COLUMN: Guzzling to illness

From Miranda Salomon's, "I Don't Know How to Write," Fall '96 From Miranda Salomon's, "I Don't Know How to Write," Fall '96BYOB is a failure, and it'sFrom Miranda Salomon's, "I Don't Know How to Write," Fall '96BYOB is a failure, and it'stime for fraternities to try aFrom Miranda Salomon's, "I Don't Know How to Write," Fall '96BYOB is a failure, and it'stime for fraternities to try anew system -- one with teeth. From Miranda Salomon's, "I Don't Know How to Write," Fall '96BYOB is a failure, and it'stime for fraternities to try anew system -- one with teeth. On Saturday, October 5, the University's Greek system sponsored a picnic in the Quad, open to students who wished to learn more about fraternity and sorority life on campus. The picnic was an opportunity for first-year students to meet members of the Greek community in a neutral setting: no alcohol was present, and two police officers were on hand as a preventative measure. The whole event went smoothly, and our Greek system made a favorable impression on all who attended. The freshman making the noise, whom I'll call Daniel, came to me because he was worried about his roommate, Ben. They had been at an official, University-registered, "Bring Your Own Beer" fraternity party. I've chosen not to name the house, because what happened that night could have occurred at any fraternity at Penn. According to Daniel, he and Ben had met some fraternity brothers at the picnic, who told them about a party their frat house was throwing that night. They invited the two freshmen to come to a pre-party, scheduled to start about an hour before the official open house. The freshmen were excited and flattered, and arrived that night at the pre-party to meet more of the brothers. Having established themselves as potential pledges, Daniel and Ben were given access to the "good beer," Sam Adams instead of Old Milwaukee. They stayed all night, drinking as much as they could, and exercising their favored status. Daniel had about eight drinks, including shots of hard alcohol, but Ben had at least 15 beers, and possibly as many as 20. They were both OK on the walk back to the Quad, but then Ben started acting strange. He stopped talking to the other kids on our hall and went back to his room to lie down. He couldn't remember the name of the fraternity where he'd spent the last four hours, and he didn't know how much he'd had to drink. I gave him a glass of cold water, and told him to get ready for bed. A few minutes later, I heard a dripping sound, and saw a puddle forming outside Daniel and Ben's room. I knocked until Ben opened the door. I saw that Ben had filled the sink with vomit. The puddle in the hall, I later found out, was the result of his unsuccessful attempt to urinate in the sink. As I went to get some paper towels to soak up some of the mess, Ben stumbled to his bed and collapsed, face down, in a puddle of his own vomit. I turned him over and called another RA to help me assess the damage. Together, we decided that Ben was in bad shape, but determined that he would be OK without a trip to the HUP Emergency Room. Luckily, we guessed right. Underage drinking is a part of college life; students would find a way to get alcohol even if fraternities did not provide it. But I resent the hypocrisy that allows "BYOB" to be the officially sanctioned, administratively touted policy for Greek parties at Penn, parties where underage students still clearly have access to alcohol. BYOB absolves fraternities of responsibility for their guests' alcohol consumption. When we officially pretend that everyone who is drinking at a frat party has brought his or her own, personal supply of alcohol, there is no way to keep track of who has had too much. A bartender at Smoke's theoretically wouldn't allow a legal drinker to have 16 or 17 beers, because it is illegal to serve someone who is obviously too drunk to control his alcohol consumption. But fraternities have no such obligation. They understand that the reputation of their house depends, in part, on the popularity of their parties. Accessible alcohol is necessary to attract sizable crowds. Every time a brother hands out a can of beer at a party, he should mark the hand of the person who drinks it. The makeshift bartender could think twice before giving a guest his 10th beer. If someone drank too much, there would be a record of just how much he or she had consumed. Underage drinking occurs in many spheres of University life, but fraternity parties are the only areas where it is tacitly sanctioned. The InterFraternity Council and the University must come up with a workable, effective solution to the problem of alcohol abuse by underage students. A policy like BYOB, which as the entire freshman class understands is merely a formality, is bound to fail. Maybe it makes insurance companies and admissions officers happy, but BYOB doesn't serve the student body. The decision to drink is not a purely personal matter. If it were, I wouldn't have found myself cleaning up someone else's urine at 3 a.m.