Boozin', Prayin', and Learnin' (or, A Subjective Analysis of the Link Between My Alcohol Drinking Habits And My Last Year In Catholic School)

I had originally written about three quarters of quite a long blog post about my opinion of denominational primary education in Ireland, but then I realised that it was pretty boring and long and I wasn't really going anywhere with it, so I'll just stick to this one tidbit from sixth class.

When I was 12 and making my confirmation, we were all herded into a classroom after lunch and handed a piece of paper. It was the pledge. I don't remember the exact wording of it, but it was something along the lines of "I promise to God that I will never take drugs and will not drink alcohol until I am __ years of age. Signed, _____". We were told that we could fill in whatever age we wanted, but were strongly recommended to put 18. So far so good. I don't recall being informed that I didn't have to do this if I didn't want to. It's possible that I was and just plain don't remember, this happened like 7 years ago, but given my overall experience at school of being told when things were and weren't optional I don't think it's outside the realm of possibility that they just didn't say anything.

At this point I'm pretty sure we'd done some health education thing on drugs (I remember making a "pass on grass" poster). But that particular day it hadn't come up. All this pledge stuff was sprung on us. So I'll get to my main point: I am all for encouraging children to adopt healthy attitudes towards drugs from an early age. I see why never taking illegal drugs and not drinking until age 18 is a sensible concept to introduce to children. Great. What I'm not all for is this concept being introduced in the form of a covenant with God instead of a decision made independantly by the child after being taught about the consequences of drug and alcohol abuse.

I can't remember whether or not I was fully atheist at this point, but the fact of the matter is that once I realised that my beliefs differed from those that this pledge were based on, that agreement I had entered into was just a laserprinted piece of nothing.

I signed the bit of paper anyway, and I put down 13, figuring that at least I'd be able to keep that and still be able to have a sip of champagne at new year's and all the other little things like that. In the end I tried a bit of my Dad's Guiness a few months before my birthday and that was the end of that.

Pledge or no pledge, I ended up with very unhealthy drinking habits, some of which still remain. I started drinking at a very early age, in what I now realise were very unsafe circumstances. It took me a long time to find my limits, and even having found them I still exceed them on all too regular a basis. I'm not trying to play the blame game and I'm not suggesting that my primary school curriculum is at the root of all evil.

But I just think that I would have had a healthier attitude towards drugs, alcohol in particular, if I had been better educated about certain things earlier. Things like the strength of spirits, units of alcohol, body weight, what actually happens if you drink too much, the situations you can get yourself into. I think that the possibility of a naggin of vodka leaving me puking in the street would have scared me more at age twelve than "You shouldnt drink because drinking is bad and God doesn't want you to" ever did.

Again, obviously my secondary school had a responsibility, my parents had a responsibility, and above all I had a responsibility. My main point is just that what's the point in having substance abuse education at primary level at all if you're just going to ignore logic and bring religion into it?