It’s 8 a.m. Monday and the chime on your iPhone keeps incessantly buzzing while you press snooze every 10 minutes. You are running late to class, and you are still recovering from the weekend festivities.
Before we know it, Wednesday comes around and we find a way to justify that we are starting the middle of the week with Irish car bombs, shots of Fireball and gin and tonics.
But do we ever stop to think about how alcohol may be impacting us as a university?
According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, four out of five college students drink alcohol, and about half participate in binge drinking. As a student body, we have nearly perfected the concept of binge drinking to the point where we can confidently list it under our “hobbies and interests” on our resumes. However, that doesn’t seem to phase us.
But who am I kidding? Drinking is entertaining and the filter that slowly dis, sipates after downing a few drinks is quite amusing, or at least we think it is. But the peer pressure to drink, and especially binge drink, is constant.
Even the social stigma that exists for non-drinkers in the college bubble can be very daunting. Consuming this much alcohol can’t be healthy for any of us, right?
The NIAA also states that, on average, more than 690,000 college-aged students are assaulted by another student who has been drinking.
Here at LSU, alcohol is nearly ingrained in our alma mater. In basically any celebratory activity, you can almost guarantee liquor will be involved in the party.
Whether it is a football game, celebrating a good grade on an exam or even a snow day, the prescence of alcohol is as much a religion as sweet tea and Raising Cane’s.
Granted, drinking in general is pretty popular on most college campuses. But as an out-of-state transfer student, I was not quite ready for the insanity that ensued during football season. I was shocked at the number of students I saw around me that were consistently vomiting, and I had never seen so many students be carried out on stretchers before.
I would be lying if I said that I don’t enjoy drinking. Nevertheless, I do feel that, as a university, it is something we should take more seriously.
So what can we do to help take a step in a positive direction?
Well, there is hope. Fortunately, LSU’s Student Health Center offers some effective solutions. For example, the Tiger Education on Alcohol and Drug Matters class meets once per week throughout the semester to provide a means of support for students who feel they may need some guidance and re-education. There are also several health links located under the Wellness and Health Promotion section of their website, and there are always one-on-one consultations available.
There are dangerous risks associated with binge drinking that can start in college and transfer into young adulthood. Binge drinking has been proven to cause long-term effects and should be taken seriously.
Now is the time to acknowledge these problems and find a definitive solution before it is too late.
Jen Blate is a 24 year old sociology junior from Miami, Florida. Jen can be reached on Twitter @Jblate_TDR.