March 23, 2007 -- Have you heard about SADD? It’s an organization called Students Against Destructive Decisions, and as its website mission statement declares, it was originally organized to help students say no to drinking and driving.

Which is fair enough. But apparently that one role wasn’t enough for the high foreheads behind the group, so now their mission “simply stated” is as follows:

To provide students with the best prevention and intervention tools possible to deal with the issues of underage drinking, other drug use, impaired driving and other destructive decisions.

Okay, so I’ll leave aside that whole “other drug use” part, which to me always implicitly links having a beer or two with shooting heroin or smoking crack, and focus instead on the seemingly benign “deal with the issues of underage drinking” part. Let’s read further on the group’s policy page:

SADD does not support or condone the use of alcohol by underage young people. SADD does not believe that it is possible to break the law responsibly. SADD and its chapters do not support or condone activities that encourage or enable the use of alcohol by underage young people, including the following activities:

• Drinking subject to passing a Breathalyzer test

So sip a glass of beer or wine or spirits before you’re 21 (in the United States) and you’re a young person making the wrong choice in the eyes of SADD, even if you’re sitting at the dinner table with your family and in so doing learning about how to enjoy alcohol in a responsible fashion. This is not being against making "destructive decisions," it's being against making any decisions!

The only inference I can draw from SADD’s uncompromising stance is that if you’re below the legal age for drinking, you are by definition irresponsible, incapable of self-control and lacking the basic facilities to conduct yourself in a socially acceptable manner. Which is not exercising "peer leadership," as the group’s mission states is its purpose, but simply undermining the notion that young people are capable of learning from experience, thinking for themselves and making rational and responsible decisions.

And that’s just sad.

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