@jonri -
Thank you for the correction. The law went into effect in September 2011. It was not yet in effect when the incident involving my D as an RA occurred.
I realize in retrospect @techmom99 that I might have sounded a bit “snarky” with my correction; it wasn’t intentional. I just really do remember the incident well and the fact that Grant (who called 911) was aware of the law. He was arrested at the scene and it was big news when the charges were dropped. If anything good came out of the incident, it was the fact that a LOT of college kids in NY State learned that the law existed because of this incident.
I think this should be the l law in EVERY state and the rule on EVERY college campus.
One of the chilling things about that post by the young man who died is how much time and energy he had spent thinking about drinking and alcohol - to the point that he claimed certainty and confidence. Focusing a lot on alcohol can be an indication of a problem, as it speaks to a kind of obsessive behavior that can accompany addiction. I do not say that to criticize him but rather to note it for those who may encounter it in someone with a suspected drinking problem.
Sad, Sad, Sad.
@jonri -
I didn’t take it as snarky. I am pleased that you took the time to correct the record. I also wish that a law like it existed in every state. I have made sure that my kids know about it.
Really good law, thanks for the info.
They need to bring back beer. College kids are going to drink, but at least with beer you are highly unlikely to drink yourself to death. Not to say you can’t get plenty drunk, but kids get far drunker by drinking hard liquor.
Actually, I don’t agree with this as one can get very drunk on beer depending on genetics and depending on the alcohol content of beer(I.e. Some can exceed 10%+ alcohol).
One friend who is the odd person out in a family full of drinkers with high tolerance for alcohol has such a low tolerance for alcohol he has actually gotten heavily drunk on a half-can of bud light a few times.
I’ve also witnessed plenty of folks who get seriously drunk/wasted after only a few(3 or less) cans/bottles light beers*…including fraternity members at their campus parties.
- 6% alcohol or less.
True, beer hits me harder and faster than any hard alcohol. Don’t know why, but I end up quite “tipsy” to use a quaint term on one beer…just one can of plain old yucky beer. I stay away from it although with the proliferation of brew houses I’ve noticed that one craft beer doesn’t hit me quite as hard and is “safe” for me if they don’t have wine or a full bar. So even beer can impact people differently.
Very interesting. Especially considering many craft/craft-style mass market beers I’ve tried tend to have much higher alcohol content(8% or 10% and up).
As a newer member of CC, I was not here during this strategy. It is very sad and helpful to others as a tragic lesson of consequences. Thank you for sharing this and posting. It should be posted yearly so that this may be a lesson to the many student who visit here.
As the father of two sons, I feel the main responsibility is to keep them alive. Sure it is nice to raise them and teach them things, but these stories bring home the real need to simply keep them alive. It was mentioned earlier that “if they could just have gotten through a few more years”. It is so true. I have heard that if children can reach 25, they are mostly out of the woods for these types of behaviors.
My prayers go out to the poor parents and family he left behind.
Thank you for reminding us of this sad story. Everyone in this virtual community was affected, I can’t even imagine what his family went through.
@cobrat It is highly unusual for someone to get drunk off half a can of beer, or even three beers (unless they are “chugged.” We should not base our national alcohol policy on the effect that it has on a small fraction of the population.
To be clear, one can get plenty drunk on beer, get a DUI, do stupid and dangerous things, and so forth. But beer is far more limiting, and it is far easier for people to gauge its effects and limit its consumption. Kids who mix their own drinks with hard liquor often can’t see how much they are pouring in their cup and end up pouring in eight or nine ounces, or almost the equal of a six-pack’s worth of alcohol, in a single drink. Perhaps I’m wrong, but I find it highly unlikely that someone would get alcohol poisoning from drinking beer. The crackdown on fraternity parties has actually caused an increased in dangerous drinking patterns.
Many European countries have a drinking age of 16 for beer, and no age at all when one is with a parent. Our goal should be to encourage moderation and to discourage the use of hard liquor. An outright ban on alcohol for 18 to 21 year olds doesn’t do that, in my view. I’m not saying that drinking beer is risk free, but people are going to drink, and to that end if we can channel them to drinking beer in moderation or wine with meals, I think that’s a good thing.
Then you’ve tried only a very, very narrow selection of beers. The range of ABVs for craft beers is very large. At the place I was at last night the beers ranged from 3.8 to 12. I had a 6.8 and 7.2
We all need to heed our limits.
A lot of schools have banned hard liquor to some extent – Stanford, ND, WUSTL, Williams, Dartmouth, UVA, etc. Which pretty much implies that beer and wine are de facto tolerated/legalized. That policy makes intuitive sense to me – liquor is quicker after all. IIRC, the Cornell kid at UVA was drinking out of a flask.
But I have not seen any studies on what effect those liquor bans have had in practice.
People die in accidents no matter what kind of alcohol they drink. But they really only die of alcohol poisoning if they’re drinking hard liquor. It is very difficult to hold down enough beer or wine to hit a fatal BAC.
This is really sad, and very scary for those of us getting ready to send our kids off to college soon. It just happened at Miami (OH) within the last couple of weeks.
I remember the misinformation that used to be spread around when I was young about alcohol not being lethal if you made yourself puke or if you drank liquor before beer, etc. My kids give me the eye roll when I talk to them about this stuff. I so hope they are listening anyway.
I had brunch today with college friends. Four of the 6 of us have 20/21 year olds in college right now, and we all agreed that we’d like the age to be rolled back to 18. And of the 5 college kids, only one really drinks and his mom said he just drinks a few beers, at home, occasionally. I have one daughter who would probably drink a few beers if it was legal. She has a boyfriend who is 24 so of course has access, but doesn’t drink more than a beer or two now (when the Packers are playing).
I grew up with an 18 drinking age and we all drank beer (in high school of course, so it was not legal). Not much trouble, not a lot of dangerous behavior. In college it was 18 for beer and wine (3.2%) and we were happy drinking that. It wasn’t until my friends turned 21 that I started sneaking into ‘real’ bars. By then, I was a lot more controlled in my drinking.