Kids, Learn to Spot Your 'Stupid Drink'

Kids everywhere are back at college, where they’ll be admonished not to drink, or at least not to “binge” drink. It’s advice they’re sure to ignore, writes “Joe Sixpack” of the Philadelphia Inquirer. Instead, we should tell them to avoid their “stupid drink,” the one that turns a good night to a bad night. It’s a term devised by Syracuse’s Newhouse School of Public Communications, to cut down on dangerous drinking

“We know the abstinence message doesn’t work,” says one professor, and students laugh at the term "binge drinking" because of its five-drink definition. Instead, the "stupid drink" campaign aims to help kids recognize when they're too hammered. Some signs:

• You can’t taste your beer.
• You’re grinning at yourself in the bathroom mirror.
• You've uttered the phrase, “I love you, man.”

Some educators may balk at teaching kids to drink, but stupid drink can’t be stopped; it’s destined to join the slang lexicon. (More binge drinking stories.)