<p>Why do so many students enjoy drinking in excess? When do they grow out of this behavior and learn to drink in an appropriate, professional manner? Why do some of them continue to do it even in graduate school? Is it a maturity issue, stupidity, bad parenting, or something else?</p>
<p>I don’t enjoy this type of “entertainment” (if you want to call it that; I don’t know what else to call it), but in the past, other students have tried to repeatedly convince me that it is something that I should do because it is fun and young people are supposed to do it. When do these kinds of students grow up and stop attempting to convince others to engage in something they simply do not want to participate in? FYI, I was raised to believe that this is totally inappropriate and unacceptable behavior for me to personally engage in, so perhaps it is just my unbringing.</p>
<p>And why do they feel the need to post pictures of this on websites? Are they really that dumb that they don’t know that anyone (university student conduct offices and admissions, employers) can access this information?</p>
<p>I don’t think you can limit it to ‘students’; this phenomena applies to kids who aren’t in school either.</p>
<p>And it doesn’t stop as you ‘mature’. As an adult, I’ve been at parties where I felt pressured to drink, so you just have to learn to deal with it and not take it personally when you are confronted with it.</p>
<p>Just posting to say I know how you feel, and it was the same way back in the dark ages 25 years ago when I was in college. My idea of fun then, and now, was most certainly not watching a bunch of people get sloshed out of their brains and engage in stupid and immature behavior. Unfortunately, as I’m heading towards 50, I can say a bunch of people my age are still doing the same thing…</p>
<p>I went to a few frat parties and when I didn’t want to drink, my friends told me to carry a full beer so it would “look” like I was drinking. Sorry, I wasn’t there to engage in duplicity for the sake of fitting in. YMMV, but not my scene…</p>
<p>I was also raised in a similar environment to you, and yes, I think that makes a big impact on my feelings. (and probably yours)</p>
<p>I’ve been out many times with some of my mid-30s friends and everyone has been blacked out. So at least to that age, I suppose.</p>
<p>Going out in the UK/Australia really puts some perspective on how little people in the US drink, imo.</p>
<p>Mr. Payne, I served drinks in an overseas British pub for a time. The volumes of beer consumed were impressive. However there also was a value placed on holding one’s alcohol. People were able to walk out of the place, and the focus was on conversation, personal interaction. </p>
<p>The current obsession with ‘shots’ and getting blotto to me seems pointless. I can understand a few drinks to relax and have fun. But this is something else. Is life really so awful for this generation that it is necessary to escape it by blacking out?</p>
<p>D1 just came back from Sydney. She said every time they went out, drinking was always involved, even if it was a dinner. It was acceptable for them to be drunk and act as such. What struck her even more bizarre was parents and kids often drank together. In comparison to her college, her school paled in comparison.</p>
<p>My kids were raised to never lose control in any social situation. We didn’t raise them not to drink either. As D1 is getting ready to enter real business world, she will need to know when to have a drink and when to call it quit.</p>
<p>S1 just returned from eight months in Rio. He commented on how little people drank there compared to his college in the U.S. He said girls were likely to nurse a single drink for an entire evening and guys would have two to three beers only. He said this was the case even at events he attended where the beer was free, which absolutely astounded him the first time he saw it happen. It is legal to drink achohol outside so people can walk down the street with a drink, similar to Vegas, but he did not see a lot of excess (not there over Carnival, which is in February). </p>
<p>Maybe it was just the crowd he ran with in Brazil, but he definitely found it to be very different and he adjusted his behavior according to the norm there. So, I would say it is less of an age thing than a peer group thing in terms of when young people may outgrow the behavior.</p>
<p>BA - I can’t explain it either. I’ve spent time in locale’s where people drank a lot, and in locales where people drank hardly at all. So there may not be a universal explanation. But it does seem that it takes at least two to get a drinking party going.</p>