Do College Students Drink Too Much?; Mid East Tensions Flow onto Campus
ARTHEL NEVILLE, HOST: Hello, everyone, and welcome to TALKBACK LIVE. I'm Arthel Neville. The world's attention is focusing on the Mideast, where old hatreds rage and violence is currently an everyday companion. But it might surprise you to know the battle between Israel and the Palestinians isn't being fought just over there. It's spilled over onto our college campuses. And that's where we're going today. So, get ready to take sides. Call me at 1-800-310-4cnn or e-mail: talkback@cnn.com. Now, take a look at what we have in store.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Israeli government is in the occupied territories to defend its citizens.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Exactly like the ghettos that were created in Poland and Germany in the 1930's...</s>NEVILLE: Is the Middle East conflict finding fertile ground on U.S. campuses? The battle lines are drawn between Palestinian and Israeli sympathizers. Can this skirmish be limited to just words? On other campuses it is spring break, and according to the numbers, too many students are dying to get drunk.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I can't really think of anyone our age that doesn't do that, a couple of shots before go out, shots at the bar, like it is a normal...</s>NEVILLE: A new study suggests it is time for campus boozers to dry out before they die out. And when it comes time to walk down the aisle will you give up your name in exchange for the ring? It could be more important to your future husband than you think. OK, right now we are going to look at another side of campus life, the party, and why not? For a lot of schools it is spring break and if you believe all the spring break shows on TV, you know, the girls dancing in those little bikinis and all of the other carrying on and you wonder, where are their mothers. Anyway, if it is all about that, it is about bingeing on alcohol, sex and drugs. The report commissioned by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism blames a half million injuries and 70,000 sexual assaults on binge drinking, and the study notes some 400,000 young adults between the ages of 18 and 24 blame drinking for having unprotected sex. I've got a bunch of college folks in the house. Make some noise, college people.</s>MISSY: I think that the drinking on campus is part of a college experience and you have to be responsible enough as an adult once you hit 18 to really drink responsibly, and take care of it. I think a lot of people have blown this idea of binge drinking a little out of control and they are blaming it a lot on different aspects when it really is the student's responsibility, I believe...</s>NEVILLE: I agree with you.</s>MISSY: ... to take care of themselves. If they are old enough to be in college, they are old enough to know what their limits are. And if they are not able to understand that they shouldn't be at college without supervision, in all honesty.</s>NEVILLE: Let me talk to David back here. You are a guy. Stand up. You are in college, right David? What do you think about this? I mean, is there a lot of peer pressure involved here?</s>DAVID: I think like what we heard, you can make a choice, and it is your own decision, but I mean if you want to drink, you definitely have the option to, no matter where you go, no matter what night of the week, you can always find a party to drink of you want to.</s>NEVILLE: But according to the study, it is depicting college people as just being wild and crazy, you are drinking, you are falling out, you are throwing up, you are going to the hospital for alcohol poisoning. Is that the picture that is happening?</s>DAVID: Well, I think there is a lot of that, and just because it is sensational when you hear it, that is probably what you will hear more than we just went down town and had a couple beers. You are typically going to hear the stories where, you know, five or six went out had a good time, and six of us ended up in the hospital.</s>NEVILLE: All right. Thank you first of all, Drew, stand up for me, Drew. Tell me how do you see it. Is it more the case that college students are drinking like crazy, or they are doing it responsibly?</s>DREW: Well, you know, it is a big stereotype that all college students drink. And personally I do not drink and there is a large amount of people on campus that do not drink. It is a problem, and I think that a lot of accidents or abuse do occur because of drinking, but it is important for people to realize that not all college students do drink, and I think that that is a problem in the day's society.</s>NEVILLE: I think you deserve a rounds of applause. Thank you very much. And I will come down to the front row and talk to some of the ladies here, the lady in the pretty black and white here, stand up for me, and do you feel pressure at all to go out and drink, and do you know of people who do drink and lose self control?</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that drinking is everywhere, whether you are on a college campus or if you are in high school, drinking is everywhere. And you are always going to have the option to drink, and it is your personal decision, and I think that alcohol being there gives you the opportunity to learn what you can do and what you cannot do and what your limits are, and it really helps you to become a responsible person.</s>NEVILLE: That means that you experiment first and you realize, you know what, I should not have had that other kamikaze.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You always have...</s>NEVILLE: What do I know about kamikazes -- AAHHH -- hey, I was in college too. No but seriously, I did drink in college but I was I responsible, and that is the whole key. I think you can, and some people are going to get mad at me, that they probably want me to say that you should not drink at all. But I am saying if you do, you should be responsible and not get out of control.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I definitely agree with that. Like I said, the option is there, and a lot of people do make mistakes, and it helps you to learn and become a better person.</s>NEVILLE: Have you made mistakes?</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, I have never made mistakes before.</s>NEVILLE: OK, your mom is watching. Thanks Candice. All right. And are going to bring in Ralph Hingson now. He is the associate dean for research at the Boston University's School of Public Health. He led the study on college-age drinking. Ralph, first of all, welcome to you.</s>RALPH HINGSON, BOSTON UNIVERSITY, SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH: Thank you.</s>NEVILLE: Most of us are apparently misinformed about the affects of alcohol. If you can help us clarify some things, like how bad can it be to have a couple of margaritas?</s>HINGSON: We know that particularly when people are driving, that impairment and driving performance can begin with the first drink. The legal blood-alcohol limit in the United States is.08. I would have to consume about 4 drinks in an hour on an empty stomach to get to that level. A 135 pound woman would have to consume 3 drinks in an hour to get to that level. All the data indicate to us that at that level there is at least an 11-fold increased fatal crash risk, and among young people, young men in particular, a 52-fold increase risk of being involved in a fatal crash. So drinking up to that level can certainly increase the risk of traffic fatalities.</s>NEVILLE: Yes, there is no doubt that if you are going to drink, you should not get behind the wheel of a car at all.</s>HINGSON: Well, there is no question about that. That is why it is illegal in all states for people under 21 to drive after any drinking, and as I said, we now have 32 states where the limit has been lowered to .08. We should remember that a lot of people who are effected by that are people other than the drinking driver. They are the innocent victims. And one of the things we were concerned about when we looked at the study on college drinking is that it is not just drinking and driving that we need to be worried about. The people -- innocent victims are affected by assaults. There were 600,000 who indicated -- 600,000 college students each year are assaulted by another drinking college student.</s>NEVILLE: Because he is just drunk and out of control?</s>HINGSON: Because they have been drinking to excess, yes. And 70,000 said they were sexually assaulted by another college student.</s>NEVILLE: And them you have the whole situation -- exactly -- of date rape. Let me get Amy into this conversation. You are from Texas. What college?</s>AMY: I go to Clemson as well. I just wanted to say that I think that a lot of dealing with irresponsible students has to be with friends, and friends should be there to take care of their friends that are out of control and make sure that things, you know, if you see a friend that could possibly have alcohol poisoning, get them to the hospital. There is a responsibility for those friends to take care of them, and there are irresponsible people, but there is a second step to that as well.</s>NEVILLE: OK...</s>HINGSON: If I may say something, I think the point she made is very good. The solution to this is going to have to come from all segments of the community including students. Students need to take care of each other and they need to make sure that there is an effort to protect innocent students from the behaviors of others who have had too much to drink.</s>NEVILLE: I have a caller on the line right now, is it Ben? Go ahead. What do you have to say?</s>CALLER: Yes, I go to Maryland and I have been watching the news from Maryland College Park and they've had a few students who have died of alcohol poisoning. And it is a real problem. Especially recently with when they won the basketball championship there were riots, and a lot of it could be directly attributed to the alcohol consumption.</s>NEVILLE: So Ben, how do we get students to stop drinking too much?</s>CALLER: I think that the problem is that not the policies that are in place, I think enforcing them -- on campus police and campus administrators and other people who are supposed to be reducing problems like that, they don't. They do not do a good job. Same thing liquor stores around the campuses will sell.</s>NEVILLE: They will sell.</s>CALLER: Yes, they will sell.</s>NEVILLE: Absolutely. Thank you Ben, first of all, for your comments. And Alana, what are your thoughts?</s>ALANA: I have been to a dry college and I have been to a college that has a wet campus, and college with the wet campus seemed to cater more to students that are drinking. They set up bus systems at night to get students out to the bars, and they get them home safely. So they had less DUI's and tended to have less accidents, and the dry college closes its eyes and acts like drinking didn't really happen as much, and DUI's did not happen much. I have seen more of my friends at the dry college get DUI's than at a wet college. I think they should open their eyes whether they are dry or wet and realize that drinking happens. It just doesn't not...</s>NEVILLE: Thank you very much, and that is a great point you made there. And the lady back here, Tammy, I would like to get your thoughts at this moment.</s>TAMMY: Yes, I am a professor at a local university and I would like to say I believe that students do have to take responsibility and so do their friends, but it actually originates with the parents because the parents have to teach their children, who are young adults, to be responsible, and values so that when they do go off to school and become adults, then they have that value system and that level of responsibility.</s>NEVILLE: Right but the parents are not always there, when it happens. And you know, thank you very much, professor Tammy for your comments. We have much more talk about, with this, students in the audience, raising their hands. They want to jump in, and I want to hear from you as well, so we are going to take a break and talk more about this after the break, Don't go anywhere.