unsupervised drinking parties on weekends the way it is?

Parent Cafe
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<p>1 of 42, why do you think we’re in a debating club here? Parents are in the business of guiding their children to follow laws in some cases BECAUSE they are laws and that’s the hallmark of a responsible citizen to be law-abiding. </p>

<p>I teach children to reduce risks or act wisely because I believe at a core level this wisdom will help make them more likely to live longer. You’re trying to appeal to my logic, and that’s interesting. Yet for me, in the end, the heart has its own reasons. </p>

<p>I’ll listen to the logical debate, but always be thinking of all the kids I know whose lives were lost to drunk drivers, flunked out of college, ruined relationships, lost money. Parents who enable all of that by hosting alcohol-filled parties for underage people do not rank high on my list of good citizens. Evidently I need the law to protect me from their bad judgment because they ARE hurting kids, and we all co-occupy the same community. </p>

<p>If I’m emotion-driven, not statistics driven, that isn’t necessarily wrong-headed when we’re talking about raising human beings up for a long, productive, healthy life ahead. </p>

<p>Rosa Parks ignited a movement because the local segregation laws violated a higher law of the U.S. Constitution (which is why her position was upheld once the case got up to the U.S. Supreme Court). What higher law or moral principle do you invoke to suggest we should lower the drinking age?</p>

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<p>1of42:</p>

<p>I’m wondering where you’d draw the line here? I understand that you think it’s okay for an 18y/o to drink at-will but - </p>

<p>Do you think it’s perfectly acceptable for a 16y/o to regularly head over to the house with no parents and get blasted with a bunch of other kids around that age - I’m guessing aged 15-18 or so?</p>

<p>Do you think the idea of ‘DKE’s’ neighbor throwing a kegger for their 7th grader is no problem?</p>

<p>It’ll be interesting to see how your opinions change someday when you have kids approaching whatever age you think it’s okay to start getting drunk.</p>

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<p>10f42, I’d be interested in your definition of “civil disobedience.” To my understanding, civil disobedience is an open, intentional act meant to draw attention to the “offending” legal statute. Sitting in the privacy of one’s home and breaking the law just because one feels it is wrong does not meet that standard IMO. Do you have a different idea of what constitutes civil disobedience?</p>

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<p>mezzomom: Civil disobedience is the act of disobeying a law with the intent to change that law. So I suppose whether or not drinking underage constitutes civil disobedience depends on your point of view.</p>

<p>u<em>u</em>dad: My point of view is this: there is no defensible reason to not allow legal adults to drink, regardless of all the arguments about risk reduction etc. If we want to argue on that level there’s a lot of other things that should enter the discussion, like fatty food, etc.</p>

<p>There needs to be consistency: either raise the age of adulthood to 21 or lower the drinking age. I think the latter is far more reasonable, but attitudes may vary. I also find it RIDICULOUS that tobacco, one of the most addictive currently used drugs, is legal at 18 or 19, yet alcohol is not. Downright absurd, actually.</p>

<p>As for drinking under the age of 18: don’t think it’s particularly good, but don’t particularly care much either. I did it, most of my friends did it, most of my acquaintances did it… you get the idea. I didn’t come out the worse for it, and I had some fun times that included drinking, so overall I’m not too concerned.</p>

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<p>The moral principle that one has absolutely no right to infringe upon the free choices of an independent adult. You can argue about people under the age of legal adulthood - but 21 is 3 years above it, and there is no justification for that, in my mind. If you want to argue that 18-20 year olds are not mature enough for alcohol, fine - but that does not give the moral authority to ban alcohol unless you are also arguing that 18-20 year olds are not legally able to make their own decisions and are thus not adults.</p>

<p>As it is, at 18 a person can sign any kind of binding contract, die for their country, etc. etc., but not consume alcohol. I think that is indefensible. Consistency: they are either adults, and able to make their own decisions, or they are not. It’s pretty simple.</p>

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<p>Isn’t it fascinating that an age restriction is only “arbitrary” if it means that kids can’t do something they want to do? It’s arbitrary to set a drinking age at 21, but “I’m 18 so I’m an adult and I can do whatever I want.” Well, 18 is just as arbitrary.</p>

<p>Given all the crap that goes on with “legal adults” who still rely on their parents for support, and the fact that colleges can’t tell parents anything about that, anyone else in favor of raising the age of majority back to 21?</p>

<p>Oh, and 1of42, most of this thread is talking about high schoolers, the vast majority of whom are not adults by any definition. So your argument that “legal adults” should be allowed to drink falls flat for the “unsupervised weekend parties” being discussed here.</p>

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<p>1of42:</p>

<p>I obviously can’t say so with any certainty but I think there’s a good chance that when you have a kid who’s a 7th grader you probably won’t want him/her going over to the neighbor’s house to join in the kegger and I think when your kid is 16 y/o you probably won’t want her to regularly go to her friend’s house where you know there’ll be no parents and a group of kids’ll be getting drunk. One’s outlook can change once one has kids and especially when they’re YOUR kids.</p>

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<p>Nobody should overdo alcohol and nobody should drink and drive. Not a 16 year old, not a 26 year old, not a 62 year old. Of course, the problem is in defining “overdo”.</p>

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<p>“Civil disobedience is the act of disobeying a law with the intent to change that law.”</p>

<p>So how do you intend your private beer-drinking at home to change the law? t’s kind of like if Rosa Parks had bought her own bus and sat in the front seat. I don’t think that would have done much to change the law.</p>

<p>The gigantic difference between your harm and Rosa Parks’s harm is that her harm was NOT just a matter of opinion. The 14th Amendment said that she was being harmed. There just isn’t any amendment that’s concerned with your right to pleasure.</p>

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<p>Chedva: You’re right, 18 is arbitrary. But it has been chosen as a societally significant marker after which people are assumed to be responsible adults with various rights and responsibilities. It is inconsistent and unjust to bar legal adults from an activity like drinking.</p>

<p>u<em>u</em>dad: You’re probably right, as a parent I probably wouldn’t. I’m pretty agnostic on the issue as a whole right now, and might continue to be, subject to a number of things like how responsible I thought my kid was - I was always very open with my parents, and because they knew how responsible I was, they were not overly worried when I told them I would be drinking at a friend’s party or whatever. This started at about 16, and I never had any serious problems. Overall, my parents’ approach may have been overly permissive and could potentially have caused problems, but in my case at least it worked out.</p>

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<p>My concern with supervised drinking parties is that another parent is presuming to give my child permission to drink. </p>

<p>Alcohol was never a real issue with our kids in high school and that’s not naivete or turning a blind eye. For a variety of reasons our kids never really went out and partied on weekends. Most beer distributors in our area would attest to the fact that I have no great issues with drinking.</p>

<p>I’m sure our oldest D drank when she got to college and our youngest may well too. That’s fine, it’s their life and their decision. S drank after he moved out on his own, maybe even before, but he has never to my knowledge driven drunk.</p>

<p>On the other hand, it would trouble me greatly if someone else’s parent, unless they were close friends, (and I mean REALLY close friends of my wife and I) gave my child permission to drink at their home when they were underage.</p>

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<p>I’m reviving my old thread here, but I was talking with an old friend as her son is 16 and drinks, she’s found. Her mentality is that beer pong is OK as opposed to drinking vodka to the point of barfing and passing out like the "wild crowd"is doing. Is this a slippery slope or am I a big square? She said that I need to lighten up, that this is normal otherwise when they get to college the kids are so overprotected that they go wild. What do you think about that?</p>

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<p>It is a struggle to keep your kids away from this IMO…
Not to say that parents should cave in to it, but it is hard to fight the battle.</p>

<p>I find that with the senior parents of this class ( my area ) are stressing that kids do not get into the car and stay where they are for the night, rather than stopping it entirely.</p>

<p>In the last few weeks, some local kids have been arrested for breaking into unoccupied summer homes and having wild drinking parties. Some major damage to the homes has occurred over the winter months and now it is time to pay the piper.</p>

<p>I know many parents that are pretty high and mighty with the declaration that their kid would never participate in any underage drinking, only to have a call from the police after arresting their innocent kids.</p>

<p>I think it is naiive to take this attitude. I, for one know my kids have taken part. I would be a liar to say they have not and that we have not had to deal with it.</p>

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<p>Yes, this friend of mine has a relative who’s very strict, but her son (unbeknowst to her) is completely out of control, throwing major parties and a very heavy drinker. The relative has NO clue whatsoever. My friend says that as long as her beer ponger doesn’t get behind the wheel its OK.</p>

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<p>

THis is an important point from an early JHS post. It is a myth that the kids who get into huge alcohol trouble when away at college were the inexperienced drinkers who suddenly went hog wild with booze. The reality is that it’s usually the big h.s. drinker just increasing his intake.</p>

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<p>

Astrophysics, this is a great point. We teach our kids to abhor racism & violence & all forms of oppression. The implications of drug use go far beyond the user’s legal risks & we should present this clearly to our kids.</p>

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<p>Yes, but whose fault is the association of a very disgusting criminal element with drugs? The people who use the drugs? Or the government representatives who demonize and criminalize drugs, knowing full well that criminal activities and suffering will be the result?</p>

<p>Have we not spent enough time preaching the horrors of drug abuse to understand that our moral responsibility is to minimize harm, and that criminalizing drugs does no such thing?</p>

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<p>1of42, it doesn’t matter for purposes of this discussion. The point is to tell kids the implications of their drug use go very deep. If drug use were decriminalized, then supporting criminals & terrorists would not be part of a parent’s anti-drug arsenal. But as it stands now, it is a very important piece to discuss with you kids.</p>

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<p>Stickershock, I am sure that most of the kids who get out of control with their drinking when they get to college ARE indeed kids that drank in HS.
I happen to know of a few that never drank or did drugs at all in high school that really couldn’t handle themselves once they did get out on their own.
Kids that one would never expect would have such troubles.</p>

<p>When I went to college ( back in the dark ages ) my roommate was a girl that I was friends with in high school. We didn’t really hang out outside of school ,but had been friendly since middle school. Her parents were extremely strict with her. Once she got to college, her judgement was just awful and I had to take on the role of being her mother…she dropped out within the first year.
Some friends of my daughters have had similar difficulties and ultimately dropped out too. One was an only child that was very bright …she really blew it once she got to college ( BU ) got put on probabation and lost her scholarship. Now she works in a convenience store.</p>

<p>My point is, sometimes being TOO strict or blind to the fact that your children partake in illegal, underage drinking can backfire just as badly as letting your kids drink.</p>

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<p>Lje62, what do you do if you discover that they are drinking? I hear alot of, “we drank ourselves silly at that age and we’re just fine” alot from my baby boomer contemporaries.</p>

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<p>This has been a hot topic in the Twin Cities lately. Several schools have suspended students based on red cup photos on Facebook…in one case a mom copied them to a cd and delivered it to school. Her student is rumored to have been escorted out of school for safety. Those with red cups had to be reinstated. No breathalyzer, no proof. At D2’s school you can have all the photos and witnesses you want but unless the student breaks down and admits it there can be no official consequence.</p>