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IF YOU'RE UNDER
20,
CANYOU
HANDLE ALCOHOL?
The answer will surprise you!
by
Michael A. Snyder
I
F YOU' RE
under 20,
cha nces are 7 out of 1O
that you already have sorne
experience with alcohol.
From the global picture, it's
clear that teenagers al m ost
everywhere consume more a lco–
ho l than their predecessors.
Three out of ten under 20 don't
seem to handle it too well. These
young people are already "problem
drinkers"- who for one reason or
another cannot control their con–
sumption of alcoholic beverages.
Stat ist ically, these young people
get drunk at least six times a year,
have run-ins with police, suffer
problems in school andjor with
fr iends, family or driving.
lf you personaJly aren' t one of
these problem drinkers (whether
teenage or not), the odds are that
you know someone who is.
But how can parents and teen–
agers cope with this problem, and
learn the use of alcohol in the prop–
er setti ng?
Cause and Effect
lt
must immediately be pointed out
that teenage alcoholism and alcohol
abuse are only symptoms of a far
more complex problem: the world–
wid e di si nt eg ration o f famil y
responsibilities.
Men and women today generally
receive and jor seek
very
little in–
depth education in preparation for
marriage and the bearing of chil–
dren .
The result? Un happy relation–
ships, later broken marriages and
children with mental complexes.
lt
has often been said that in a divorce,
May 1982
the
children
suffer most.
If
you' re a
helpless victim of this t ragedy of
needless separation , you under–
stand!
But what most don ' t real ize is
that suffering and problems result-
ing from unstable families are vir–
tually permanent in this physical
life. The problems encountered in
one fami ly often
reappear
in later
families. lf not consciously arres ted
and resolved, fami ly problems can
(often,
tend
to) be self-perpetuat–
ing. And this includes the problem
of alcohol abuse.
Concerning alcohol, this means
that worldwide teenage alcohol
problems simply mirror the prob–
lems affecting the parents.
Example
by parents and society
plays an important role in adoles–
(Continued on page 42)
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