage daughter to alcohol in a civilized setting. Her friends, not likely.

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I think as parents sometimes we take on too much responsibility for curating our children’s eventual adult behavior.

There are dozens of adult behaviors that I learned on my own that I shudder to think of my parents “introducing” me to. While I won’t go into detail, I think there is value in placing some things firmly in the “when I’m a grownup and on my own and making my own decisions” sphere, instead of entangling them into the “I’m a parent, I need to teach this and control it” realm.

Sometimes as a parent you have to step back and say “I’m not going to teach this to you, and you’re not ready to learn it yet”, and hope that the kids understand that taking those adult steps require adult levels of thinking.

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What’s really criminal is NOT having a glass of wine with a good dinner.

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I haven’t read every post, but it seems that mostly every poster is stating that their under 21 kids don’t drink, have no interest in doing so, or only have a “sip.” That doesn’t seem to align with what is going on college campuses today, or 30 years ago when I was in college for that matter…

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I don’t get that impression. My take is it is split. With regard to post 135 I am a believer that as a parent you never stop learning and you never stop teaching.

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Does anyone know of someone that actually waited until their 21st birthday to have a drink because it is “the law?”

I think most have had a drink prior to 21, or haven’t because they just choose not to drink. I imagine it is really popular to go to a club or bar for a 21st birthday celebration, but to actually have a first drink that day seems like a rarity.