<p>You will never be able to eliminate stupidity with legislation. Kids with integrity who are sure of themselves, don’t let others “make” them do anything. As for true kidnapping and the use of physical force by an organization on a member, that needs to be punished by law. And it is. But banning peer pressure is impossible.</p>
<p>However, parents can do a lot in the early years to pressure-proof their kids. I know very, very few parents who stand up to their children, much less their teenage kids, even though it will make the kids unhappy and angry. Too many parents are afraid of undermining their teen’s popularity and ability to “fit in,” and many are too lazy for the uncomfortable fight against what “everyone else is doing.” So they say yes to co-ed sleepovers after prom, and yes to underage drinking in their basement, and any number of such things. This is how kids learn to go along with drinking someone’s vomit or urine to join a frat.</p>
<p>We know that kids who drink early, including those who “learn to drink” with their parents, are much more likely to become binge and heavy drinkers when in college. Drinking has become “normalized”, as it were, as has breaking the law and doing things that are taboo. It is true that not all those who drink heavily engage in hazing. But it is also true that almost no one who engages in hazing (on either end) is not also drinking heavily.</p>
<p>Outright drinking bans work. No, they don’t stop all students from drinking. But when the U. of Oklahoma banned all drinking on campus - including for faculty, the university president, alumni, and students over the age of 21 - it did indeed push drinking off campus. Then the town police stepped in and drove drinking further away from campus. Now those who REALLY want to drink continue to do so. But there it is no longer normative, and people who wish to do so have to step out of their routines to do so, and some students, faced with that, simply no longer find it attractive. </p>
<p>Pushing hazing (and illegal drinking) off campus is a good thing, when it takes it away from students who simply don’t want to be confronted with it on a daily basis. And, yes, legislation works. Thousands of people are alive today (and tens of thousands are not alcoholics) because of drinking laws dating from the early 1980s. Now a case can be made that the drinking age really should be 14, and I respect the case, but it isn’t because the laws aren’t effective.</p>
<p>(And yes, the stupidity quotient won’t change one iota.)</p>
<p>My point was that GFG seemed to be implying that modern kids who have parents who are too permissive and grow up in environments that are too bound by picky rules will be more inclined to fall into hazing situations. The historical list provided up-thread would seem to fly in the face of any idea that it’s a matter of modern parenting or overly legalistic administrations.</p>
<p>It’s very hard to isolate out factors in order to understand why societal trends form or are changed. But when I was growing up, if my parents prohibited something, chances were the parents of the majority of my friends prohibited it too. If you wanted to get drunk back then or have sex with your gf or bf, you had to sneak around and hide in the woods or something. Nowadays kids are free to do it in their parents’ basement! I am a bit less conservative than my parents, and even so I find myself standing alone on issues like showing R movies in middle school classrooms or allowing co-ed sleepovers with alcohol for high schoolers. So I think the concept of the change in what’s normative is spot on.</p>
<p>One of my best friend’s son goes to OU. Drinking is alive and well on that campus. In dorms, at parties, everywhere.</p>
<p>We attended a football game there and apparently the dry campus policy is suspended on game days. There is booze EVERYWHERE, displayed by both students and alums. Walking back from the game, I couldn’t believe the number empty beer/liquor bottles strewn about, the number of extremely intoxicated students and adults on campus, etc. Seems kind of odd to have such a strong policy, only to throw it completely out the window simply because of a football game.</p>
<p>You could replace parents with school officials and teens with donors and “support” groups. It is a given that few schools are determined to eradicate problems when facing a sea a “romantics” who believe the good old days of heavy boozing and hazing are an inherent part of the college culture. If the only opposition came from teenagers and young students, most campus would be have been drier and safer. </p>
<p>The real opposition comes from the formidable army of boosters who continue to support fraternities, athletics, and other groups. </p>
<p>The results take the form of lip service and gentle slaps on the wrist. And again, taking the pragmatic view that drinking is not about to vanish from our campuses, could we not concentrate on the most egregious acts and attack the worst culprits with relentless abandon and determination. </p>
<p>Trying to solve all problems at once is just part of the issue, leading to exasperation and fatigue.</p>
<p>I am a believer of educating our own kids, instead of worrrying about what other people are doing. The idea of getting pressured into doing anything stupid just to make other people like you is just a strange concept. I know for fact, my kids would rather have no friends than doing anything they don’t want to do. With that being said, D1 enjoyed her Greek life while in college, and most likely D2 will also give it a shot. I also hate the idea that the school administration or the government should care if an 18 year old should be drinking. I do agree with that if anyone should cause harm to anyone (whether it is in the name of hazing or not), that person and organization should be punished.</p>
<p>The story might fail to convey what the parents of Gordie Bailey went through. Anyone who knew Gordie and his parents would also know they could have said what you just wrote. Anyone who knew Gordie thought he would be the very last person on earth to succumb to peer pressure. And succumb he did!</p>
<p>But, at 18, all of us know everything better (especially better than our parents) and know we are invincible.</p>
<p>Xiggi - you are right, we may think we know our kids, but sometimes we don’t. I do what I can with my kids, try to give them sense of security, have empathy, and know what’s right and wrong - kind of giving them the tools they need to survive out in the big bad world. I am just not convinced that by banning everything would keep our kids safer, or would it be better to allow them to do somethings and to keep a closer eye on what they are doing.</p>
<p>When D1 was a toddler we thought it was best to ban all candy in our house, but I caught her stealing it and hiding in a closet stuffing her face with it. Instead of punishing her, we decided to allow her some treats every once in a while, but agreed with her if she ate more than what she allowed then she wouldn’t be allowed to have any for few days.</p>
<p>So, what about the many more people of college age not in college who also drink and do drugs at high rates? I believe there are many more in that group. They also may be more prone to drink and drive as much college drinking can be done within walking distance.</p>
<p>I do not believe in banning everything. We are, however, at a crossroads with choices between relaxing rules for drinking and drugs or augmenting the toughness of our approach. Since the excessive criminalization of drinking and drugs seems to be a total failure, perhaps time has come to try something different. Unfortunately, I am not certain if there is model the United States could borrow with great success. Perhaps initiatives such as Holland’s and Portugal’s are worthy of a careful examination. </p>
<p>Would it help to legalize drinking before 21? I would be inclined to think that reducing the numbers of “criminals” might be a good thing. But, I am sure others would say that reducing the number of criminals depends on reducing the offenses in the first place. </p>
<p>Again, I am not naive enough to think that the consumption of liquor will diminish magically in and out schools or colleges. As Barrons said, the issue transcends the college world. On the other hand, I fail to understand why egregious acts of hazing, including acts that led to deaths are so hard to eradicate. After all, we know whom the usual perpetrators are, we know whom the incorrigible recidivists are, and we also know that the penalties do not seem to deter those organizations. </p>
<p>I realize that it is hard to draw distinct lines between various offenses, but it remains that some activities really, really should not be part of the college landscape.</p>
<p>“Would it help to legalize drinking before 21?”</p>
<p>This is a wonderful argument from a civil liberties perspective, and I respect that. But from a public health perspective, this argument is a non-argument; it is a settled issue. We have hundreds and hundreds of studies - cross countries, where there are different ages for drinking, cross state borders in communities with different ages, data on where children learned to drink with their parents, “dry” versus “wet” campuses, places with full enforcement v. lax enforcement. The data goes back more than 30 years.</p>
<p>Oh, and we also have data on drinking among 14-year-olds when drinking among 18-year-old high schools are legal drinkers. No, drinking doesn’t go away in any case. But there is enough difference (HUGE differences) among what would otherwise seem to be similar campuses to know what works (and what doesn’t).</p>
<p>People who believe that lowering the drinking age will help solve the problem have a resistance to looking at the data. (And from a civil libertarian perspective - if you can try a 14-year-old as an adult, why shouldn’t s/he be allowed to drink?)</p>
<p>I also agree with whomever pointed out upthread that at the top schools some kids join fraternities and sororities for future career networking purposes, and that this may be one reason colleges don’t crack down more on the Greeks. The system is part of the valued alumni network that helps grads get jobs. After all, the primary career advice kids hear these days is to network, network, network. Calling up a fraternity brother is one way to do that. Presumably, one feels a greater obligation to a “brother” than to some random guy who attended the same school you did. Thus, students put up with stuff they shouldn’t out of ambition and/or fear of not getting a good job so they can pay off college loans.</p>
<p>At a recent interview my son had, the interviewer mentioned that he had belonged to the same fraternity, only at a different Ivy. It gave them a commonality to talk about. In times like these where companies receive hundreds of applications for a single position, an affiliation like that can help pull your resume out of the pile. Or at least that’s what kids are told.</p>
<p>At schools where Greek life is important, a lot of alumni strongly support it, and alumni goodwill (and money) is important to colleges. </p>
<p>And there are also instances where the Greek houses provide a substantial portion of the student housing. There are ways around that, but it takes some doing.</p>
<p>For the vast majority of participants, the Greek experience is tremendously positive and continues to provide benefits throughout life. This is why the system is so entrenched and resistant to change. In a way, it is like driving a car, but much less dangerous. The societal benefit of driving and allowing cars on the road far outweighs the risk of death from driving. People do die from driving, but we don’t react by banning cars. We continue to strive to make cars and driving safer.</p>