Well, with American culture, youth and adults alike are rather irresponsible when it comes to alcohol and things of that nature. If you look in nearly every other country's culture, you'll notice a vast difference in how the people handle and use alcohol.
Alcohol is widely used in many things, such as celebrations, gatherings, for self-pleasure, for an experience. We drink alcohol nearly everywhere. We drink them at birthday parties, weddings, social gatherings, or open up a flask when walking down the strike and take a sip. Really, alcohol is everywhere, no one can prevent it from being consumed, however, how it is consumed and to what extent it is consumed it the real issue.
People here in America think quite differently about alcohol then people do in say Europe. We drink it more often then not to impress people, to feel better, or to be rebellious. People in Europe drink it because it's a drink, and nothign more. It's like Coca Cola here in America. We all drink it, and quite often, in Europe however, drinking alcohol is widely accepted and is quite on par with American's drinking soda.
But, unfortunetly, America has a drinking problem. Heck, we even knew this back in the 20's! We signed a law that banned alcohol! Because people knew how bad it was. People know how bad it can be, but still, we refuse to act morally with it and abuse it. Not to much you can do though. Where there's a will, there's a way, so even if it gets banned or whatever, peopel will still do it just because they can and want to.