More News Columnists

• Bill Slakey: As Trib closes, many questions remain unasked
• Phill Casaus: Don't cry for us, Albuquerque; it was worth it
• Joline Gutierrez Krueger: My Wall of Fame holds memories of people, stories that have mattered

MOST RECENT TRIB STORIES

• ABQTrib.com to remain available
  08:48 a.m., February 25, 2008
• Congressman is indicted
  08:37 a.m., February 23, 2008
• Series of attacks target Green Zone
  08:36 a.m., February 23, 2008
• Iran is defying U.N., agency says
  08:35 a.m., February 23, 2008
• Waterboarding approval probed
  08:34 a.m., February 23, 2008

TRIB IN THE BLOGOSPHERE*

• Ty Murray Invitational thrills fans in Albuquerque
• Is Rome Burning?
• Ominous Skies
• The Road to Invalidation
• Albuquerque company participates in “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition”

*Note: The Tribune does not create and is not responsible for the blogosphere's headlines and stories. These links to blogs talking about ABQTrib.com are automatically generated. Use them at your own risk.

STORY TOOLS

• E-mail story
• Comments
• iPod friendly
• Printer friendly

SHARE THIS STORY [?]

All this time we've been operating under the premise that teens listen more to their crew than to the crew cuts.

We thought they were shining their parents on — biding their time until they could slip out of the house with their ever-so-influential pals for an evening of whatnot. Or, maybe more likely, you-know-what.

Turns out we were wrong. Kids still take their cues from Mom and Dad.

And that might be the most frightening part of all.

A group called the Century Council was in town this week, talking to girls at Albuquerque High School about the realities of teens and alcohol — data that suggest children really do learn what they live.

According to the council, an alcohol awareness group sponsored by the nation's distilling industry, 49 percent of mothers say it is OK for their daughters to drink. An astounding 20 percent say drinking is a natural part of growing up.

"What we find," said Ralph Blackman, president and CEO of council based in Washington, D.C., "is that parents aren't living up to the bargain."

The bargain, whether parents know it or not, is simply this: They are still crucial, influential, in what their kids know — and, thus, how they act. That reach is longer and stickier than fellow teens, the Internet, the TV.

Nowhere, Blackman said, is this reality more apparent than in the delicate dance between mothers and daughters. The Century Council says 65 percent of adolescents say their parents are the leading influence when it comes to avoiding alcohol, and yet 36 percent surveyed said they hadn't spoken to either parent about underage drinking.

"Parents are way above peers," Blackman said. "When everyone talks about peers, the fact of the matter is, even into (ages) 18 and 19, parents are still part of that conversation. At 13 and 14, all these issues are on the table because to the parent they seem hypothetical.

"By the time they are 17 or 18, sex, drugs, boys and alcohol are no longer on the table. All of a sudden, that communication dynamic, which was 'Don't drink,' now becomes 'Be careful.'

"The parents," Blackman concludes, "have given up the opportunity to influence their teen's life, male or female."

A couple of dozen girls sat in a computer lab at AHS, listening to the presentation from the Century Council and New Mexico's so-square-he's-cool attorney general, Gary King.

The group was a smart one, attentive and polite. Most were athletes and student leaders who know the score much better than many of their parents would imagine.

"There's a lot of parties with drinking that I've seen," acknowledged 17-year-old Rachel Montoya, the senior class president at AHS. "But I know that if you go to a party and you say that you're not drinking, people will respect you. I've tried to go by that: no drinking, just be involved in school and sports, and your high school experience will be the same."

It's not that easy for many kids. And in some cases, that's because adults — perhaps thinking they're doing the safer thing — are hosting parties that include alcohol.

Those cases — like the one in the Far Northeast Heights last weekend that landed two parents in jail and 23 La Cueva students in a mess of trouble — make Blackman shake his head, in large part because good intentions and good outcomes don't intersect at the parent-sponsored backyard kegger.

"Parents think they're controlling the environment," Blackman said. "First of all, you're really not. Number 1, you've sat upstairs (during the party). OK, so you really didn't control the environment. People say, 'I'd rather have them here than going out doing it.' Well, you've enabled them.

"Number 2, you didn't say, 'Gee, you shouldn't be doing that at all.' You said, 'Gee, I'm accepting that you're going to do it and so I'd rather have it here so I can watch what's going on.'

"Well, the fact of the matter is, you're not down in the basement with them watching what's going on. You're sitting up in the living room, watching television, reading the paper. You're being the responsible enabler, whatever that is."

What it is, is trouble.