Posted on 05/09/2022 8:55:26 AM PDT by Jacquerie
It was his freshman year.
The University of Florida student had just returned from a night out drinking with friends in 2018 when he was caught by university police with a fake ID — one he said he wasn’t even using that night.
His friends had bought him alcohol, but he drank too much and fell asleep in the common area of Rawlings Hall, where his friend lived. A university police officer searched his wallet, he said, and discovered his fake ID. He remembered being told he might get an email from the university and that otherwise he was “good to go.”
Two months later, his parents received a letter in the mail from the Alachua County Court Clerk’s Office. The fake ID he had obtained for less than $100 would ultimately cost him about $2,500 — mostly in attorney’s fees.
University of Florida police have forwarded nearly four dozen felony complaints to state prosecutors against students caught with fake IDs over the past four years according to an analysis of court records conducted by reporting students at UF’s College of Journalism and Communications. Outcomes varied, but out of 45 cases all charges were either dropped or reduced to misdemeanors.
(Excerpt) Read more at floridapolitics.com ...
It was worse than that in Georgia around 1999 - 2000. They asked EVERYBODY for ID. I remember having a lady in front of me who had to be 85 get asked for her ID. I think she actually enjoyed it because it helped her vicariously relive her salad days.
Illegals, Pierre Dilecto, and Carlos Danger.....all ok.
Amazing how the almost universal need to alter ones consciousness and mood is manifested. Alcohol, mental stimulants, depressants, hallucinogens, etc. Couple their use with pleasant social situations, and yeah!
Why, some can make a good living selling those chemicals. Or even touting the positives aspects of those chemicals in movies, or books, or videos.
Wow....does wall street know?
Growing up in Houston I didn’t need a fake ID. Every convenience store was run by a Chinese who couldn’t judge age. They would always sell you beer if you drove up in a car and came in looking confident.
Another donut?
By the grace of God leftist college demons get hassled this way. Enforce!
Never had to use a fake ID. I was prematurely bald and rarely got carded.
A few months before my 21th birthday, I was carded, and gave the waitress my real ID. It took her 5 minutes to realize I wasn’t 21...
I was buying alcohol at liquor stores when I was 16 and going to bars when I was 17 in the early 70s. Never got carded once in Alaska. Joined the Marine Corps and immediately got carded in Cali when I was 19.
LOLOL!!! wonder which one was the genius that provided the photo???
When we could, my buddies and I relied on a classmate who had an incredibly thick, dark beard. We figured he was probably shaving at ten years.
Great post. It’s all insanity now, 24/7/365. No wonder I retreat to the great outdoors daily.
Interesting, not sure I’ve agreed and disagreed with a post before!
I’m an immigrant, came here from the UK when I was 16. It was an interesting experience, especially on this topic. I totally agree with you that the topic of alcohol is strange in the USA. I knew of a kid in HS that was found to have an EMPTY beer can in his car, he was required to attend some rehab!!
In the UK, at 14 you can be on pub grounds (garden) and an adult can buy you a drink. At 16, you can enter the pub and have an adult buy you a drink. At 18, you can enter the pub and buy yourself a drink. Of course, this is just the ‘official legal’ aspect which is largely ignored. At 16, I could go into a pub and buy a drink. Of course, if you couldn’t be responsible you’d get kicked out and get a reputation very quickly, ending you being welcome.
The main difference I saw coming here...in England I could walk home, at worst catch a (cheap) bus. In the USA all the kids have to drive everywhere. I was astonished at the notion of a “field party”. Now kids would find a place with zero reason to be responsible and also have to drive even further distances! This was at least true here in Michigan - but I’d imagine it’s also true for most States.
I now live in a suburb of Detroit, like most it is a large area of only houses - with zero walkable pubs. I truly believe the best solution for “drinking and driving” is just to allow a couple of pubs here and there around where people live - but the zoning doesn’t allow for it. I really miss being able to walk to the pub, have a few drinks, and walk home.
That said, I completely agree, the way a 20 year old is treated because they have alcohol is absurd - especially considering they could be, as you say, fighting a war. I don’t agree with other countries having fewer alcoholics, they do, if not more - but as said, the _problems_, such as drinking and driving, are probably less. As more people walk to pubs, frequently, they’re usually more responsible - they don’t want a public ‘drunk’ reputation. In the USA, having to drive to a bar is a problem, so drinking non-socially, at home, may lead to having more to drink.
It’s certainly an odd topic, one of the weirdest when I arrived, especially for my brother that was 18 at the time and had been drinking for a few years! It was worse for him :)
On my 12th birthday, I hot-wired my brother-in-law’s VW bug (he was stationed in Hawaii at the time), drove to the State Line Bar package window, and asked the lady for a six-pack of Schlitz and a pack of Salem cigarettes.
She said, “you don’t look old enough, sonny” Never mind I had full-on mutton chops sideburns that came to a point at the corners of my mouth.
I told her I was old enough last week when the sold me the same — she laughed and handed out the beer and cigs to me.
Grand theft auto, driving, drinking and smoking BEFORE I became a teenager!
College at UF was fun too.
NYS licenses were printed on paper, numbers were easily erased or amended. You need only get one from a friend who was your approximate wt and ht. It was never an issue getting into a bar at 16 or 17 when the age was 18. I believe it may have changed in NYS to 21, which is ridiculous. Smart Kids today split an UBER. In Suburbia you really can't "walk" to bars in most cases.
I had one once, found it in the bowling alley that i worked at 16.
sort of looked like me i used it a few times to get into bars.
I wonder what ever happened to it..
Ha! I graduated from UF and I of course had a fake ID just like everybody else. Back in the late 80s though, all they would do is confiscate it. Now they’re making them go through the system and pay a couple grand and do community service. That’s a bit much IMO. 18-20 year old boys especially away at college are going to drink. That has always been the reality. Its not going to change. As long as they don’t drive or harm others, I don’t think its a big deal.
That’s how I see it too. They are adults or they are not. If they are....and they can vote and get married and be held to a contract and be drafted into the military....so I’d say 18 year olds are considered adults, then how can it be legal to discriminate against them by denying them the same right to drink that other adults have?
Seems like an obvious case of age discrimination to me and thus a 14th amendment violation.
Remember Dubs? The Swamp? Skeeters? The Purple Porpoise? Rickenbacker’s? Gainesville institutions that had been around for decades. All gone.
Dubs was my hangout. They were super lax on the fake ID.
I remember “Kamikaze Halftime” when they used to allow pass outs from the stadium and everybody’d sprint to the Porpoise, slam a couple kamikazes and try to stagger back to the stadium - without stopping to puke - in time for the 2nd half kickoff.
It was so much fun. Til the SEC made us stop giving half time pass outs so we could all re-tank up for the 2nd half.
Oh yeah. Nothing like getting an "Asher" at Skeeters at four in the morning after a night out. And yes I did many a "Kamikaze Halftime".
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