If you look at the fan response to the West Virginia athletic director’s rather sensible proposal to sell beer at home football games as a Tea Party-inspired reaction to big government attempting to place restrictions on the people’s freedom to smuggle liquor into public events, the hostility begins to make a certain sense.
Of course, the other possibility is that no sober person really wants to be around a bunch of Mountaineer fans in their native environment.
Loosen up and listen to a little Dwight Yoakam, people.
Get The Picture 
It’s the fan reaction, not the proposal to sell beer, that’s rather sensible. Even in West Virginia they know selling beer won’t stop liquor consumption during the games.
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Are you saying you’ve never been to a sporting event where beer was sold on the premises and the crowds weren’t out of control bringing liquor into the stadium? That sure hasn’t been my experience over the past four decades of attendance.
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I think the controlling factors are the age of the crowd (college/under 21 crowd vs. pro event) and the unique traditions of college football. I saw some pretty out of control crowds at Tennis matches at Georgia (granted that was late 70’s). I know I’ve been to plenty of minor and major league baseball games where beer was sold and the crowd was civil (for much of the 70’s and 80’s the Braves could put anybody to sleep).
Lemme clarify my main point: there’s a pretty strong unwritten code that requires college kids to smuggle booze into college football stadiums. I think most of them are going to smuggle booze even if beer is sold because they’re under 21.
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Yes, but some of these commenters are sitting in non-student sections. The availability of alcohol will curve bringing in some liquor but not alleviate it.
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Do you mean ‘curb but not eliminate it’? That’s sort of my point, with the curbing being very slight.
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Could we buy beer from the bench? How does a transfer work?
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I did mean curb but I did mean alleviate too. Eliminate will never happen.
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There is no danger of people sneaking fifths into your living room though.
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Doesn’t mean that they will sell to minors. The older crowd not in the student section would be benefited most. Liquor that’s snuck into football games is usually not beer. More alcohol to volume is always the desirable way among students because more of them can get liquored up on a small volume. It is my opinion that the sale of beer will not stem the flow of hard booze to the student section and cannot be purchased by students under the age of 21. Beer sold at the game will only marginally affect crowd rowdiness. The rowdy minors achieve this usually before walking in or will sneak in wine or higher alcohol beverages. Besides, many prefer a joint for their laid-back pleasure and in my 50 yrs or so in sports attendance those folks are less rowdy than the nondrinking/nonsmoking fans. It will be an interesting experiment at WVU and I’m sure that the first couch burning will now be attributed to beer sold at the game instead of business as usual after their wins.
Consider taking a page from the Chicago White Sox Stadium where beer has been sold for many years. They installed open showers down front and when a fan has had too much, they walk down front, pull the overhead chain and give themselves a soberup shower to the applause of the surrounding crowd. It was the highpoint of the games to my young sons. Especially when a buxom Miss in a t-shirt decided she had had too much.
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