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November 29, 2006
Vera Simon-Nobes
It has been over a month since University of Vermont senior Michelle Gardner-Quinn left a Church St. bar in Burlington, Vermont. She borrowed a man's cell phone to call a friend, and was last seen on a jewelry store's security camera walking with the man. Gardner-Quinn was sexually assaulted and murdered that night.
The majority of college students drink, and we assure ourselves that we are safe as long as we are in control. This case illustrates that outside factors often override our feeling of invincibility. Drunk, not drunk, a little drunk, or wasted, Gardner-Quinn asked the wrong person to borrow a cell phone, and this resulted in her tragic death. While the immediate Burlington community grieved, the effects were felt throughout the country.
The reality of the case was hard to grasp at first. My friend, a UVM student who never knew Gardner-Quinn, mentioned that he wanted to go to a vigil for her that evening. I felt the grieving of the community through him, and suddenly the case was anything but surreal. Having spent many nights in Burlington, I could easily remember the few times that I had felt uncomfortable. And, like so many others, I thought to myself, "It could have been me."
At Clark, I witnessed worried parents reminding their kids to be safe. Friends showed me articles that detailed the latest on the case. I walked next to one friend as her grandmother in Florida shouted into the cell phone. She chastised us for walking out after dark, and when the grandmother brought up the "girl from UVM," my friend replied, "I know, Grammy; Vera is transferring there next semester."
A walk across campus at Clark takes about six minutes, sometimes less at night. I rarely leave my dorm-room with my wallet and always look around as I walk. Before coming to Worcester, I was never this cautious, and it is these necessary precautions that make me feel claustrophobic at this school. Vermont has been a relief to this claustrophobia. When I envision Burlington, I picture the amicable environment. Burlington's security has countered my feelings about Worcester for the last year and a half. Ironically, this young woman was murdered just as I sent in my transfer acceptance letter to UVM. I look forward to being at UVM for many reasons, but I now question the comfort that I have always felt in the city.
It's unnecessary to draw some deep conclusion from this essay. And it would be redundant to remind readers (females especially) of the safety practices that we all know. The connections that I had to the Gardner-Quinn case were indirect and few; however, for me, these connections made her murder much more than "a story on the news." Through this essay, I simply hope remind us all of our vulnerability, and to let this story become more than a headline.
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November 22, 2006
Esther Hwang
All my entries are invariably beginning with, "Last week, at a bar…" or "I was drinking at a party when…" If I keep preaching about the evils of alcohol and its luring deceptiveness, then why don't I just stay the hell away from these booze-ridden bars and parties? Because drinking has its merits and, until now, I have yet to speak about them and the positive experiences it can bring.
Last month, I attended a house party thrown in honor of one of my friends who was going abroad. Alcohol was plentiful and I'd had a beer and a half (I have low tolerance, ok??) and a friend of a friend had had a handful of tequila shots. We both had a very good calm buzz going, the kind where you're just mellow and sedated. We sat in the back porch in the warm weather, having a smoke, isolated from the drunken raving hubbub inside the house. In our placid state of euphoria, we had one of the unexpectedly best conversations I ever had. With slurring enthusiasm, he told me about the almost supernatural phenomena in astrophysics and taught me how to blow a smoke ring. I rambled about the fascinating ideas behind game theory and gossiped about certain professors. We both reminisced about the '90s, the fantastic decade of the Spice Girls, Nintendo 64, and that one irritatingly catchy song, "I'm Blue" by Eiffel.
It was possibly one of the best bonding experiences I ever had with a stranger, let alone a student at this school. Coming into Berkeley, I knew kids at this school were party-goers who at the same time maintained a nerdiness that made them adorably dorky, fun, knowledgeable, and passionate about their work. Yet in my one and a half years at this school, I have rarely run into them or had a chance for a stimulating conversation with them. Was it because most students don't get a chance to see each other outside the classroom? Was it because there weren't very many inter-major relationships in college? Whatever the reasons, I never had a more intellectual, funny, thought-provoking and enjoyable conversation at this school than I did with that student that night. I believe a big part of that had to do with our lack of shyness due to the alcohol. The drinks got us talking to each other, allowing a female Los Angelino majoring in Business Administration and a male San Jose native majoring in Physics to find, not only some common ground, but a realization that they actually had common ground. It's one of the undeniable merits of booze.
There's no lesson to this story, no moral about why you shouldn't drink, no turn of events where my new friend was suddenly run over by a drunk driver in mid-sentence. That night, I had a great time while drinking, opened up to a stranger and had a terrific conversation, and that was that.
Why in the world am I writing about this on an alcohol education website? I think my past preaching about all the bad things that have happened during intoxication might perhaps give the wrong idea to readers that alcohol is categorized in a very black and white, good and evil category. This was the same education I'd received in high school. In the midst of the horror stories about date-rapes, drunken driving, dive-bombing GPAs, and acute alcohol poisoning, nobody ever stopped to tell me, "But there's definitely some fun stuff about drinking." When I came to learn that alcohol did have some actual benefits (i.e. facilitating social situations), all warnings, however valid they were, were thrown out the window. That's when I'd fallen into the vortex of partying and drinking. So instead of warning people about the horrible things that can happen while drinking, I think I'll warn everyone of the opposite: drinking can be fun and it can turn you into the uninhibited person you never thought you could be for a night. You've been warned.
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November 15, 2006
Kate Frankola
Drinking Realization
It suddenly dawned on me last Thursday after class that it had been a week - an entire seven days - since I'd had a drink, a realization that prompted me to think back to the last time that I'd gone a week without drinking. I tried to mentally relive the past few months, flipped backwards through my planner…and slowly the shock began to set in: I realized that the last time that I'd gone an entire week without alcohol had to have been before my high school graduation - May of 2005!
I'd never thought of myself as a heavy drinker, especially compared to some of my classmates at Tulane, who drink five or six times a week. In fact, I always figured that drinking two or three times a week made me a pretty modest partier. But this discovery incited me to wonder if perhaps my perspective was a little skewed. Someone who hasn't experienced a week without alcohol in nearly a year and a half must be drinking that much for a reason. But, I asked myself, what was my reason?
That afternoon, as I was leaving campus to go for a run, I bumped into a good friend of mine who regularly sees me both drunk and sober and whose favorite topics of discussion generally include how much he drank last night and how much he regrets it. Figuring that he'd offer an interesting opinion, I asked, "Greg*, would you consider me a heavy drinker?"
"No, definitely not…wait, well actually yes, you do drink a lot…but you're like the most responsible drunk ever…well, usually…but you care a lot about school...ummm, I have no idea! In fact, I've often thought about why you even bother to drink. You act exactly the same when you're drunk as when you're sober, give or take some balance issues. You don't seem like you're doing it because of peer pressure. I mean, I'm afraid to admit that I like Kelly Clarkson - OK seriously don't tell anyone that - so it's obvious that I drink partly because I want to fit in. But you seem like you don't care about that stuff. Whenever I see you out drinking, I always think, man, Kate Frankola must drink because she really loves it."
Greg's comments really hit me. His perceptions were totally accurate: I don't drink because I feel pressure to have a more appealing personality or to fit in. If those aren't my reasons for drinking, then clearly I must have others. But do I drink because I "really love it?" And if so, wouldn't drinking for that reason, rather than due to various forms of social pressure, actually be more of an indication that I have a real problem with alcohol? If that were the case, could I even admit such a thing to myself?
I set out on my run that afternoon with a great deal to think about. First of all, did I "really love" drinking? Certainly I would be lying to myself if I didn't admit to really enjoying drinking - and even being drunk - on many occasions. I take refuge in the gradual dimming of reality, the respite from total consciousness. My taste in music becomes more inclusive, and I'm much less self-conscious as I sing and dance along. I become less inwardly judgmental, and I'm often moved to remember how much I love my friends or family members.
But there have been times - occurring at a frequently increasing rate - when I have used alcohol not to enhance my good time, but to distract me from my bad one. There are times when I'm out at a party or bar and I'm just downright bored. I think to myself, "Why am I doing this? This is pointless. We're not here to have fun; we're here to get drunk for the sake of getting drunk until we're too inebriated to know if we're having fun or not." And then, because I'm a lazy, irresponsible barely-adult, I do the same thing: try to get drunker so that I can be entertained by the room spinning, amused by my stumbles, and generally distracted from my boredom.
I've come to understand, now, that I don't "really love to drink;" that what I really love to do is have fun and, for me, drinking does enhance a good time that may happen to be unfolding independently of alcohol's presence. But I have also discovered, especially over the past few months, that alcohol fails to single-handedly create fun or a party. It may be an ingredient for a good time, but by no means is it the only one.
With all of that being said, I still cannot fully explain why I drink. Even though I now understand that it is fun and not drunkenness that I seek when I go out and party, I nonetheless doubt my ability to be honest enough with myself to distinguish, while I am out, whether drinking tonight would be "worth it," or a waste of time, money, and calories. Perhaps I am less of an independent thinker and decision-maker than Greg gave me credit for being; just like everyone else, I'm going to keep drinking until I have an explicit reason not to, not the other way around. Indiscriminate drinking has just become another habit - one that I, because I'm lazy, "fun," and immature, will probably not feel compelled to break. But does even that explanation account for all of my behavior?
I wrote an essay last spring for the AlcoholEdu Essay Competition, hypothesizing why college students as a whole drink to excess and, based on the many comments that I received from the people who read it, I don't think that my speculations were too far from the truth. I must have managed to figure out some of the entire youth culture's motives for drinking…so why can't I understand my own?
*name changed to protect the closet Kelly Clarkson fan.
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November 8, 2006
Michael Shannon
A few weeks ago - it was a Saturday around two in the morning - I headed into the men's room on my floor to find the large mirrors shattered, trash and toilet paper scattered, an empty fire extinguisher laying on its side, and its contents emptied onto the floor, the ceiling, and what was left of the mirrors. My good friend Ezekiel and I - we're floormates - were forced to use the women's bathroom on the other side of the building for the week that followed. It was a bother, though the girls did their best to accommodate the 30-odd boys who had been left without their own bathroom. The culprit(s) still have not been named, and housing policy dictates that my floormates - girls included - and I will be forced to pay for the damages.
I like to think of Columbia University as made up of bright kids, but such acts make me question it. Then again, vandalism surely occurs independent of a kid's S.A.T. Just last week, another dorm on campus was vandalized by a group of drunken males who destroyed the plaster-board ceilings on the majority of floors.
Though the vandal(s) on my floor have not yet been identified, statistically, logically, and intuitively we all conclude that the basic characteristics of those who destroyed my bathroom and those who destroyed the other dorm's ceilings are the same: they acted in a group; they are men; and they were drunk.
Even if a lone, totally sober girl intent on inconveniencing the men on her floor for a week might have slammed a fire extinguisher into several mirrors and sprayed white frost all over, the trend of groups of guys getting drunk and committing acts of vandalism is worth examining.
I talked to my good friend Ezekiel the day after the incident. In the course of our conversation, he recalled that he himself had once gotten intoxicated to the point that he considered it a fine idea to throw a cinderblock through a parked car's windshield. And he did. I need not mention that he was with a group purely comprised of guys and they were all well gone.
What is it about alcohol that can transform an Ivy League student with a 1500 S.A.T. score into a wholly asinine delinquent? To me, the drink flows across several psychological influences and leaves a person vulnerable to his baser impulses.
The typical college-age vandal would not destroy during his sober moments. Even in a group of rowdy college kids, it will not generally occur to him to act on any destructive impulse, and Ezekiel believes this of himself. Add alcohol, though - and a fair amount of it - and the desire to impress those around him quickly moves from thought to action. He will become more subject to the pressure of those around him, perhaps goading him on; he will more easily sense the connection between a brave act of destruction and peer approval; he will not realize or care for the consequences of his actions. The group does not even have to exert an overt pressure and still the drunkard might feel the drive to act more acutely than the sober man.
There is no doubt a strong group effect on such decision-making, but the individual's role should not be overlooked. Alcohol has the effect of conjuring up primitive urges that usually remain buried behind one's sense of social mores and proper behavior. Alcohol removes the unease of inhibitions. In small quantities, alcohol catalyzes the feeling of comfort in a social scenario. In large quantities, the removal of these inhibitions can bring out the violent and destructive impulses of the individual.
Vandalism is often a relatively dramatic act that occurs because of a variety of influences at play within the individual and around him. While not underestimating the variety of these influences, it seems clear that alcohol has a particularly negative effect on the very areas - self-control, foresight - that keep a person from committing destructive acts on a daily basis.
In exchange for a few hours of total ease and seemingly harmless fun, the kids that destroyed my bathroom left us boys without our own bathroom for a week, forced us to intrude upon the girls, forced the building cleaners and workers - who have too heavy a workload as it is - to scrub the bathroom with bleach and replace the mirrors, and left a floor of guiltless college students to foot the bill. Thanks, fellas. I sure hope it was a hell of a night.
On a related but positive note, my good friend Ezekiel - following the incident I related in my last article - decided to try sobriety for a bit. He went two weeks without a drink and felt it was a worthwhile detoxification period. Midterms came around and he has returned to drinking, but with relative moderation. I have a feeling that he will be a success story, having realized how to enjoy alcohol in moderation and responsibly. I could not be more proud of my good friend.
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November 1, 2006
Vera Simon-Nobes
Two drinks: you're talking to an attractive boy, off-limits to the "sober you." Four drinks: you're leaning into the conversation, tasting his beer-breath but not caring. Six drinks and as soon as someone precariously climbs onto a table, you are the first to follow. You are a table dancer, a drink spiller, and a spectator to the kid who swings like a monkey on the chandelier. You stumble and fall to the floor only to be caught by that someone from your "significant" conversation earlier in the night. In the morning, a few seconds pass before the previous night's memories drown you in regrets. You find comfort in the assurance that the raspberry Smirnoff® was responsible for your intimate conversation. The "jungle juice" turned you into a close-talker, and the "5 o'clock" directed you to the table-top.
As a thirteen year old, this was my perception of the "party" lifestyle. The media was my sole access to this risky and exhilarating world. I, like many of my peers, was at the mercy of movies and TV shows as I shaped my vision of what I would experience once in high school, and even better, college. While I had my doubts that I would ever be at a party as legendary as those I saw in movies, I fully expected that someday I would get really drunk and probably end up doing crazy things that I regretted the next day.
As I began to "party," I found that my experiences differed tremendously from those of the fictional teenagers I had "learned" from. I have yet to see girls giddily dancing on tables, let alone dance on one myself, and I have yet to attend a party where the chandelier was a rope swing. Waiting for those moments to come, I've wondered how many drinks it takes to feel as out of control as they are in the movies. But in the movies, they are all acting, and at real-life parties, people are real! Or are they?
I have come to believe that much of the crazy drunken behavior happens because it is supposed to happen. After a certain amount of alcohol there is a protocol for drunkenness, largely created by the media. No matter their true mental state, it becomes permissible to go crazy, dance on tables, and swing from chandeliers. By telling yourself that you are drunk beyond control you can justify any kind of behavior. Many people use alcohol to escape, do things their sober selves wouldn't dream of, and say, "I was drunk" to ease their regrets in the morning.
The desire to be "crazy drunk" has origins in the fictional world that most of us grow up watching. We were often exposed to characters as they regretted their actions at a wild party the night before, but we rarely saw the character who drank excessively, but never "lost her head." These individuals were too boring to portray in lieu of the table-dancers, and most likely always will be. Trends in movies and TV will continue to highlight those who drink until they're "gone." Teenagers who access the party world through these media only will learn through experience, that there isn't a simple tipping point when you suddenly become puppet, with alcohol as your puppeteer. Most times, you have a choice: to believe that you have little control over yourself and that is why you've somehow ended up splashing your drink throughout the room, or to understand that you are in control, but this crazy behavior just happens to be a lot more fun to take part in.
Everyone knows that alcohol is a party drink because it loosens people up. However, next time you're at a party and you still feel very in control when everyone else doesn't appear to be, remember that they may not be more drunk than you, they are probably just following the "drunken protocol." They are making the choice to give way to the alcohol because it's more fun than remaining within your sober self, and they have an easy excuse if they go too far. Like so many other ideas the media has constructed, the "ideal" drunken scenario is one that we must deconstruct. Rather than waste your time waiting for the moments you've grown up believing "typically" accompany the party scene, just have fun, and always do what feels right for you.
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