Spring Break
The Race to the Bottom Not Inevitable at College
Rami Abdoch and Kyle Wukash
Issue date: 12/3/08 Section: Opinion
It's Friday night of orientation week and you're officially on the cusp of the college life experience. After 18 years of parental non-sense, your moment of true "liberation" culminates in the glistening light of a red solo cup. Staring at the red cup, you justify having one drink. After all, you just want to have fun. You fashion the red cup, and the next thing you know you're off to the races.
The next morning you wake up late for your language placement exam, your head is spinning madly. You forget about the exam and settle for intermediate French, knowing full well that your AP score could have placed you into much higher class. But who cares, last night was fun and tonight is going to be even better. You can't help but anticipate the moment of revenge on your roommate in another game of captain dick head. School starts, and you decide to join a fraternity; a great way to access alcohol. Weekends are now a time to relieve some stress by drinking away the pressures of school, and Mondays are always the days where you try to piece together the weekend occasionally saying to yourself, "did I really do that?" But deep down, you can't help but find a sense of self-satisfaction as to the tremendous accomplishment you made while being drunk. College is going to be great.
Today, college campuses across the country have become plagued with the pandemic of "binge drinking." The hysteria of drinking, which characterizes a large part of the so called "college life," is often disregarded and excused as typical adolescent behavior. But excuses, however, fail to account for the unwanted ramifications of binge drinking such as academic deficiency and sexual exploitation. The problem with social drinking in college is the lack of responsibility and intermittent emphasis on moderation.
Nowadays, in order for students to have "good time," the social setting can no longer be devoid of alcohol. Together, "having fun" and binge drinking pose a strange dilemma. In part, this misconstrued understanding of fun dictates the social culture in a college setting. Instead of a place where students are socially nurtured and encouraged to exercise responsibility, college has become a place where responsibility is tolerably suspended.
The next morning you wake up late for your language placement exam, your head is spinning madly. You forget about the exam and settle for intermediate French, knowing full well that your AP score could have placed you into much higher class. But who cares, last night was fun and tonight is going to be even better. You can't help but anticipate the moment of revenge on your roommate in another game of captain dick head. School starts, and you decide to join a fraternity; a great way to access alcohol. Weekends are now a time to relieve some stress by drinking away the pressures of school, and Mondays are always the days where you try to piece together the weekend occasionally saying to yourself, "did I really do that?" But deep down, you can't help but find a sense of self-satisfaction as to the tremendous accomplishment you made while being drunk. College is going to be great.
Today, college campuses across the country have become plagued with the pandemic of "binge drinking." The hysteria of drinking, which characterizes a large part of the so called "college life," is often disregarded and excused as typical adolescent behavior. But excuses, however, fail to account for the unwanted ramifications of binge drinking such as academic deficiency and sexual exploitation. The problem with social drinking in college is the lack of responsibility and intermittent emphasis on moderation.
Nowadays, in order for students to have "good time," the social setting can no longer be devoid of alcohol. Together, "having fun" and binge drinking pose a strange dilemma. In part, this misconstrued understanding of fun dictates the social culture in a college setting. Instead of a place where students are socially nurtured and encouraged to exercise responsibility, college has become a place where responsibility is tolerably suspended.
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