by Mark Morford

Created on: December 06, 2008

Drunk In High School

More alarmist fun with those lyin', cheatin' teens

I can't speak for you but if some pasty government researchers marched into my high school way back when and handed out dopey surveys with questions like, "Have you ever come to class drunk?" and "Have you ever lied to a teacher?", I and my non-drunken friends would've had a certifiable field day, caring not a whit for accuracy or statistics but only thrilled to answer such panicky and insulting questions with equally panicky and insulting replies.

Oh my yes, I've come to school completely wasted on many occasions (thank goodness you didn't ask about the heroin, btw) and, sure, I could get a gun if I wanted and I've lied to both my parents and my teachers and probably my grandma too, but don't tell anyone; I also listen to Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch Nails and wear black nail polish and have a pierced tongue and I'm having lots of awkward sex with vaguely dangerous girls and it drives my parents crazy, but isn't that the point?

And I've little doubt the intentions of this recent Important Government Study about teen behavior were pure and optimistic and maybe even good, and I've also no doubt that a great many high-school students, particularly in big-city schools, have far too much access to far too much lethal adult garbage and hence are far, far too preternaturally jaded and hardcore and depressed.

But really now, in-class drunkenness is a goofy freak minority, and regular and casual lying to teachers and parents certainly isn't anything new: basic lying, of course, being the most common characteristic (and artform) known to humankind; other famed and oft-cited studies proving how we all lie what, 10 times a day? Twenty? More?

Depends on the degree of course: "No I didn't plagiarize my book report" being far more acceptable than "No I didn't shoot that teacher in the head with this Beretta," but the basic idea being that why should high schoolers be any different from the rest of us when it comes to the basic human tendencies? Try to minimize lying and don't hurt anyone and be honest as often as possible. That's pretty much all you can ask for when it comes to bipeds, for better or worse. And that includes teens.

And isn't it about time parents and nervous government types get over the idea that school - particularly high school - is some gilded temple of purity and virtue and innocence? Isn't it about time we acknowledge how high school's usually the place where we all learn about sex and

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