The Washington Post's new higher ed section has an article on universities evolving alcohol policies. Apparently, a growing number of universities, Virginia Tech and The George Washington University among the most recent, have instituted a policy of notifying parents if their under-age children are caught drinking. As someone who was until recently a student, and based on common sense, this is a terrible idea.

The logic is that universities are turning to parental notification as a way of protecting students from dangerous behavior. To be clear, if students are hospitalized or demonstrate dangerous behavior, unless there are serious family problems, parents should be notified so that they can decide how to take care of their children (not to mention legal ramifications). But apart from these more extreme circumstances, notifying parents if a minor has a few drinks, or even is in possession of alcohol, is actually a pretty dangerous policy.

The problem with these policies is that they do not curb drinking, they simply drive it underground. The safest environment for students who are seeking independence and beginning to drink is to do so in a safe environment where they don't fear punishment. If a student feels sick, they should be able to ask for help. If students don't have to hide their drinking, they can view their RA's or other student officers as friends, rather than spies. Instead, if students fear parental notification, they hide their drinking and when they get sick. Parental notification will not cause students to turn to a healthy game of scrabble on Saturday night before turning in at 10:30 pm.

If campus becomes a dry zone, where do kids go? These policies drive students off campus,which is demonstrably less safe. If campus and dorms become Big Brother situations, then students get fake ID's and go into the city to try their luck at bars. Here, there are fewer friends to look after you, and you are inebriated farther away from the safety of campus and campus health facilities.

In June of 2008, a group of university presidents and chancellors came together and signed the Amethyst Initiative, a statement calling for the reassessment of the 21-year-old drinking age because they believe it contributes to the dangerous practices of binge drinking and drives students off campus. The point is that debate on how to keep students safe is varied. We need more research to help us draw conclusions, not rash policy changes that scare college students with parental notification. After all, college is about learning to be independent, to exercise good judgment, even make a few mistakes. 

Obviously the increasing instances of alcohol-related deaths is tragic and must be addressed. However, blanket parental notification polices are the wrong way to do it. When it comes to drinking, universities should promote safety and education in an open environment. Reducing the visibility of drinking, after all, is not the same thing as actually reducing drinking, or making it more safe. There need to be more studies on this. We need to ask students how they think drinking could be made more safe. I know it doesn't fit well with our national Puritan mentality, but punishment and secrecy really aren't productive when it comes to drinking. For universities to come off as tattle-tails, losing the trust of their students is exactly the wrong approach.

 (Flag of the Hitler Youth, Wikimedia Commons)

 

I hate to ruin the fun, or seem too politically correct, but a drinking game which mocks the Holocaust goes too far. I think my generation is better than this. I mean really, don't they remember that the words "Hitler" and "youth" should not go together.

The Facts: According to this article, students at the University of Huddersfield in the United Kingdom started a popular drinking game. The game is played by arranging cards in a swastika shape; drawing each card mandates a certain activity, such as saluting and saying "heil." You would hope that this game would be limited to a small number of students, but the original Facebook group is reported to have had 12,000 members before being shut down. Students who posted photos on the group's page would be promoted to "Nazi officials" (article has photos of boys heiling, with swastikas painted on them). A new Facebook group was created in its stead, which, as of this writing, as 2,790 members. Finally, there is a third group (and probably others) in support of the students who started the group and the game and whose expulsion from school is pending, claiming that:

"the Uni students who created this genius game may be getting chucked out of their university because the game is allegadly "racist". However, We all know that its a great game and the whole situation has been blown out of proportion by the older generation..." (and yes, they did misspell allegedly).

Well, I am of the students' generation and I am appalled by the game. It's because I think my generation is really great, active and tolerant and important, that I am writing about this shameful episode. The best way to react to this is to express that not all Millennials are so out of touch.

The reason students feel they can get away with this is the simple and ignorant assumption that anti-semitism and white supremacy are no longer issues. Yes, World War II ended 65 years ago, but discrimination against Jewish people, gays, and minorities in general in the name of white supremacy continues to this day. Just the other day, we learned that James Von Brun, the violent white supremacist who opened fire at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. and killed a security guard had died before standing trial. Von Brun was a Holocaust denier. Further, racism and anti-Semitism in particular are not limited to the United States.   Read More »

Dear Social Capital readers, I must admit that I have been holding out on you. There is a place in DC that makes the most ridiculous cocktails, and I have been debating whether or not to share this information with you.   Read More »

One of the best parts about summer is eating and drinking outside. BBQs are great, but far too much work for my taste. Patios and seats in front of restaurants/bars are cool and all, but really, the sidewalk's for suckers. That's why I'm glad DC's weather and building restrictions present an array of roof options.   Read More »

“Late Night Shots is herding the next generation of assholes through Georgetown bars. And you're not invited.” 

This is the clever sub-head for the Washington City Paper’s recent takedown of DC’s primarily-conservative drinking/mating site, Late Night Shots. According to WCP, Late Night Shots is a social networking site that has created an insular community of DC’s elite trust fund babies who log on several times a day to dish about last night’s sloppy hookups, rank which DC bars are party-worthy, and rate each other’s pics and tag them with snarky comments like “Cute? She looks like a dressed corpse." 

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