Did I miss something?

[susiestar]

When I was a restaurant manager in Ohio we had to be VERY careful. We did NOT serve alcohol of any kind, but the laws there said that the last place someone was served ANY kind of food or beverage was liable for ALL the damages done by the intoxicated person.

So if someone came in to the restaurant and had a sandwich and cup of coffee, then went out and was in a drunk/intoxicated accident the restaurant and the manager AND the server were the ones responsible.

I can see if it you are coming from a private party, that if you don't stop the person from driving (or call the cops if the drunk person fights you and you can't get the keys), well, the host might share some liability.

But it can be VERY hard to identify someone under the influence, esp if they are a chronic alcoholic and function well so you wouldn't know. But for a business to be held responsible when we had NO idea what the person did before entering our doors, well that is just wrong.

I cannot tell you how many times I had to refuse service and even remove the sugar, jelly, coffee creamer from the table. But otherwise I would have faced legal issues.

makes you wonder what happens to personal responsibility - because these were ADULTS who knew the law and stopped for coffee or whatever so if they were in an accident then THEY would have diminished liability.

I know as a teen my bro drank and used pot, etc...... My parents never seemed to clue in. I wouldn't go to school dances because the amt of alcohol involved there. It was scary to me. I think it is even worse today because parents want to be "friends" of their kids more than when I was a kid.

One NYE I went to a party where I KNEW parents would be there. It was the ONLY NYE party I went to in high school. The dad left, mom had her boyfriend over, and MOM mixed several pitchers of martinis, margaritas, etc.... Kids were all OVER the house drinking and having sex (some WITH the mom and her boyfriend - they didn't shut the door). The kid having the party was SOOOOO embarrassed. And then one of the local drug dealers showed up with his "party favor" - enough pot to get all of us adn then some stoned.

I was on medication for health problems, including muscle relaxers and anti-anxiety medications. So I didn't drink (NOT painting myself a goody-2-shoes, just stating a fact). I was SCARED that the alcohol or drugs would really mess me up or kill me.

I think it is truly sad when adults abdicate their responsibility to parent their child so that they can be a "cool" parent, or be their child's friend.

It is just SOO not cool.

At least Wiz is convinced at this point that drinking or using any drugs will interact with his medications and possibly kill him. He may not have listened to much I said, but THAT seems to have gotten through. For now.

 

[recovering doormat]

Oh, man, things are really tightening up for parents and responsible adults here in Connecticut. New laws have gone into effect that go after the homeowner where the alcohol was served to underage kids, regardless of whether the adult was present and aware that it was going on.

sometimes it's relatively harmless and laughable, as when a group of Dartmouth students, loosened up on Jagermeister and beer, stripped off their clothing and ran buck-naked through a nearby public park at midnight. Little damage except to the eyes of the unsuspecting neighbors.

Less amusing is the 19 yr old son of a neighbor killed instantly when the drunk kid driving hit a utility pole on their way home after a kegger in a home the next town over. The parents of the dead boy are suing the kid behind the wheel and the parents who owned the home where the party took place (while the parents were out of town). Unfortunately, you just can't take a chance and leave even college-age kids home alone these days.

I found out that when I was out of town visiting my brother two months ago, my oldest difficult child found a key to my house (she and sibs were staying with dad) and sent out an open invite to people she barely knew on Myspace that there's a crib available for a party. Fortunately, all I had to deal with was puke on the rug, dirty dishes, sticky spills on the kitchen floor, and oh, yeah, all my wedding jewelry was missing. But no one got hurt, thank God.

I've changed the locks. I also will never again assume that their dad is able to supervise them when I'm away. Neither of the older two came home that night and dad didn't know where they were. Nice, huh?

 

[Rotsne]

I had to laugh...:grins:

I have a problem with such headlines. They tend to be too dramatically. For years our newspapers have told us that we have the most drunken youth in Europe. Guess what, the English newspapers are stating the same about their youth and are talking heavy fines for shop selling alcohol to minors.

Here is the reality. A European survey with the numbers for both Denmark and United Kingdom.

http://www.espad.org/denmark
http://www.espad.org/unitedkingdom

Alarming numbers? Yes if it meant a large prison population, more teenage pregnancies and other violence. But it doesn't.

I urge people to be careful about taking headlines about alcohol for granted. Even the all too often quoted research on rats showing that introducing alcohol at a younger age means higher risk of alcoholism has been disputed by newer research.

 

[maril]

Originally Posted by Anaheimfan
It is amazing how deep some parents' heads are in the sand...I think some of them got their heads somewhere else, but that's just MHO.

I had to laugh...:grins:

I just wanted to clarify that the sentence above where I wrote "I had to laugh..." was referring to Anaheimfan's comment that I quoted right before my statement. It was not referring to the paragraph that followed, where I referenced an article that contains some eye-opening and concerning (accurate or inaccurate?) data about problems in the US.