[Mick]

As the Incognito/Martin story makes clear, two things an entity (like Stanford or the Dolphins) can do to promote mental health are: (1) expel bad actors, or force them to get treatment, so they don’t traumatize others; and (2) give people suffering trauma or mental health issues an opportunity to escape an antagonizer or take a leave of absence that won’t prejudice them. When I attended Stanford, I had friends assigned to freshman roommates who were bad abusers of alcohol, which imposed significant consequences on my friends. I don’t remember anyone ever being forced into treatment or expelled. I don’t remember anyone ever being able to move out of a bad dorm situation or taking leaves of absence for mental health. Maybe those remedies actually did happen sometimes but I was oblivious to all that.  Maybe the more proactive approach would be to heavily limit alcohol on campus. It’s a scourge that causes lots of problems and generally doesn’t give people the benefits they are hoping to obtain.

That's a good idea, but it might prove challenging in the execution. Right before my frosh year in college, the son of a major donor got blindly drink and stumbled off the top of the arena roof on campus. So for my frosh year, kegs were banned from dorms. And I distinctly recall going up in an elevator my first month with the new president of the university. Seven drunk frat brothers, all with beer cups stumble into the elevator. "Having a little party boys?" said the Pres with a tight-lipped smile. They all cheered. Pres gets off on fifth floor, elevator continues to top floor, eleventh. One of the drunken kids finally gets the clue and realizes that it was the university's new president.

Next week, all alcohol is off-limits at university events. The next quarter, alcohol was permanently banned from campus.

Wish I could say that it did the trick. But it just moved off-campus, or the kids got better at hiding it.

[Mick]

As the Incognito/Martin story makes clear, two things an entity (like Stanford or the Dolphins) can do to promote mental health are: (1) expel bad actors, or force them to get treatment, so they don’t traumatize others; and (2) give people suffering trauma or mental health issues an opportunity to escape an antagonizer or take a leave of absence that won’t prejudice them. When I attended Stanford, I had friends assigned to freshman roommates who were bad abusers of alcohol, which imposed significant consequences on my friends. I don’t remember anyone ever being forced into treatment or expelled. I don’t remember anyone ever being able to move out of a bad dorm situation or taking leaves of absence for mental health. Maybe those remedies actually did happen sometimes but I was oblivious to all that.  Maybe the more proactive approach would be to heavily limit alcohol on campus. It’s a scourge that causes lots of problems and generally doesn’t give people the benefits they are hoping to obtain.

That's a good idea, but it might prove challenging in the execution. Right before my frosh year in college, the son of a major donor got blindly drink and stumbled off the top of the arena roof on campus. So for my frosh year, kegs were banned from dorms. And I distinctly recall going up in an elevator my first month with the new president of the university. Seven drunk frat brothers, all with beer cups stumble into the elevator. "Having a little party boys?" said the Pres with a tight-lipped smile. They all cheered. Pres gets off on fifth floor, elevator continues to top floor, eleventh. One of the drunken kids finally gets the clue and realizes that it was the university's new president.

Next week, all alcohol is off-limits at university events. The next quarter, alcohol was permanently banned from campus.

Wish I could say that it did the trick. But it just moved off-campus, or the kids got better at hiding it.