University of Missouri students gathered at Speakers Circle yesterday asking college administrators to stop “driving us to drink.”

The rally was part of a national movement known as SAFER, which argues that marijuana is a safer — but less accepted — recreational choice than alcohol.

Scott Lauher, an MU graduate who works with the college’s NORML chapter, said he has met students who do not smoke weed because they fear they’ll be arrested or kicked out of residential halls. So instead, they drink, which is more dangerous, he said.

“Universities are saying they’re so concerned about a culture of alcohol and an alcohol epidemic on college campuses, yet they’re the ones promoting that culture of alcohol,” said Mason Tvert, SAFER’s executive director. “When an 18-year-old shows up on campus, they’re told to drink responsibly. What that says to them is they’re supposed to be drinking, so do it responsibly. Why not tell them to party responsibly and let them know the facts about these two substances?”

The group cites statistics about excessive consumption of alcohol leading to assaults, overdose, date rape and injuries. No such statistics exist for marijuana, Kellie Smith, president of MU NORML, said during the rally.

“If marijuana is safer than alcohol, why does the government prefer students to use alcohol instead of marijuana?” she said.

SAFER has issued a petition known as the Emerald Initiative to encourage college leaders to consider lighter punishment for smoking pot as a way to curtail excessive drinking. The initiative is in response to the Amethyst Initiative, a call by more than 130 university presidents and chancellors to consider whether lowering the drinking age to 18 would reduce binge drinking.

About 35 students delivered a copy of the initiative to Chancellor Brady Deaton’s office. Deaton said in a statement he received the message, listened to students’ perspective and respects their right to express opinions but that MU adheres to the law.

MU police Capt. Brian Weimer said the university follows Columbia’s marijuana ordinance, which decriminalizes small amounts of marijuana and makes the penalty for possession a $250 fine.

Tvert said the group wouldn’t expect students to stop drinking entirely if marijuana were more accepted, but he said harsher penalties attached to pot steer students to alcohol. “When a student arrives at a university and is told the penalties are much harsher with marijuana and they face greater punishment if they stay home and use marijuana and play video games than if they go across the street to the fraternity house and get drunk, it sends a dangerous message to them,” he said.

MU spokeswoman Mary Jo Banken said students caught with any drug, including alcohol, on campus face disciplinary action. Discipline is administered on a case-by-case basis, she said, and the same rules apply even to students who are of legal drinking age.