Senior Week, graduation Means Teen Drinking

Just in time for spring graduation, senior week and prom, I’ve been hearing from a lot of friends about the teenage drinking haunts of youth. For the record, I never made it to Chesaco Park (a favorite of Overlea Sr. High students back in the day), but I was not in the norm.

These drinking sites weren’t reserved for certain cliques. The kids who frequented the many drinking haunts crossed every cultural and school group. One of the famous stories involved a star football player who dropped a keg on his toe, breaking it, messing up his game. Many more stories involve a quasi-famous rookie law enforcement officer, Chuck X, supercop, who ferreted out teens in parking lots and made them dump out their stash.

The drinking age was 18 when I was growing up, and I know that a few of my friends had parties in their basements that their parents were not only aware of, but condoned. The parents said they’d rather know where their child was so they didn’t worry about him driving or getting into a car with someone who had been drinking. It was a way of controlling the situation which, they believed, was going to happen anyway.

That logic hasn’t changed much over the years. The drinking age is 21, and kids are still sneaking off to favorite drinking hideaways or to friends houses’ where parents are looking the other way. According to a Harris Interactive poll, a quarter of all parents of children aged 12 to 20 say they’ve allowed their children to drink under their supervision. One in twelve indicated that they allowed their children’s friends to drink in their presence as well.

In addition to the safety factor parents consider when allowing children to drink at home, another school of thought has been that Americans make drinking such a mystery that it encourages teenage drinking to excess---binge drinking. In other cultures, where drinking is not off limits, theory has it that teens see drinking as a non issue, so it’s not much of a problem.

On his HSN show, Dr. Drew Pinsky, known for Celebrity Rehab and his work within the addiction community, discussed this latter notion with a parent of European heritage. She allows her children to have a glass of wine on special occasions with the family, and according to her child, it is not a big deal to him, and he wouldn’t get involved in drinking parties or get into a vehicle with someone who had been drinking.

Pinsky informed the woman that the rate of death as a result of drinking was far greater in Europe than in the United States, but that it doesn’t get reported the same way as in the United States. So, he said, the notion that allowing the child to drink in the home makes it non-taboo and a non-issue is nonsense.

Studies reported by the American Medical Association back up Pinsky’s point. “Regarding Europeans and alcohol use among youth, research confirms that Europeans have rates of alcohol-related diseases (such as cirrhosis of the liver) similar to or higher than those in the U.S. population (Single, 1984).” The rate of drinking and driving accidents is lower and can’t be compared, according to the AMA report  because in Europe, the age to obtain a driver’s license is older which means a motor vehicle plays less of a role in teenage drinking in European countries.

Pinksy's recent show was based on a new report released by the American Medical Association regarding teenage drinking habits. According to the new study, teenagers obtain alcohol easily from familiar, non-retail sources. Over 70 percent of teens reported that it was easy to get alcohol at home from unaware parents. More interesting, about 1/3 of those surveyed said that they got alcohol from their consenting parents. A larger percent obtained alcohol from the consenting parents of friends.

It doesn’t seem that the theory on parents allowing children to drink at home has changed over the years? Should it? I allowed my son to have a glass of wine with dinner here and there when he was a senior in high school. Was I wrong?