underage drinking?

I really don't have a problem with people drinking, overall.  I enjoy a drink (or three) now and again.  I love beer.  I don't think the world will end if I overdo it a bit (though I might wish it would), and I don't think that anyone who has a drink under the age of 18 (or 21, or whatever) is doomed to a life of raging alcoholism and an early death by liver disease.

I didn't drink when I was in high school.  This wasn't so much a conscious decision as a result of never being invited to parties.  My friends and I certainly had plenty of access to alcohol if we'd wanted it, but it never occurred to us.  We were too busy with school/extra-curricular activities.  

It might also be that we all had at least one alcoholic parent.  When you've come home from school to find your father has driven his car through the ditch, over the front lawn and then passed out on the front step next to an empty bottle... well, you could say that the romance of alcohol is sort of gone.  Of course, the reason that stands out is that it's not the norm, socially (even in WI).  It's an embarrassment.  If you see that sort of thing all around your community, it probably doesn't have the same impact.

ETA:  My point, which I swear I was getting to...   So as far as enforcement, I don't think that the cops need to bust every teen party and ticket every kid who's touched a drop.  And mostly, they don't.  But I think that having the ability to confiscate alcohol from minors and/or cite them provides a bit of a deterrent, and can be a useful tool in dealing with kids who are developing problems.  If you find a kid falling-down drunk once or twice, send them home.  If you find the same kid passed out drunk four weekends in a row, then I think it'd be good if there were further options.

DH was a year tutor at a (then) Polytechnic and every year they took the first-years (mostly 18-year-olds) on a field trip to a remote village. While it was perfectly legal for the students to drink in the local pubs, it was a bloody nuisance for the lecturers to go and mop them up at all hours of the night. And there was a tragedy (after DH's time fortunately)

I'm with Woadgrrl, I'm a bit more conservative about underage drinking in the UK. I live on an estate where I see it a lot and I HATE it. I often hear kids on the bus bragging about how they had this and did that. They often talk about drugs too but that's a whole other kettle of fish.

While I like the laid back attitude towards drinking in the UK, underage drinking does bother me. But then again so does giving tea and coffee to an 8 year old, which my inlaws don't blink an eye to.

While I like the laid back attitude towards drinking in the UK, underage drinking does bother me. But then again so does giving tea and coffee to an 8 year old, which my inlaws don't blink an eye to.

I've seen milky tea in baby bottles 

I've seen milky tea in baby bottles 

That is just crazy.

They talk about it in the Little House books.  She called it Cambric Tea. 

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-cambric-tea.htm

I suppose boiling the water made it safe for babies and with just a splash of tea it doesn't really do any harm.

My 2 year old niece was in hospital recently and they asked her what she wanted to drink and she said tea.  My sil and bil have no idea where this came from, as they had never given her any.  But maybe she just associated it with adults and that is what you say when you are feeling poorly?

Well, tea is supposed to cure everything from the common cold to an amputated leg, apparently.

My nephew (American) who's five has been drinking coffee since he was a baby.  He has horrible asthma and my mom and sister are convinced it helps him.

The last time I was there, I was the first up so I made a pot of coffee.  He asked for a cup, and I asked him how he took it (feeling weird giving this little tiny person a cup of coffee).  "In a cup," he said.   

I remember people saying they drunk coffee in the morning when I was in middle school and being a bit shocked.  I had to force myself to start drinking it to stay awake in late high school and at uni.  But I had tea in the afternoons from the time I was about 8.  Both my grandmothers drank it.

My nephew (American) who's five has been drinking coffee since he was a baby.  He has horrible asthma and my mom and sister are convinced it helps him.

The last time I was there, I was the first up so I made a pot of coffee.  He asked for a cup, and I asked him how he took it (feeling weird giving this little tiny person a cup of coffee).  "In a cup," he said.   

I remember people saying they drunk coffee in the morning when I was in middle school and being a bit shocked.  I had to force myself to start drinking it to stay awake in late high school and at uni.  But I had tea in the afternoons from the time I was about 8.  Both my grandmothers drank it.

I just had major deja vu reading this. We must have talked about this before.

Jon has a very tense relationship with his mother for various reasons but he keeps hold of this snoopy cup he's had since he was a child because the one good memory of his childhood is his mother giving him his tea in this cup.

My niece who will be 10 shortly has been making and drinking tea/coffee for years. I find it disturbing. Firstly that someone so young is allowed to handle boiling water and that she's drinking caffeine. She's 10, she doesn't need it!

My niece who will be 10 shortly has been making and drinking tea/coffee for years. I find it disturbing. Firstly that someone so young is allowed to handle boiling water and that she's drinking caffeine. She's 10, she doesn't need it!

I used to get a couple of spoonfuls of my mother's coffee in my milk at about that age. But tea was for when you were sick to your stomach (probably why I'm not so keen on tea)

Yeah, I probably posted about it before.   

I don't have a particular problem underage people drinking - especially in the US where I think the drinking age is too high and ineffective.  But I do think that the attitude towards alcohol in the UK and the US is wrong.  There's too much binge drinking among young people.  I found this article interesting http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-15265317

*blinks*

I don't remember ever not drinking tea as a child. I never drank coffee as I simply didn't like it.

I see toddlers drinking soda/coke and gatorade/powerade and juice that is nothing more than sugared up water that had an orange waived in it's general direction on the production line and nobody blinks twice.

What could possibly be worse about a cup of tea? The caffeine content is negligible when compared to the sugar high they get from all of the aforementioned stuff.

Caffeine is a bronchodilator, so yes it does help asthma.  I would consider coffee better than soda as young as it doesn't have sugar.

I don't disagree with you, Morkai, especially if you include the massive amounts of fruit juice people give their kids since the 80s.  I don't think that tea's all that bad, but I don't know if I'd give my 5 year old (and younger) coffee.  But he's not my kid, so I really don't have a place to say anything.

I don't know what age I started making my own tea, but it was definitely under 10.  I might not have it every day, but most days in the winter and any time it rained.  My grandmothers were really "nains" with one or both parents from the UK, so that's probably where they got it from.  And I got it from them watching me in the afternoons. I absolutely hated the taste of coffee.  I always loved the smell, but hated the taste until I picked up the habit.  Now I prefer it to tea.

Have they done studies regarding the alcoholism rate/problem drinking rate with people who grew up in homes with a more open attitude towards alcohol to those who were mostly or totally abstinent?  It'd be interesting to find out which turns out more responsible drinkers as adults.  I know the rationale behind serving kids alcohol is that they develop a more mature attitude towards it when they are exposed to it without their parents around, but I wonder if it's true or not.