Pubdate:  Fri, 25 Sep 1998
Source: Santa Maria Times (CA)
Fax: 1-805-928-5657
Mail: Santa Maria Times, PO Box 400, Santa Maria, CA 93456-0400
Section: Your Turn
Author: Frank Hamilton

LET'S SEE ZERO TOLERANCE

To the Editor:

School has begun again along with the attendant social and sports
functions. This is an exciting time for our youth. It is also fraught
with the temptation to increase this excitement by using drugs. The
drug of choice for youth is alcohol. It is easy to obtain, cheap, and
socially acceptable for everyone over the age of 20. One major reason
this age limitation exists is the lack of maturity foremost of those
under 21. There are several recent examples where alcohol was involved
in situations that varied from embarrassment to tragedy for underage
drinkers:

There was at least one school graduation incident involving alcohol
this year. A group of seniors brought Popcicles made with vodka to a
graduation rehearsal. They were caught and properly dealt with by the
school administration. Unfortunately, a mother of one of the students
objected to the disciplinary action on the grounds that it was "not a
big deal."

It is MADD's belief that kind of attitude toward the use of alcohol by
youth is a major reason why our country has the problems it has with
underage drinking. Not very responsible behavior. Where did they get
the alcohol?

Two young men were recently killed bacause the driver, who was under
the legal age to drink and had a blood alcohol level twice the legal
level, crashed into a tree while driving dangerously. He did not use
good judgment to drink, to drink and drive, and to drive dangerously.
Where did they get the alcohol?

The young woman who was struck and killed while walking on the freeway
was also intoxicated. She was also under the legal age to drink. Where
did she get the alcohol?

It is not a big deal that high school athletes routinely celebrate
victories with a beer party, then drive home? It is not a big deal
that youth routinely have beer "kegger" parties, then drive home? It
is not a big deal that youth routinely drive to parties (private and
school) either under the influence of alcohol and/or have alcohol with
them? It is not a big deal that a significant number of our youth are
already alcoholics? It is not a big deal that the leading cause of
death for males 16 to 22 years of age is drinking and driving? When is
it a big deal? When do we adults draw the line and say that if you are
under 21 years of age you don't drink? - PERIOD!

The raising and education of our youth is a challenging experience
under the best of circumstances. They are always testing their
boundaries.  It is the unenviable task of adults to have to so not to
them when they  do cross them. This is why it is so important for them
to receive a  consistent message from all adults (parents, friends,
school, teachers and administrators, etc.) that underage drinking is
not tolerated under  any circumstances. Our school administrators have
to combat social problems that never used to be part of school life.
They do not need parents to criticize them for taking appropriate
action. We adults need to consider what we are teaching our youth with
our words and our deeds.

Frank Hamilton
MADD Santa Barbara
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Checked-by: Patrick Henry