So Northwestern students are going off campus, getting drunk and doing disgusting things in other people’s backyards. Now the neighbors are mad — and rightfully so — and police are responding by scrutinizing parties more than ever.

Why is this becoming such a big problem now? Is it part of the aftermath of Sept. 11? Have the terrorists now really won?

Or are we finally seeing the result of five years of crack downs in the fraternity quads? As recently as 1998, 16 fraternities were still allowed to have regulated parties with alcohol. A combination of elements — an NU policy giving priority to new frats that want a dry house, a national trend toward dry houses and some NU sanctions against wet houses — have made all but four either go dry or leave campus.

All those students who used to roam drunkenly around the fraternity quads are now roaming the streets of Evanston terrifying parents and small dogs.

Not only are off-campus parties furthering the divide between the city and NU, they aren’t very safe. You have to walk across five blocks of cold, poorly lit streets to get to a party, and once you start drinking you run the risk of getting alcohol poisoning with no peer health educators, RAs or administrators to help you.

Why doesn’t NU try to create some more alternatives on campus? The Associated Student Government Executive Board thinks it should. According to ASG President Rachel Lopez, ASG presented William Banis, NU’s vice president for student affairs, with a proposal to bring some nightlife back to campus.

The ASG proposal contains several ideas, such as improving Norris University Center bar nights so there’s an area for legal drinkers and an area for underage kids, much like ASG’s tailgates. Lopez also wants NU to extend hours at Lisa’s Cafe in Slivka Residential College to make it open 24 hours a day, and to subsidize dorm trips into downtown Chicago.

The plan is worth looking into. It’s always better to have more late-night options. But because ASG has to deal with NU’s administration, they can’t broach the subject of creating a safer environment for underage students to drink. They can only come up with alternatives to drinking.

The problem with that is no matter how many alternatives you come up with, and no matter how great they are, kids want to drink. It’s fun, it loosens them up and it increases the chances someone they like will kiss them.

So if kids are going to drink no matter what, why doesn’t NU try to create as safe an environment for it as possible?

The answer, in a word, is liability. Because underage drinking is illegal, if NU doesn’t commit to and enforce a policy that prohibits it, the university could be liable in a lawsuit if an 18-year-old freshman drinks on campus and then gets sick or hurt afterward.

I’m not one to suggest that my university start breaking the law. Others, however, have. They say NU is such a reactionary policy-setter that if a student died at an off-campus party, that might be enough to force NU to rethink its policy. As this argument goes, if NU could be proactive, a life could be saved.

Realistically, NU is not going to do anything that would condone freshmen and sophomores drinking on campus — at least, not until Illinois returns the drinking age to 18.

So that leaves the health of our social lives in our hands. If you want to drink, go off campus. Walk in groups. Drink responsibly. Play the music quietly. For God’s sake, don’t pee in someone’s lawn or have sex in someone’s hammock.

And the next time you have a chance to drink on campus like the Frances Willard party, don’t pull the fire alarm.

Dan Murtaugh is news editor and a Medill senior. He can be reached at [email protected].