Why do we dress up just to get drunk?

If you like to go out to the bars on the weekend — or during the week, if you really have nothing better to do — I’m sure, like me, you’ve seen the droves of college students crammed inside and lined up along the brick walls up and down Chauncey Avenue. Something you also might have noticed — and this might seem counter-intuitive — is how good everybody looks.

Seriously, look around next time you’re out. Men are in button-ups, brown shoes, ironed jeans. Women are in tight dresses, their faces heavy with dark eyeliner and cheeks blushed just right. Cologne and perfume drift above the less-sweet smell of booze breath.

Of course, this seems perfectly normal to all of us. It’s a common practice. Yet I can’t help but think it’s odd. Historically, events for which people “dress up” are associated with two ideas: that is, dressing up out of respect for someone else like at a funeral or in celebration of someone else like a wedding.

Even high school dances, arguably derivatives of traditional balls that stood as platforms for young people to meet a future husband or wife, have celebratory pre-marriage roots in their conception. So, when we college kids go out to the bars to drink the night away, what exactly are we celebrating or paying respects to?

The most obvious answer is, nothing. We are drinking to socialize, to be with friends, and to have a good time. But we can do that without dressing up, right? And certainly we can socialize and have a good time without getting drunk, right? So the connection between the two — being dressed up and drinking — still seems odd.

Here’s a few quick facts, according to the National Institutes of Health:

• Too much alcohol over time or even on a single occasion can severely damage the heart, and can cause problems such as arrhythmias, stroke and high blood pressure.
• Drinking too much alcohol is associated with an increase risk in developing cancers, specifically of the mouth, throat, liver, and breast.
• The immune system’s ability to combat disease and illness is considerably weakened for chronic drinkers along with those who drink too much on a single occasion.

Even the CDC came out with a recent report, made controversial by several news and blog articles, expressing that binge-drinking as well as consuming eight or more drinks per week is dangerous for women who may eventually want to have a child. In fact, an article by the Tab Purdue’s own Rachel Kim argues that this report by the CDC was nothing but a ridiculous misogynistic lecture (referring to it as a “boozy-doozy”), and that the CDC itself “doesn’t know what the hell it’s talking about.”

Maybe, as many other collegiate articles across the US will agree, she is right. And honestly, the CDC should have been inclusive regarding men’s role in procreating, the effects alcohol will have on sperm cells and then some. There’s no doubt about that. The issue that I find here is within the statement within Kim’s article that persecutes the scientifically-backed data as a whole:

“It’s a bit unreasonable to tell women in 2016 the sole solution to this is to not drink at all. Drinking is bound to happen anyway. Alcohol has become so embedded into our culture, especially for us millennials here at Purdue. We’ve got our own traditions to uphold. Here’s looking at you, The Breakfast Club, Grand Prix week and Thirsty Thursdays at Cactus.”

As I said, many people will agree with this. From those I have personally talked to, it seems like most people do. Maybe the CDC is biased. Maybe we should turn our heads from facts about alcohol and keep doing what our culture tells us that we do best – get drunk.

But maybe the issue isn’t with the CDC, or the sound factual information that alcohol is detrimental to a future child’s health and our own personal health at the present moment. Maybe Rachel’s attitude, a representative of the collegiate attitude as whole, is the issue.

It’s the same attitude that might keep Bernie Sanders off of the presidential ballot this November. Everyone knows he doesn’t stand a chance, so why waste a vote on him, right? It locks us into a cycle of thinking. Likewise, everybody knows that getting drunk is part of the college experience, so why should I deviate? As a result, incomprehensible arguments arise, stating that that facts about alcohol don’t matter, that the CDC is somehow irrelevant to college students who apparently need to booze up.

It seems sad to me that a culture is so unwilling to change yet so eager to attack something as inconvenient as the raw facts seem to be. In fact, just for shits and giggles, lets look at some more statistics on booze consumption directly from the National Institutes of Health:

• On Death: 1,825 college students between the ages of 18 and 24 die each year from alcohol-related unintentional injuries.
• On Assault: More than 690,000 students between the ages of 18 and 24 are assaulted by another student who has been drinking.
• On Rape: More than 97,000 students between the ages of 18 and 24 are victims of alcohol-related sexual assault or date rape.
• On Injury: 599,000 students between the ages of 18 and 24 receive unintentional injuries while under the influence of alcohol.
• On Academics: About 25 percent of college students report academic consequences of their drinking including missing class, falling behind, doing poorly on exams or papers, and receiving lower grades overall.
• On Suicide: More than 150,000 students develop an alcohol-related health problem and between 1.2 and 1.5 percent of students indicate that they tried to commit suicide within the past year due to drinking or drug use.

But wait a second — I must be missing the point, right? It’s part of the college experience, isn’t it? Breakfast Club is damn tradition, for goodness sake! Plus, it makes me feel good. So, there must not be a problem. What else would we do on a Thursday/Friday/Saturday night anyway?

The logic of some of these college minds (which, according to Purdue, are supposed to be among the best in the nation) just seems so absurdly senseless… almost like dressing up just to get drunk.