Kegs vs Cans

Collegiate administrations across the country have either completely banned or heavily regulated the use of beer kegs on campus and inside college-recognized houses on private property. This has been under the guise of reducing binge drinking, officially defined as five or more drinks in one night for men or four for women. The idea is that large quantities of easily accessible alcohol will lead to higher and more dangerous levels of drinking. Although it has been proven that one can pour faster from cans than from a keg [Edit: Link seems to be down. Anyone know of another source?], ultimately the fact that the amount of alcohol in kegs is higher will lead to a higher level of consumption in order to kick the keg.

I Agree with the college administrations on these points. The traditional student response is to play the [valid] environmental card - that it takes a huge amount of energy to create aluminum from raw ore (easily the most energy of any commonly recycled material) and that by using one-time use cans instead of reusable kegs we are using up many times the amount of energy than is necessary to deliver alcohol to our bodies. However, a more important question is present: Is the job of our college administration really to tell us how much alcohol to drink? If we’re 21 years old, aren’t we old enough to decide for ourselves how much alcohol we can consume? Certainly there are a number of serious alcoholics who need help, but isn’t it my decision if I want to have 2 beers or 20?

There are people with weight problems who abuse food, and anyone who has been to an eating disorder talk can tell you that food is a drug the same way caffeine, alcohol and cocaine are. Should we do away with buffets in our college dining halls because some people can’t control the way they eat? Should I be put on academic probation if I eat so much in one sitting that I have to throw up? Doesn’t the same reasoning apply to drinking alcohol?

The president of my fraternity once told a member of the administration that if he wanted to drink so much that he passed out on his basement floor in a puddle of his own vomit and urine, that was his Constitutional right. Whether or not you can sympathize with that, isn’t it the job of the college to turn us into people who can make decisions for ourselves? Maybe we have to make some mistakes, eat too much food or drink too much beer until we find out just how much is right for us. Maybe once we’ve figured out whom we are, instead of having the administrationt tell us, we can go out prepared for the real world.