vodka eyeballingVodka eyeballing is pretty much what it sounds like: pouring vodka straight from the bottle into your eyeball. Are you cringing yet? If not, you will, once you find out that the game that started over in Britain has made its way to the States. Kids who try eyeballing say it gets them drunk super fast and creates an instant high that they can’t get from just drinking the alcohol.

But the truth of the matter is very different. According to experts, you can’t even get drunk this way because applying 40 percent alcohol directly to the eye causes membranes to swell and blood vessels to shrink -- so barely any vodka is even being absorbed.

We all know kids do stupid things, but this might even beat the choking game and snorting bath salts for sheer idiocy. Watch for yourself.

It’s more likely that the sheer agony caused by applying alcohol to your eye is resulting in a rush of adrenaline and endorphins, kind of like when you get a tattoo. But the alcohol is resulting in something else, too. Pouring vodka onto your eyeball is about the same as pouring bleach into your eye. Think about it -- vodka is used all the time as a disinfectant and sterilizer in emergency situations. That’s what these kids are putting in their eyes.

And it’s doing serious damage (as any normal person would expect). It strips away the outer membrane of the eye, which can lead to potential scarring. For Melissa Fontaine, it got a whole lot worse. Repeated eyeballing has left her with a permanently damaged eye. It’s in constant pain and always weepy. Doctors told her she burned through her cornea.

Why are kids so willing to hurt themselves to get high? More and more we see kids pushing each other to extremes, usually out of sheer bravado. Who can tolerate the most burning, who can get the drunkest, who can stay conscious the longest ...

Kids used to race each other on bikes, now they surf on cars. They used to sneak a few beers, now they pour toxic substances onto their eyeballs, all for a few kicks. It seems like there is a huge element of competition involved in things like this, and that should be something we can address at home and in the schools. Someone’s got to do something before they end up setting their eyeballs on fire just so they can get high off a fire extinguisher.

What do you think of the eyeballing trend? How can we stop our teens from participating?

 

Image and video via YouTube