Texican, you missed the point.
The issue here is the press; the “flaming liberal waitress” is not the press.
The significance of the Bush daughter’s arrest is that an arrest report is a public record. The privacy of an individual is not infringed by the press when the press reports something that is already, by definition, public.
Gore’s son’s expulsion, unless he was going to a public school, would again not be part of the public record.
If the press had reported that the Bush daughters were drinking underage and they had not been arrested, then yes, the press would have been infringing on their privacy. But that’s not the case here.
For all of you talking about Chelsea getting plastered in England - even if she had been under 21, the British drinking age is lower than in the U.S. (either 18 or 16, I forget which). So the British law enforcement wasn’t failing to act - Ms. Clinton was acting in a perfectly legal manner.
Bullshit. I was in college at the time and saw the segment in question when it originally aired, shortly after Clinton was sworn in for his first term. The setup was talking about Socks, the White House cat, and the punchline was a reference to the “White House dog” with a picture of young Chelsea on the screen.
This predates Buddy; at the time, there was no White House dog.
I remember it well because I’m a conservative and, up until that point, I considered Rush to be an effective, if simplistic, new voice for conservatism. At that moment I realized he was just a great big ass.
The British Legal Drinking age is 18 (can be as low as 14 if with food).
You should also remember that we Brits have a much more relaxed attitude to drinking and drunkeness that you Americans.
It is PERFECTLY acceptable for a young student to go out and get legless, indeed it’s pretty much mandatory at some times (eg Balls), and as such this would not attract any form of comment. THis also applies to drugs, hence the complete disbelief that Clinton Pere “Didn’t inhale” at Oxford (first University student who didn’t in my experience)
Tony Blairs 16 year old son was recently taken home by the police having been found brahms in Leicester Square, no big deal.
I find it inconcievable that one could go through college without a drink.
Bush twins got arrested, one multiple times. As did their father. The Clinton father daughter team did not get arrested. Early in the Clinton administration the media was absolutely vicious to Chelsea, who was about 12, repeatedly referring to her as ugly.
Rush Limbaugh does not have any dirt on Chelsea because there is none, unless you consider that as an adult she has done some drinking, which is perfectly legal.
I have my doubts that public drunkenness is all that acceptable among “you Brits”, whether or not there is a more relaxed (or lax) attitude toward drinking.
There’s a major difference between having an occasional drink in college and repeatedly getting drunk. There’s increasing recognition in the U.S. that binge drinking among young people carries a significant risk of serious problems, including alcoholism, susceptibility to unwanted pregnancy and HIV infection, criminal activity (see the recent riots near the Ohio State University campus after a big football win) and deaths due to drunken driving.
A “relaxed attitude” toward alcohol abuse can have major consequences.
Not that this proves Chelsea has a problem or that it’s newsworthy.
As can a “stringent attitude,” jackmannii, including lower earning potential for students with underage drinking convictions, decreased access to work in those states where underage drinking convictions lead to the loss of a driver’s license, regardless of whether driving was involved, increased police, judicial and prison costs, etc.
sua, whatever damage you feel is unfairly done to underage drinkers by specific laws, the suggestion that any attempt to reduce binge drinking in young people must have a countervailing negative impact does not make sense.
Nowhere in my post will you find a call to throw all young alcohol abusers in jail or unjustly take away their civil rights. What I am addressing is the casual attitude that binge drinking is a rite of passage that one should have a “relaxed attitude” about. And in addition to causing deaths, severe injuries and addiction among its practitioners, it has the capacity to injure, kill or cause economic losses to innocent people who accidentally get in the way of drunks.
Fixing this problem involves parents, students and university officials as well as the law.
Tolerance for stupid, juvenile and self-destructive behavior is not excusable.
Why? Many people feel that the war on drugs lack of tolerance for self-destructive behavior is far worse than just letting people get on with their self destructive behavior.
There was a recent pit thread post which commented on the propensity of some people to hijack almost any discussion with a denunciation of the “War On Drugs”. I see this thread is no exception.
A little over-caffeinated and spoiling for a brouhaha, are we, Sua?
Quite obviously I have been referring to tolerance for binge-style drinking among young people.
And you keep dragging in the idea of “criminalization” when I have previously emphasized that solutions require much more than the criminal justice system, as in the following quote:
*“Fixing this problem involves parents, students and university officials as well as the law.”[\i]
Whatsamatter Sua, did you get busted as a rollicking youth for pissing on a cop’s shoes while sloppy drunk?
Your responses here have not been up to your usual rational standard.
I can assure you Jackmannii that heavy drinking at university is part of the experience. Oxford has many drinking societies who’s sole existence is dedicated to getting elephant’s. Here’s a woman’s one:
And this is reflected in society in general. It is not headline news when some one in their teens gets sloshed, its part of life. Admittedly it’s not very dignified when you’re 40, but its far from uncommon (as I regularly prove, much to Mrs Owl’s annoyance).
One of the biggest shocks to a Brit in America is the incredible prudishness of Yanks regarding alcohol. If you have a beer youmust go to AA as you have a “problem”
No doubt. It’s a heavy part of U.S. college/university experience as well. When it degenerates into street rioting, i.e. overturning and setting cars afire at intersections and then pelting the firemen with bottles, many folks would perceive a problem.**
Just a bit prone to exaggeration, are we?
On my two previous excursions I did not see hordes of Brits staggering about the streets emitting 100 proof fumes and vomiting onto the hoods of their Mini-Coopers, but perhaps I wasn’t in the right neighborhoods.
We Yanks also can be quite “prudish” about smoking, what with our silly preoccupation with premature death from lung and throat cancer. Not to mention our boorish attitudes on public smoking, protecting asthmatics from secondhand fumes and such. I redden with embarassment when I consider what sophisticated Continental types must think of us.
No, I keep responding to what you write, and you keep saying, “you should have known what I really meant was something other than what I wrote.” I’ve been very rational - you are the one who keeps dodging.
As for my past, no, I’ve never been arrested. And that is my point - your position demonstrates innumeracy. The ridiculously overwhelming percentage of high school and college kids who engage in what you refer to as “stupid, juvenile and self-destructive behavior” cause no harm to themselves or to others.
What likely causes greater harm are the laws that criminalize that behavior. Such laws cause harm to the individual kid who is busted.
Further, and what I believe is more disturbing, they cause harm to the rule of law. Kids treat these laws either with contempt or as obstacles to be avoided. It creates a habit that other laws can be treated with contempt or as obstacles to be avoided.
Sure, let the parents yell at the kid if they catch him/her drinking. But that is a very different thing from involving the denunciation and punishment that society imposes.
For an example of booze-fueled violence resulting from a football win, look no further than the street rioting that followed the recent Ohio State University win over Michigan. At this site you can view some nice young people overturning cars, hurling bottles and doing other innocent things that the nasty police and university officials want to result in suspensions/expulsions from school or criminal charges, potentially causing the unfortunate protagonists to miss out on future life opportunities (insert Sua fume here).*
I am no Carrie Nation, and comments such as “I find it inconcievable that one could go through college without a drink.” seem to reflect willful misunderstanding. I care not so much about the damage individuals do to themselves by excessive/binge drinking (although that can be tragic enough), but about threats to the personal safety and property of others.
Sua, I don’t know if you are totally unable to read in context or are just being pointlessly pugnacious. But there seems to be little point in responding to you further, other than to note that practitioners of the “skydiving, scuba diving, skiing, sports cars, Jet skis, snow mobiles” activity you claim I want to criminalize are already subject to criminal or civil penalties, when such activities are undertaken in a reckless manner resulting in harm to others or threatening to cause such harm.
A fine point, but one I’d hope a lawyer could grasp.
*And yes, the consensus from observers on the scene was that alcohol was a major accelerant to the night’s activities.
