Are teenage kicks worse than middle-aged blows?

Teen Times:While flicking through the Weekend Review section of a recent edition of this newspaper, I noticed an article entitled: "Parents in denial about teenage kicks." The radio review in question highlighted coverage of the State of the Nation's Children report. It had painted a picture of teenage life that seemed to focus on the defects of a select few individuals who apparently represent youth culture as a whole.

By the same token, it could be said that the stereotypical behaviour of all mothers is to smuggle cocaine, in light of the recent jailing of a woman who smuggled cocaine to get money to help her sick son.

But, of course, all mothers are not drug smugglers, just as all teenagers are not alcoholics who hate society.

We come from a nation of heavy drinkers. Our long love affair with the bottle has been at the core of our culture for centuries. It inspires our playwrights and writers, not to mention Irish traditional music. Songs such as The Wild Rover and Seven Drunken Nights are a staple of any traditional Irish music fan.

I wonder how the "grog" has seduced the youth of the country with such overpowering ease, and why it now plays such a key part in Irish youth culture, when there are so many alternatives available.

Some teenagers claim boredom to be the cause of underage drinking. This is a lie. However, in a country where one can buy six cans of a fine Dutch lager for €7, it is by far one of the cheaper pastimes that we indulge in.

In the same edition of this newspaper, I was astonished to see such a polar opposite view of teenagers presented in an article entitled "Tribal gathering" in the Magazine.

This article was written with an open mind and, although acknowledging that teenagers are occasionally loud and raucous, it acknowledged that our job is to push the boundaries, and the question was raised that if we don't do it now as teenagers, when will we ever?

Can a 17-year-old having a few cans with his mates really be worse than a middle-aged alcoholic who lives on the street, or, even worse, has a wife and kids, who spends his wages down the local and lets his family go hungry, instead of facing up to his demons?

Studies have shown that people who don't experiment with drink/drugs when they are young and healthy are more prone to drug and/or alcohol abuse in later life, when their bodies are less able to cope with the strains of addiction.

So I ask you to pardon your prodigal sons and daughters because, like it or not, our fair isle is full of underage drinkers and there is not a soul, from beyond the Pale to the northern sky, whose horror stories of the effects of alcohol will put us off it.

Michael Fogarty (17) is a fifth-year student in Marian College, Dublin

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