Alchohol Ban On College Campuses

[Guest Jason]

Just last week, I believe it was last week, Okalahoma St. has issued a ban on alcoholic beverages at their University. Ok. St. isn't the first to do, I believe they are the third 'major/big/ college to go this route.

The Banning came after a student was found dead following a Frat. party due to alcohol poisening. The other colleges also issued a ban after students were found dead from alcohol consumption. Several other cases have known about, but many colleges take no alcohol ban actions. Most cases were affiliated with Fraternity parties as well. One of the deaths was the result of a frat hazing in which the pledger was forced to drink 'X' amount of beers and shots.

Now, do the colleges need to take action on these issues? Some have banned alcohol and some have even disbanded fraternities and sororieties due to excessive alcohol consumption. Are the colleges justified in banning alcohol and Frats?

 

Personally, I am for it. I realize that most college students are of drinking age and can do it legally. But being in an college environment only seems to encourage it, especially in frats and such. The school I attended was a 'dry' college, no alcohol whatsoever and you weren't welcome on campus if you were drunk. I know people will say, 'I paid the tuition, I should be able to drink if I want'. But College is an orginazation, not a public party. Schools all have rules, regulations and standards and it is their decision to say what goes and what stays. Just as with any other business or Institution. A Fraternity is a student body that represents the college, and if a Fraternity can't live up to the standards set forth by a college, they should be disbanded. Give them a fair warning first though. Fraternities are notorious for being nothing more than an excuse to get drunk.

 

Thoughts and opinions. Agree or disagree?

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

Frats killed these people, not booze. Ban greek living.

[Superstring 0]

I'd love to see them try and do this in British universities, god there'd be riots in the streets.

[Guest Cerebus]

Frats killed these people, not booze. Ban greek living.

On one hand I agree with Agent. Then again, it was the college enviornment that made my sister an alcoholic & got her to drink so much she had to get her stomach pumped. So I'm split.

[UseTheSledgehammerUh 0]

"Ban greek living".

 

Greeks run the country.

 

Why don't you look up some "Frat" men that have risen to prominence in this country...

 

Hell, Michael Bloomberg, Woodrow Wilson, and JFK Jr. are among the great leaders who were in MY frat alone.

 

Don't make stupid comments.

[Guest BDC]

My campus is already dry, has been for a long time and I'm going to tell you something: it saves a buttload of headaches. I went to go visit some friends of mine at other colleges and with the kind of stuff going on there, I don't see how you can live, let alone study around that kind of noise/idiocy.

 

"Ban greek living".

 

Greeks run the country.

 

Why don't you look up some "Frat" men that have risen to prominence in this country...

 

Hell, Michael Bloomberg, Woodrow Wilson, and JFK Jr. are among the great leaders who were in MY frat alone.

 

Don't make stupid comments.

 

You're going to tell me that they rose to such positions of prominence because they were in frats?

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

Let each college and university do what it wants, but it'd be better if there was a ban, imo. However, I don't really care either way...

[Justice 0]

Frats killed these people, not booze. Ban greek living.

Ban freshmen. This year at my college, we've had NO cases of Alcohol poisoning at any frat on campus. We've had a record 11 involving freshmen (That was back in early November, and this is a college of around 1700 people). The frats at my college tend to be a LOT better with alcohol because they have something they lose if they get caught drinking (The house). I find freshmen are far dumber with alcohol than any frat boy could ever be.

 

Ban Freshmen.

[Guest Fire and Knives]

Ban whatever you want. They'll still drink. A lot.

 

Hooray for meaningless edicts!

[Damaramu 0]

Are you sure you meant Oklahoma State and not Oklahoma?

Because a student from the Sigma Chi fraternity died of alcohol poisioning early this semester and they've been debating all this semester and have finally made it a dry campus. I'm pretty sure OSU has been dry for a long time.

 

It's really not the frat's it's the freshman being influenced by the frats. They show up to college and think that all they're supposed to do is party and get drunk and the frats encourage that.

When I'm sitting in class and I hear somebody bragging about how drunk they were it's usually a freshman. When I hear someone talking about going out and getting wasted on a Tuesday night when they have a Wednesday morning class at 730 AM it's a Freshman. The Freshman are irresponsible and don't know what moderation is and don't know how to party on the weekend when there is no class. They don't realize college is to learn and earn a degree for your career. They think it's time to party. That's the problem at least at my University.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Yikes. You have 7:30 classes?

 

Banning alcohol at a college is a silly idea. At most schools half or more of the student body lives off campus anyway. When you're saying "dry campus," do you basically mean "no alcohol allowed at frats"?

[Guest netslob]

drinking and college? i never heard anything about that...

[Styles 0]

As a college student who rarely drinks, my perspective is actually one my dad passed on to me from his expirence in college (he was part of a frat). He thinks the exact opposite should be done. That the drinking age should be lowered to 18 and that all frats should be completely recognized and regulated by the university. His rationale is, college kids are going to drink, and his time the kegs were allowed right on campus, everyone had a good time and there was no danger of people having to drive around to places to sneak in to to drink and thus less accidents. Furthermore, if the frats are embraced by the university, frats have the incentive to ban hazing. If housing, programs, honors whatever is provided by the university that monitors the frats and bans hazing, none will want to encourage the practice, lest they lose their house and get kicked off campus. It's when the university ignors the frats and pretends they don't exist that trouble starts because then they do whatever they want, hazing happens and kids get hurt. Anyway this makes sense I think.

I don't understand the whole drinking culture as it is, but in terms of frats, if you keep them on a leash instead of shunnning them there's a better chance of regulating them.

[Guest Fire and Knives]

All this alcohol poisoning. What happened to pot, anyway? Or maybe that's just St. Mary's.

[Damaramu 0]

See the thing about this kids death was that his brothers were making him drink and I think that's wrong.

"Hey if you wanna be cool and be in our frat you have to drink until we tell you to stop!"

Different people can handle different amounts of alcohol. They have some 120 pound kid that's never touched a drop of liquor drinking the same as some 250 pound guy that's been drinking since High School. And I've talked to people and they're pretty much made to do it even if they don't want to or else they'll be looked at like an outsider.

[Styles 0]

I got a lot of heat with my friends after an incident earlier this year where a freshman girl was killed, hit by a train, stumbling home drunk in the middle of the night after leaving a party, and while everyone was being all "oh, this is so sad" I gave my crass opinion that she should have been more responsible, made safer arrangements and watched out for the big fucking flashing lights and sirens before crossing the tracks. They thought I was a monster, and were telling me how she was a just a freshman who was taken advatage of by her friends and couldn't help drinking on her first week in college, to which I responded "I've gone a year and a half without getting completely messed up and run over by a train". Even though I expressed it was indeed sad and I felt bad for her family and friends, there are other people who have their lives taken from them by actions not caused by their own irresponsibilty and stupidity that I have more sympathy for. They didn't talk to me for a week after. I just don't understand it...

[Guest BDC]

Blame her friends while you're at it, Slapnuts. I'm serious. If no one is responsible enough to even look after their friends... well...

[Styles 0]

Blame her friends while you're at it, Slapnuts. I'm serious. If no one is responsible enough to even look after their friends... well...

Yeah, that was my friends' angle too, that she was a victim in this. I agree, the whole thing is just fucked up, but a little common sense and responsibilty on all sides could have prevented it.

[Guest BDC]

Blame her friends while you're at it, Slapnuts.  I'm serious.  If no one is responsible enough to even look after their friends... well...

Yeah, that was my friends' angle too, that she was a victim in this. I agree, the whole thing is just fucked up, but a little common sense and responsibilty on all sides could have prevented it.

Oh no, I'm not saying one or the other, I'm saying both.

 

She wasn't responsible enough to take care of herself. Her friends weren't good enough friends to watch out for her.

[Highland 0]

Where is the sense of personal responsibility? College students are considered adults, not children and if they don't want to drink they shouldn't have to, conversely if they want to they should be able to. The universities have no business banning anything just because some people were too weak-willed to know when to stop.

[Guest BDC]

College universities have business banning things because they have to take into account all the people they're serving. It serves the guy down the hall to drink, but dammit, when he gets loud, the rest of us have to put up with it, exams and papers be damned.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

"Ban greek living".

 

Greeks run the country.

 

Why don't you look up some "Frat" men that have risen to prominence in this country...

 

Hell, Michael Bloomberg, Woodrow Wilson, and JFK Jr. are among the great leaders who were in MY frat alone.

 

Don't make stupid comments.

And I'm willing to bet there's at least a thousand more regular joes, dropouts, drunks, and bozos that were in your fraternity. I can only speak about the roofie-dropping embarassments I saw in college of course, but I'll say with total certainty that 95% of them were twats trying to buy friends.

[iggymcfly 0]

I can't believe how many people actually agree with this bullshit.

 

No matter what the university does, unless you're at BYU, people are going to drink. This is a natural and normal part of the college experience, as well as life in general. All these useless edicts do is pay lip service to the concerns of a couple nosy people and make it a pain in the ass for the 70% of the student body that wants to drink.

 

To echo the sentiments of someone further up in the thread, what did happen to personal responsibility. If someone decides to drink, and goes overboard, and gets alcohol poisoning or something, that's their decision and their fault. It's not a green light for the university to go start suspending students who function perfectly well for getting caught with booze a couple times.

 

This idea that someone who drinks themselves retarded is a "victim" is completely foreign to me. If they choose to fuck up their life, they deal with the consequences. If they really want someone to "protect them from themselves", they can go down to the police station, and I'm sure the cops will keep them from drinking there.

 

I'm a sophomore at WSU, and I've never lived in a frat, but I do drink 1-3 times a week, and I don't see what the big deal is. I have a little fun, I get stupid occasionally, and then when the school week rolls back around, I get my work done, and maintain a 3.5. They also share this idea that it's good for their reputation to crack down on drinking, and they've always got campus cops swarming everywhere, but I really fail to see why anyon thinks that it's a solution to anything.

[Guest BDC]

Fine. Then go out and drink. Don't sit across the hall from me and drink til you turn into a moron while I'm trying to get work done. There is something to be said for living in dorms, but there's also the awareness that there are other people around you whose time is just as valuable as yours.

 

The whole thing pretty much devolves into where you're going to drink. Fine, go somewhere else if you're going to bitch about it. I've had drunk people stumble into my room wanting to fight while I'm trying to get a damn paper done, you're not going to convince me that this isn't a good idea.

[UseTheSledgehammerUh 0]

You know what sucks about throwing fraternity parties.

 

If a freshman girl gets LOADED at her dorm...

 

And then come to my house and doesn't have a sip and leaves.

 

And then gets killed in an accident.

 

The fraternity is held responsible. There's a TON of shitty laws that fuck us over.

[Damaramu 0]

There is the whole thing that most of the people that are doing this drinking are under the age of 21. And no matter how much you say "It's harmless and fun!" It is still illegal. So if the college campus bans it you're either going to have to go to a party off campus or to a bar where you should have no trouble drinking if you're 21.

 

This is mainly created to keep the fuck up frats from pressuring freshman into drinking against there will just so they can be "in" with the brothers of the frat.

 

I'm a Junior at OU so I've been to the school for a couple of years and I've seen the behavior. Freshman think they have to get wasted b/c they are in college and frat boys think they have to get wasted every night and party every night b/c they're in college and in a frat. Then to top it all off they look down on you if you don't party every night and they brag very loudly in class about it which is never cool.

Hey I had a couple of beers on Saturday night but I'm not in class on Monday morning going "HEY GUYS! GUESS WHAT!? I DRANK ON SATURDAY! THAT'S RIGHT I HAD SOME BUDWEISER AND SHOTS OF VODKA! YEAH THAT'S RIGHT! EVERYONE LOOK AT ME! I WAS DRINKING! I'M COOL!"

And that's basically what I get from the fuck ups in the frats.

[Guest Loss]

I agree with AoO. Ban Greeks.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Fine.  Then go out and drink. Don't sit across the hall from me and drink til you turn into a moron while I'm trying to get work done.  There is something to be said for living in dorms, but there's also the awareness that there are other people around you whose time is just as valuable as yours.

 

The whole thing pretty much devolves into where you're going to drink.  Fine, go somewhere else if you're going to bitch about it.  I've had drunk people stumble into my room wanting to fight while I'm trying to get a damn paper done, you're not going to convince me that this isn't a good idea.

Drinking in dorms is illegal at pretty much every school unless you're 21, and certainly against university policies. If you live in a dorm and have that big a problem with someone, get your R.A. They exist to handle that shit. If you're not willing to do that because you don't want to be a tattletale or whatever, then suck it up and deal with it. You can work within the system to take care of people who cause problems for you, or you can bitch about it. Take your pick.

 

And if you live in a frat house and complain about people drinking and getting stupid...well, you made your rickety bed. Lie in it.

[Highland 0]

There is the whole thing that most of the people that are doing this drinking are under the age of 21. And no matter how much you say "It's harmless and fun!" It is still illegal. So if the college campus bans it you're either going to have to go to a party off campus or to a bar where you should have no trouble drinking if you're 21.

 

If you're old enough to live away from your parents, join the army, drive, vote or otherwise be considered an adult, you're old enough to drink and the law should reflect that. I still get a chuckle out of hearing stories about soldiers fighting valiantly and all of them expected to give their lives for their country, but if they're under 21 they're not mature enough to drink. Sad.

[Guest Vitamin X]

In my opinion, the drinking age shouldn't be lowered, the age for being a legal adult should be lifted to 21. Most 18-20 year olds I've seen are completely irresponsible with their newfound freedom, and quite frankly when it comes to having the right to vote at 18 instead of 21, how much of a turnout have they had to justify that law? I was all for lowering the drinking age, of course before I turned 21, but I've realized since then the enormous gap in maturity in those couple years so I wonder what good (or really what bad) it would do in that situation.

 

With that said, why the fuck are the prohibitionists coming out in full force again? Let em drink, I say. I'm all for personal responsibility, if that girl killed herself because SHE didn't look out for herself and noone else did as well, then tough shit. Keep government (whether university, city, county, or state) out of the affairs of the public. Let them have fun.

 

You know what sucks about throwing fraternity parties.

 

If a freshman girl gets LOADED at her dorm...

 

And then come to my house and doesn't have a sip and leaves.

 

And then gets killed in an accident.

 

The fraternity is held responsible. There's a TON of shitty laws that fuck us over.

 

Maybe you left something out, but it seems to me that law is in place so that you frat boys discourage drunk driving, which really makes a lot of sense if that was the case. If someone showed up to my house drunk, I don't care if they drank more or not at my house, I wouldn't let them go out and drive.