<p>“idea of easing the underage kids into drinking while knowing that if they drink away from home it’s illegal just boggles my mind.”</p>
<p>You do lots of things with your kids that would be illegal if there was no parent-child relationship. Vaccinate them, for example. I’m not saying that you should drink with yours, of course, just that alcohol is not the only area where parents have legal authority to do all kinds of otherwise illegal things.</p>
<p>I haven’t read all the posts in this thread, so pardon me if this has already been said…isn’t it illegal for parents to provide alcohol to underage children? In other words, the parents and the children can be arrested.</p>
<p>There has been a huge crack down on parents providing alcohol to underaged teens and not yet legal adults in my area. However, if the parents are not at home, and it can’t be proven that they provided the alcohol or are aware of the drinking, they have not been prosecuted. The underaged drinkers are being arrested as well. Parents are legally allowed to serve their own children alcohol though.</p>
<p>I hope to God that the state troopers come knocking on my door during a holiday dinner to arrest me, or my kids for indulging in a glass of wine.</p>
<p>Now if I host an underage drinking party at my home, that is a different matter.</p>
<p>lje62…there are states where that glass of wine served to your kids would be considered illegal. Now, if the state troopers come knocking at your door to confiscate that glass of wine and arrest you, that’s a whole 'nother story. Although, I suppose legally, it’s possible. :)</p>
<p>right on coronax about that.
Luckily , for what it is worth state troopers ( our only police where I live ) love my husband because he is a major player with a charity event they participate in… I could take advantage of that, but never would.</p>
<p>It is certainly a dilemma for parents and I believe that a lot of kids pull the wool over their parent’s eyes when it comes to this topic.</p>
<p>The thought of my kids getting in a car with someone who has been drinking scares the heck out of us…all to keep up an image that their parents have of their kids not participating in this activity. I have seen it firsthand, and I am sure I am not alone here.</p>
<p>One of the influences in my household is my European born husband…
There is a zero tolerance for any alcohol use and driving. No numbers of blood alcohol level…absolutely no drinking when driving. As a result, they people in his country respect and obey that law. The legal drinking age there is 18. Yes, the kids drink before that but it is a non-issue since driving is not just a legal issue, but a huge moral issue. It is extremely rare for someone to be arrested for drunk driving, as well as accidents caused by drunk driving.</p>
<p>When we visited a couple of yrs ago, there was a family party where there was drinking. There was an arrangement for a van to drive people home. It was a family friend, no money exchanged, just what they do. They don’t even drive the next day after drinking.
I think that alcohol being the forbidden fruit here in the US is what makes it so appealing to minors.</p>
<p>Wednesday, October 13, 2004
Underage drinking laws take aim at parents
By Alison L. McConnell </p>
<p>Lenient parents beware: You’re the target of a new generation of tough laws that make parents liable for underage drinking.
The increased enforcement has caused legal headaches for some. Adults have been charged in Georgia, Iowa, Kansas, Montana, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, Rhode Island and Virginia. A handful have been convicted, fined and put on probation.</p>
<p>Here in Florida our neighbors were arrested for serving liquor to a party of 16 yr. olds. I think its presumptuous of any parent to do that. Who knows what health factors are involved with other people’s children? (and they are still children) We have alcohol issues on BOTH sides of our family tree, and the last thing we need is somebody introducing our kids to it all prematurely and without our consent.</p>
<p>It’s a serious no no to serve other people’s kids alcohol.</p>
<p>It is legal to serve alcohol to your own kids in our state, obviously allowing too much would be abuse. If having a drink with dinner is not a natural, comfortable thing in your family, then it’s not for you; there are lots of good ways to be a family. We like the taste of alcohol paired with foods and the teenagers were allowed to taste too. They really learned what they liked and that small amounts can enhance food. It was natural in our family and certainly not a daily routine, just occasionally. </p>
<p>I certainly never served or tolerated other kids drinking in my home. And we had to really be aware, those water bottles teenagers carry into the house might be vodka. </p>
<p>Learning to appreciate decent stuff paid off tho----now ( they are of age) when they come home and go off to local parties, they take a nice bottle of beer for the evening so they don’t have to drink the party bud light. </p>
<p>I really agree with the strict laws — serving kids is such a danger. There are so many risks, you could set them up for driving accidents, inappropriate sex, violence, or trigger hereditary alcoholism.</p>
<p>You could also unknowingly serve a kid with a life threatening peanut allergy something with peanut oil. There comes a time when people have to begin to take responsibility for their own actions. Our drinking laws are so stupid.</p>
<p>Triggering herediatary alcoholism is going to take more than one night of drinking. A pattern would need to be established. Aren’t you being a bit of an alarmist?</p>
<p>dke:</p>
<p>Your description certainly wasn’t the norm for my kids’ group of friends at HS. I don’t understand your friend taking what seems (from half of a line of a post) to be a victim or ‘oh well - nothing I can do about it’ attitude. If the friend knows this is happening almost every weekend and the friend allows their kid to join in, it’s plain bad parenting IMO.</p>
<p>collegemom-- yup, it sounds alarmist but I have a friend with alcohol issues on both sides of the family like dke mentioned and she had great fear of any drinking. She swears that her brother lost control over alcohol with his first teenage binge. </p>
<p>I also think think that the drinking laws should be modified so that alcohol could be somewhat normalized. Making it into a forbidden evil doesn’t help people develop a moderate view.</p>
<p>Oh, I sound like I’ve contradicted myself… I favor laws that prohibit adults from facilitating teenage drunkeness … but I wish there could be a cultural shift so that moderate use of beer and wine wasn’t such a big deal.</p>
<p>Thirty one states allow drinking by minors under specific circumstances (Typically for religious reasons, culinary classes, for employment, or with family members).</p>
<p>Sorry to barge in like this, but I’m a high school student who frequents the parent board because I think you guys have a lot to say and tend to give good advice, and here’s my opinion:</p>
<p>I go to a selective public high school in NYC. My parents have always been very strict in general, and while I admit that sometimes the rules seem more for them to keep the illusion that I am still their little girl than they are for my safety, I agree with them overall. They’re very strict about drinking; the most alcohol I’ve had in one sitting was 5 sips of wine at my bat mitzvah. I’ve never been big on parties, mostly because of their strictness, and while I know the people in my grade who do get drunk every weekend, I have never been to one of those parties and I don’t want to go. However, they definitely do happen without supervision, and mostly at the houses of the more wealthy, as has been said. The parents leave for a weekend, probably knowing what their kids are going to do, but except for one extreme case where a girl invited ~500 people to her apartment and they broke some expensive things, I have never heard of the parents doing anything about it. Most of the kids who frequently drink admit that their parents don’t really care as long as they’re not really injured, and I for one simply don’t understand how that can be so. Granted, they want their children to be happy, and I’m sure at least some of them drank in high school, but I just don’t see what positive things they see in letting their kids drink.</p>
<p>You sound like a great kid, teenage_cliche. </p>
<p>I took my S and his friend to dinner tonight. They told me about a party they dropped by last Friday night. It was not at the home of a wealthy student, by the way. Apparently, when they walked through the door, someone asked them if they wanted to buy mushrooms. They went further inside & saw the bongs and beer. They left. They were really glad they did, because the party got busted. Everyone there got MIP or MIA citations. I told them I was glad they knew enough to leave, and that I hope they continue to make good choices.</p>
<p>Whew … who knew parenting would be this scary??</p>
<p>Stories about drunk high schoolers get much attention and generate excited discussion among parents but I suspect we overestimate its prevalence. It is just not as “interesting” to talk about high schoolers NOT getting drunk, NOT getting arrested, etc etc. But there are plenty of kids who don’t drink in high school and by some miracle they still turn out OK!</p>
<p>How many parents stay up to wait for their high school kids to come home every night? How many parents smell their kids breath when they get home? How many parents do drop off and pick up at parties, or do they let their kids hitch rides with friends because it’s more convenient?</p>
<p>I have been to too many cocktail parties where parents would tell each other their Johnny or Susie do not party (alocohol, sex, drug), and I’ve wanted to ask them if we were talking about the same kid.</p>
<p>vicariousparent, you may have your head in the sand. I’d much prefer to think that drinking is rare. But a recent anonymous survey in our middle-class suburban hs, 70% of students reported have consumed alcohol in their lives, and 48% reported binge drinking in the past 3 months. That’s HALF admitted to binge drinking within the past 3 months. Yet, at the PTA meetings all the parents want to ask about is if there’s heroin or weapons in the school. A lot easier to worry about the monster off in the distance than to confront the monster already in the room.</p>
<p>DD (sophomore) had a falling out with her middle school girlfriends just as frosh year started. At the time, it seemed like a disaster, especially as they were the “popular” kids. Well, last weekend one of these girls’ parents went away for the weekend and of course they got the bright idea to just have about a dozen people over… and a dozen turned into 40, and the party got busted, and now they have to go to court for Minor in Posession. If DD had still been with those girls she’d have been invited and probably would have gone to the party (unless I found out the parents were away, then I’d have said no). Turns out to be a great thing that they parted ways… and btw, these are “good” kids with good grades. They made a dumb mistake, hopefully they’ve learned from it and hopefully DD learned the lesson while watching from a distance!</p>
<p>I overheard DD arguing with her ex-boyfriend on the phone (while they were still dating), she was angry at him for getting drunk with his friends and said she was tired of him doing this. The next week, bf’s mom was telling me she knows her son would never drink, “he’s so into fitness that he won’t even eat french fries so I know he wouldn’t drink!” I just looked at her and changed the subject, I was tempted to tell her what I knew but she probably wouldn’t believe me and DD would have KILLED me for hearing her phone conversation.</p>