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August 09, 2005
MADD Gone Wacko
Mothers Against Drunk Driving seems to have forgotten what its name stands for. Radley Balko writes:
That's exactly what a Rhode Island couple did in 2004. When they learned that their son planned to celebrate the prom with a booze bash at a beach 40 miles away, William and Patricia Anderson instead threw a supervised party for him and his friends at their home. They served alcohol, but William Anderson stationed himself at the party's entrance and collected keys from every teen who showed. No one who came to the party could leave until the next morning.For this the Andersons found themselves arrested and charged with supplying alcohol to minors. The case ignited a fiery debate that eventually spilled onto the front page of the Wall Street Journal. The local chapter of Mothers Against Drunk Driving oddly decided to make an example of William Anderson, a man who probably did more to keep drunk teens off the road that night than most Providence-area parents.
I had a total of one beer in high school, but knew lots of people who would drink much more than that and many of them would drive afterwards.
It seems more and more like MADD has followed the pattern of the temperance groups at the beginning of the 20th century. Both started out against alcohol abuse and gradually moved towards total alcohol prohibition. When you can not make a distinction between responsible, temperate alcohol drinking and problem drinking, then you start to treat all drinkers the same no matter the actual harm (or in some cases benefits) caused by their alcohol use. Its hard to take MADD seriously anymore and conbsidering the reduction in drunk driving rates and the increased criminal treatment of drunk drivers that has occurred since MADD's creation, MADD may be best off declaring victory and closing up shop.
Posted by Pete at August 9, 2005 06:07 PM
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A recent teen survey found that about 1/4 of teens said they’d been to parties where there was alcohol and parents present and a third said they could get it from their parents with their parents’ knowledge. Now I’m open to a debate... [Read More]
Tracked on August 9, 2005 11:38 PM