Teens drink. Not all of them, and not all the time, of course. But if you’re a parent of teenagers, there’s a pretty good chance your kids have at least experimented with alcohol. There’s also a pretty good chance that you don’t know about it or that you underestimate how much they drink.

Most health experts advise against letting teenagers drink. Not just because it’s so dangerous when they drive a car under the influence, or because of the myriad other dangers they may confront when their common sense, iffy under the best of circumstances, is compromised.

Recent research has determined that early drinking inhibits the normal development of the brain and can cause irreversible neurological damage. Kids who drink are more likely to become dependent on or addicted to alcohol, setting them up for a lifetime of personal and social problems.

And, as school performance, athletic ability and personal achievement goals slide away, teens may develop serious depression or other mental health challenges.

Teens, on the other hand, think most adults make way too big a deal out of drinking. While they acknowledge that some of their peers go overboard, some of them think the best way to counteract party-till-you puke behavior is to lighten up, make alcohol less of a taboo and more of a normal part of growing up. After all, they argue, if you’re old enough to vote, old enough to fight and die in a war – or sort of old enough – why should it be a crime to have a couple of beers? Let kids use alcohol moderately under supervision and they’ll grow into responsible adult drinkers, they say. Some parents, probably a minority, support this point of view.

Clearly, there’s a lack of consensus on the matter. That’s why the city of Bangor, in partnership with the United Way of Eastern Maine, Husson College and the Maine Attorney General’s Office, is sponsoring a “community conversation” about underage drinking next week. The event will bring together law enforcement, educators, parents and teens for an evening of shared information and ideas for protecting youngsters from the dangers of drink.

The state’s position is firm: No one under 21 should use alcohol. Though self-reported student drinking in Maine shows a steady decline since 1995, Kim Johnson, director of the state’s Office of Substance Abuse, said alcohol remains the No. 1 drug abused by Maine teens.

“It’s still a huge problem,” Johnson said in a conversation earlier this week. “[Alcohol use] has been dropping in our younger teens, the sixth- to eighth-graders, because we’ve been putting a lot of effort into school programming and community support. But we need to be doing more at the high school level and at the college level.”

Johnson said there are two effective ways to counteract underage drinking. One is to strengthen law enforcement and the other is to establish firm community expectations about the unacceptability of teen drinking. Both, she said, are essential to reducing our children’s use of alcohol and preventing a lifetime of problems.

Johnson said parents and other community adults must actively promote a unified, zero-tolerance policy toward teen drinking. Some grown-ups, she noted, attempt to protect teenagers by allowing them to drink at home under supervision, sometimes even hosting parties and providing the alcohol themselves in exchange for collecting kids’ car keys to keep them off the roads. While driving intoxicated is lethal behavior, Johnson noted, there are many other bad things that can happen to a drunk teenager – including fights, accidents, rape and fatal alcohol poisoning.

Communities that consistently refuse to condone teen drinking are more likely to have aggressively enforced underage drinking laws, Johnson said. Police get the message that parents support their intervention at parties and other gatherings. Retailers know they’re under scrutiny and will support the effort to keep alcohol out of the hands of teens.

“If you make alcohol harder to get, kids will drink less,” she said. And for Johnson, teens drinking less is a step in the right direction.

But many teens – even the “good kids” – just don’t see it that way. At a recent meeting of the Bangor Interact Leaders’ Club, a high school group associated with the civic organization Rotary International, teens discussed the issue with animation. Drinking, they readily admitted, is all around them. Not only can you find a local party with alcohol available any night of the week, they said, but it’s also not uncommon for students as young as 13 or 14 to bring clear alcohol like vodka to school in a water bottle.

Where does all this booze come from? Parents’ supplies, older brothers and sisters, or friends who have “understandings” with look-the-other-way store clerks, they said. “I know a store where anyone can buy beer,” said one youngster.

Living near a college or university makes it easy, too – college students will almost always agree to pick up an extra bottle or two, especially for a small fee. And plenty of teens have fake I.D. cards.

It’s a rare party where there’s no alcohol or other drugs, said a student. Even if a party comes together spontaneously, it won’t be long before someone shows up with the goods. If you choose not to drink, you won’t get ostracized – but why would you want to go to a party if you weren’t going to drink? It’s not really that much fun to sit around and watch other people drink.

Parents who buy booze for their kids are “stupid idiots,” according to the two youngest students. But older kids weren’t so sure. “They have good intentions; they’re trying to take control of the situation without chaining their kids in their bedrooms,” said one. “Some parents think that if you’re old enough to fight for your country, you’re old enough to drink responsibly,” said another.

The allure of party-style drinking dissipates with age, they said. “You don’t see a lot of 35-year-olds saying, ‘Hey, cool, let’s go out drinking.'”

It’s the forbidden fruit aspect that makes young people think alcohol is so important, and that leads some of them to drink to excess, these young people agreed. “I think if the drinking age were lower, people wouldn’t feel the need to drink so much,” said one. “It doesn’t make any sense that drinking is morally and legally wrong until the day you turn 21, and then suddenly it’s OK. There should be more of a transition.”

Penobscot County Sheriff Glen Ross said it’s not surprising that some teens feel they should be able to drink, given alcohol’s youth-friendly marketing, widespread availability and “a certain amount of tolerance” on the part of some parents. Most caring adults acknowledge the danger of letting kids drive while intoxicated, and some take steps to keep them off the roads, he noted. But there are many other unintended consequences to even mild drinking, he said, including criminal mischief, date rape and the beginnings of addiction.

Ross, who will be speaking at the upcoming gathering on underage drinking, said combating it in our communities will require a strong partnership between parents, retailers, churches, schools, law enforcement officials and teens themselves. Any community member ready to discuss the issue should plan on attending the event, he said.

The Community Conversation on Underage Drinking will take place from 6:30 to 8 p.m. Thursday, June 1, at the Richard E. Dyke Center for Family Business at Husson College. In addition to Sheriff Ross, speakers include Maine Attorney General Steven Rowe, Bangor Police Chief Don Winslow, Bangor High School principal Norris Nickerson, and Martha Dudman, author of “Augusta, Gone,” a memoir of her daughter’s struggle with substance abuse. Gov. John Baldacci also is expected. The event is free and no pre-registration is required. For directions or more information, phone 941-2800.