Opinion: Four Loko an Issue of Culture, Not Caffeine

(Nov. 18) -- By now you must have heard about this purported drink of doom called Four Loko.

The malt liquor beverage is a blend of alcohol and caffeine that reportedly contains the equivalent of four beers and a cup of coffee inside its colorful 23.5-ounce can.

It has become a bit of a cultural phenomenon and has sparked cries from critics who stress that the drink is really bad for you.

Already states like New York, Michigan and Washington have banned the $3 concoction after the hospitalization and in some cases deaths of several college-age students.

Now, according to Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., the FDA will issue warnings about the current state of the drink that could lead the way for a nationwide ban. Schumer says the agency will soon rule that caffeine is an unsafe additive to alcoholic beverages, potentially paving the way for the FDA to seek a court injunction to halt production of Four Loko. (The maker of the drink, Phusion Projects, has already announced plans to take the caffeine out.)

Schumer wrote: "Let these rulings serve as a warning to anyone who tried to peddle dangerous and toxic brews to our children. Do it and we will shut you down." (Funny, I don't recall similar cries when MD 2020 was damning the lives of several high school and college students of color years ago. What a difference a politically charged environment and frustrated electorate make.)

Personally, I'd rather drink pork chop grease and gasoline than Four Loko. But this effort to ban the drink makes no sense.

In a statement, Phusion Projects states: "If it were unsafe, popular drinks like rum and colas or Irish coffees -- that have been consumed safely and responsibly for years -- would face the same scrutiny that our products have recently faced."

With respect to those who've died, Phusion Projects is right. People have been adding caffeine to alcohol for years -- there's a huge list of alcohol/coffee mixes, for example, that includes everything from Black Gold to the Nose Warmer. Where have the FDA and Sen. Schumer been all these years?

Much of the hype about Four Loko misses the true culprit here: It's not the drink, it's the culture.

It has been reported that illicit drug use was coupled with Four Loko, and that ultimately lead to nine students from Central Washington University being rushed to the hospital.

And while friends of a 21-year-old Maryland woman claim she lost her mind after consuming Four Loko, it was after she grabbed someone else's car keys that she sadly lost her life.

We are simply not teaching young people to drink responsibility. It's an important lesson to instill, given the binge-drinking culture permeating many college campuses. Similarly, we need to do more to thwart underage drinking.

Unless that changes, a Four Loko ban won't end these sorts of scenarios. In fact, it may lead to far worse ones, as homemade Four Loko recipes are already spreading across the Web.

If the government wants to nanny a nation about Four Loko, while it continues to hypocritically allow the usage of the long-proven gateway drug called tobacco, so be it. However, the real issue will still be personal responsibility.

We're all crazy to keep ignoring it.