ASUW malt beverage resolution ‘bill without balls’

Remember the anti-smoking bill Associated Students of the University of Wyoming passed last semester? Well, it is round two of the “bills without balls” series. Our student senate is currently considering a resolution that would allow for malt beverages to be sold at sporting games, more specifically War Memorial Stadium. And with malt, they mean beer, wine and that good stuff.

“Woo, awesome,” some of us students might think, while our ever-vigilant protectors at UW Police Department must be rolling their eyes. So why is this bill not ballsy? Hint: it’s everything that the bill won’t do.

This malt resolution was mostly copied from Resolution 1688, which was passed by the ASUW senate 20 years ago, based on significant student interest and research.

The first problem on the list is that there is no scientific research. Sure, some students might get together for an evening at the Gardens and whine over the fact that if you have $1,000 to blow on Wildcatter seats in the stadium, you can drink hard liquor all you want.

While that is a glaring unequal separation of classes, assuming that all students want to drink at the games is a bit stereotypical.

But alcohol and sports go together like prayers and Hail Marys in this wonderful nation, so let’s assume that the assumption is true (there goes everything I learned in logics class.) The resolution speaks of increased security at the games and significant revenue increases for the university, or at least the athletic department.

When it comes to security, my knee jerk reaction to an entire student section yelling, “First down, suckers,” while double-fisting some light beer is not a sense of security. The argument here is that with more supervision — a drink limit and more policing of alcohol — security increases. However, this presumes that students and other fans will actually choose the highly overpriced stadium drinks over their years of pre-game tailgate tradition.

Next is the problem of underage drinking. It already happens, nobody is naive about it, but organizing different sections of the stadium into underage and legal age would be a nightmare. Bootlegging would be even more prevalent than it is now.

In addition, the increased cost of police force to monitor the games would definitely put a dent into the revenue. So would the liability and other insurances the athletics department would have to cover. And since we’re in speculation land, what would the news look like if an underage student possibly died in the stands during one of the games?

Finally, my biggest issue is not the problems with allowing alcohol. It seems only fair if our “dry campus” leadership gets to drink in their box, then students should have the right as well.

No, my issue is that this resolution won’t go anywhere. Just like resolution 1688, this new resolution will most likely end up as a political message and then 20 years from now, another senate will pick it up and pass it.

As the student body, we have to ask the hard questions. Why is such a resolution even considered if no one expects anything to change? Will ASUW senators just sit in a room for a couple of hours and say “aye” or will we see actual lobbying by senators?

There should only be two options for ASUW: either drop the resolution and focus on updating their finance policies, or truly adopt this issue and actually do everything in their power to finally leave a palpable change and legacy on this campus.