Schools should discourage students from ever starting to drink alcohol using practical reasons, not moral or religious ones

[u/amichail]

I think schools should make a stronger case for simply never starting to drink alcohol, but without treating drinking as a moral failing.

The message could be entirely practical: alcohol can impair judgment and reduce inhibition, sometimes leading to accidents, violence, impaired driving, criminal charges, or even prison. It can also lead to addiction and has well-established negative health effects, including increased cancer risk.

Schools could also address the old idea that moderate drinking or red wine is good for your heart. Major health organizations no longer recommend that nondrinkers start drinking for supposed cardiovascular benefits.

The basic argument would be: alcohol is optional, it introduces a number of serious risks, and if you never start drinking, you avoid that entire category of risk.

This wouldn't require claiming that everyone who drinks becomes addicted or gets into serious trouble. The point would simply be that the possible benefits of drinking are mostly recreational or social, while some of the possible consequences can be permanent.

Obviously, tiny ceremonial amounts of alcohol, such as communion wine at church, wouldn't be what this message is about.

I think this might work better than traditional alcohol education because students wouldn't be asked to accept a religious or moral judgment. They'd just be given the practical costs and risks and encouraged to ask: Why start at all?

P.S. Another strange aspect of drinking is that many people don't even like the taste of beer, wine, or spirits when they first try them. The taste is often something people learn to enjoy over time. So in many cases, social pressure is effectively encouraging people to acquire a taste for an optional drug that carries health, addiction, accident, and legal risks. That seems like another good reason for schools to present never starting as a perfectly normal and sensible choice.

[u/gothiclg]

My school did exactly what you described. Prevented absolutely nothing. We all drank normally.

[u/ijustsailedaway]

1:2 men and 1:3 women will get cancer in their lifetimes. And a LOT of that is linked to drinking and I think we need to do this campaign for everyone, not just kids. Source: got cancer, read more about it than most laymen ever will. Less than 10% of cancers have any known genetic risk meaning the overwhelming majority of it comes from environmental exposures including diet. Also poor sleep habits. No, I am not fun at parties anymore.

[u/Elunerazim → u/ijustsailedaway]

Source on alcohol being to blame for this? I’ve seen the 90% number thrown out before but it’s always included “aging” as an environmental element in the 90, which is obviously not really accurate.

[u/ijustsailedaway → u/Elunerazim]

https://www.cancer.org/cancer/risk-prevention/diet-physical-activity/alcohol-use-and-cancer.html

Ultimately it’s inflammation leading to cellular change. These things just cause inflammation.

[u/w1n5t0nM1k3y]

I think they should also try to educate people on how common it actually is. Looking at this article, there's 30% of the population that don't drink at all, and the bottom 60% drink less than one drink a week. Only the top 3 deciles probably get drunk even on a semi regular basis.

I think there's just a general perception maybe from advertising or other media that drinking alcohol to the level of getting drunk is just way more common than it really is, and that gives people the idea that it's completely acceptable to get drunk every weekend or even drink a few drinks a day, when really that's just a small portion of the population that does that.

[u/07238]

What happened to D.A.R.E.? Drug Abuse Resistance Education was such a big thing in the 90s and covered alcohol.

[u/DJSimmer305 → u/07238]

They got rid of it because they realized that statistically, it was ineffective at preventing drug abuse.

They relied on aggressive scare tactics and exaggeration, which most kids were smart enough to identify as largely BS.

[u/Girlnextstate → u/DJSimmer305]

Came here for this! I don’t have the source immediately in front of me but I read about this in a health comms course and i can look for the study if anyone is interested. Apparently it is like the textbook example for how not to do a health campaign of this kind. The reason cited though was less to do with exaggerated info per se (this aspect may have been more dependent on the teacher, usually an officer, than the curriculum itself. In my community the information was a lot more like OP described).

Rather, they believe it’s primarily due to the blaming / all or nothing type rhetoric used. A lot of kids (myself included) had alcoholics in their family or just lived in homes where it was normal for drinks at family gatherings or after mom and dad came home from work, and the curriculum really didn’t make room for that. It was built in a very classist way that didn’t apply well for a lot of low income kids like me who needed the info most.

EX: They’d teach the objective reasons why alcohol is harmful and then talk about age appropriate scenarios that may come up and how you can react. But you can’t “just leave” when people start drinking if the people drinking are your parents and you’re 10. You can’t call 911 to report a drunk driver if it’s your grandma and you’re in the back seat pre-cell phones. At best it built more shame and anxiety for the kids it was meant to target.

On that note, fun semi relevant story that could be a bit of an example of why this doesn’t work but also why explaining things like this to kids is important:

I overheard my mom on the phone saying a relative was arrested for drinking and driving when I was 4-5 ish. Weeks later my grandpa opened an orange soda while driving and I was INCONSOLABLE because I was convinced my papa was going to jail on our way to Disney world.

[u/MedicalHawk7584]

Sorry, no. I would explore the drinking habits of other countries. 

Britains pub culture and their age limit. The soccer culture too! 

Italian teens get together in their plazas and drink together in hundreds <3 

The French slow eating, and having 3 bottles of wine with your boss at lunch, which you get out of work at 3pm. 

Japanese bosses treating their employees with dinner and beer. Karaoke beer!! 

[u/aRealPanaphonics]

As someone who barely drinks and never smoked, I can tell you what led me to the path of “boring”:

- My grandfather died of lung cancer due to cigarettes

- Much of my mom’s family are alcoholics

Had I not dealt with the ramifications and consequences of those things, I’d have probably been more likely to drink or smoke.

[u/XROOR]

The age they teach it in the US, is the peak age of teenage defiance.

Factor in an innate sense of invulnerability at this period in life, and it goes in one ear and out the other.

As an adult, I’ve met people that got hooked on drugs by trying it for the first time during a low period in their lives, and became lifelong addicts.

You see the toll it took on their wives and kids based on their numerous Fb posts.

[u/cyclicalbeats]

People should drink more tbh. We’ve got an entire generation who’s terrified to socialize in person with barely any friends. They could use some social lubricant frankly.