UL Makes the Wall Street Journal. Not for Good Reasons

I subscribed to the Wall Street Journal a few weeks ago for school, and lately, I've been trying to make good use of the subscription (its expensive). I read a lot of interesting (and weird) articles on there, but something caught my eye. There was a link to an article called "Beer Sales Make a Comeback at College Stadiums". When I read the link, I had a sneaky suspicion that my university would be mentioned. Recently it was announced that UL would start selling alcohol at collegiate athletics. This does not surprise me. The university will make a lot of money.

Apparently, the move is gaining national attention. Here's a quote from the WSJ article:

"The University of Louisiana at Lafayette this weekend expects to allow fans for the first time to buy beer inside "The Swamp," as the school's stadium is known." (Opdyke, Desmodel 2009)

When I read this, I sighed and shook my head.

Don't mistake the message I am communicating here. I do not condemn the consumption of alcohol. My views on that subject have no place in this post. I am just concerned about this move. My concern stems from a simple fact about southern Louisiana: we like to party, and we like to party hard.

Have you ever been tail-gating at Tiger Stadium? Its chaos. A similar chaos exists on a much smaller scale at Cajun Field, and it stems from the copious drinking that people in this area take to on a regular basis. "Social Drinking" as defined by someone who is lives in this area is basically getting "plastered".

I fail to see how this is going to be healthy for Cajun Field ("The Swamp"...whatever) and the school in general. Yes, we are going to see enhanced revenues from this move. You know what else we're going to see?

A loss on control on the behavior of several thousand 20-somethings, not to mention a few older folks and plenty of underage drinkers as well. Its no secret that its easy to get a beer around here, even if you aren't underage.

All of that being said, it doesn't make sense for the university to go through with this. The tarnished image we are going to inherit is not worth the financial benefits. We'll see how this turns out.

[Link] "Beer Sales Make a Comeback at College Stadiums" (Wall Street Journal, Subscription may be required)