Even as drunken student antics go, it was, by any stretch of the imagination, a disturbing scene. Surrounded by cheering rugby players, applauded by fellow members of the university netball team, 19-year-old Melissa Fontaine tipped back her head and giggled as fellow drinkers in the Students' Union bar pulled apart her eyelids and allowed them to pour a shot of vodka into her left eye.
'Vodka eyeballing', as it is known in student circles, is the latest drinking craze to sweep through Britain's universities.
Those who do it claim that it induces feelings of drunkenness at break-neck speeds, providing an instant high.
But the devastating long-term damage it causes is becoming a major concern among doctors and university authorities who already worry that Britain's student drinking culture is out of control.
Melissa, who left university last summer and is now 22, believes they are right to be worried. Her constantly watering left eye has been left permanently scarred by her antics. More worryingly still, she has been warned that her eyesight may deteriorate further as she gets older.
'I'm in constant pain because of what I did,' she says. 'And I'm terrified that it will get worse. I wish I could turn the clock back and change things. But I can't.'
It would be easy, of course, to dismiss Melissa as nothing more than a silly 'ladette'. But it is hard to reconcile that stereotype with the young woman she is today, fresh out of university in London with a first-class English degree, the privately-educated daughter of financiers, and an aspiring writer.
In short she is not the kind of young woman who might naturally be associated with Britain's spiralling binge-drinking youth culture.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z0nxHEPAQo
You don't have to be dumb to be stupid...
You don't have to be dumb to be stupid...
“If you trust in yourself, and believe in your dreams, and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.”
Re: You don't have to be dumb to be stupid...
In short she is not the kind of young woman who might naturally be associated with Britain's spiralling binge-drinking youth culture.
Riiiiight... They never are... Phhht
All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
Arthur Schopenhauer-
Arthur Schopenhauer-