TheAgitator.com
Neoprohibition Links
Tuesday, June 29th, 20041. New study from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation encourages lawmakers to regulate drink specials, happy hours and other promotions on or near college campuses. Unsurprising quote from the exec summary:
Binge drinking on United States college campuses appears not to be just a matter of choice or personal responsibility, the authors suggest. The so-called “wet” environment — easy availability of alcoholic drinks, low prices and marketing strategies such as discounted drinks during “happy hours” — may entice college students to drink alcoholic beverages to excess. The study concludes that regulation of these practices may do well to reduce binge drinking and its associated problems.
2. Another new study — also funded by RWJF — will lay out a blueprint for bringing Big Alcohol to its knees via class action suits. The authors are two tobacco litigation veterans.
3. The World Health Organization’s plan for a dryer Europe as some particularly scary provisions:
· By 2015, â??per capita consumption should not increase or exceed 6 litres per annumâ? (that would require Great Britain, Ireland, France, and Germany to cut consumption by about half).· â??By the year 2005, all countries of the European Region should … develop a taxation policy that ensures a high real price of alcohol, taxation based on alcohol volume (i.e. higher taxes on alcoholic beverages with a higher alcohol content) â?¦ [and] use alcohol taxes to fund alcohol control activities â?¦â?
· â??Implement strict controls â?¦ on direct and indirect advertising of alcoholic beveragesâ?
· â??By the year 2010, the maximum blood alcohol concentration limit should be reduced to 0.2g/L for all drivers,â? which, in the US, equals .02% BAC.
Fifty-one European countries have signed on. For all the nanny-statists and lifestyle cops here in the U.S., the WHO might be the creepiest of all.
All this stuff is really getting on my nerves. I just can’t deal with it. I’m going to go get drunk and try to forget about it.
There are two kinds of heavy drinking in Europe: (1) the HAPPY German-Austrian-Czech, Oktoberfest-Hofbrauhaus-beertent sort of drinking; and (2) the UNHAPPY (old) Irish or (old and new) Russian style “make the pain from our oppression go away” sort of drinking.
Bet WHO didn’t factor that into their analysis.
6 liters of what? Pure alcohol? Hard liquor? Anything alcoholic? If it’s the latter, that’s about 18 beers – and I drink more than that a *month*, much less a year. Hell, even if it’s pure alcohol, I probably exceed that, but then, I probably do drink too much.
I can’t find the original source for the story, though – the WHO has a pdf of their ‘European Alcohol Action Plan 2000-2005′ on their website (http://www.euro.who.int/alcoholdrugs/Policy/20021009_1), but it doesn’t mention the ’6 litres’ thing.
The notion that drink specials, happy hours and such near college campuses are encouraging binge drinking is laughable. Most of the students aren’t old enough to go to bars, so they’re binge drinking at student housing parties, where there are no responsible adults to cut them off or send them home.
If they want to reduce binge drinking, they should lower the legal drinking age and work on helping young people learn to drink responsibly
New Neoprohibition in the E.U. and U.S. (The Agitator)
New Neoprohibition in the E.U. and U.S. (The Agitator)
They don’t believe there is any such thing as “drinking responsibly”. Actually, along with the obesity types, they don’t believe there’s any such thing as “responsibility”.
Hey, anyone wanna hear a good joke? Ok, here goes (courtesy of the trauma foundation):
“While alcohol damages related to underage drinking are well-documented, proving industry fraud may be difficult. Consumer attorneys will face substantial legal hurdles, the first of which is to survive summary judgment so that they can gain access to industry internal memoranda.
Litigation alone won’t solve the many problems of underage drinking. However, judging from the statesâ?? tobacco lawsuits, litigation may provide an important tool for uncovering the darker side of alcohol marketing. And ultimately, it could give policymakers the support they need to translate legal remedies into sound public health alcohol policies.”
Hahaha! Man, that was a good one! These guys should write for The Onion!
What’s that? They were serious? Oh, fuck.
Just one last thing before I check out. I read that statement again, and it was talking about how “proving industry fraud my be difficult”. Is it just me, or is our justice system based on simply trying someone based on the evidence, and presuming them innocent? The Trauma Center has presumed the alcohol industry to be guilty, and now, they are talking about finding ways to prove their claim. Isn’t this backwards? I mean, shouldn’t the Trauma Center have at least a little bit of proof before they presume the industry to be guilty of fraud? And no, I’m sorry, funny ads with talking lizards does not equate to “fraud”. This just proves that these dirtbags aren’t worried about “facts”. All they care about is their agenda, and how to justify it.
Another example of bureaucratic loons trying to take away the ordinary citizen. And these arsehats wonder why people hate them so much.
Wandering thoughts:
Nobody seems to talk anymore about the studies that suggest moderate alcohol intake is actually healthy…
If I lived in Europe, I figure I’d be about 347 beers beyond their goal for me every year. Wow. All that from a guy who never has been a “binge” drinker.
If the price of alcohol is artificially inflated to reduce consumption, look for a surge in home-brewing. I know that at least I would dust off the old brewing equipment in the attic.
In Madison, WI some students are actually suing bar owners for price fixing because, under pressure from groups like this, they’ve eliminated weekend bar specials.
What happens to people that they forget their own youth and become determined to steal the fun from the next generation?
So I’ll just bring up KSA as I often do, and point out that alcohol has been illegal in that country forever. You can’t have it, make it, sell it or of course drink alcohol. You can’t even have real vanilla extract or other such extracts because of their alcohol content. Medicines are alcohol-free. Got it?
Yeah, so alcoholism runs rampant in KSA. The youngsters drive across the causeway to Bahrain, get trashed, and drive back. It’s smuggled in. People make their own. I know of two families who, while I lived over there, blew their homes to kingdom come when their garage stills exploded.
The yoohoos in this country and at WHO should take a look at what perma-prohibition really produces. Maybe they’d think again.
Although, they don’t seem to do much thinking in the first place, so maybe not.
I can tell you what happens to people that they forget their own youth and become determined to steal the fun from the next generation. They don’t trust their kids. The baby boomers were such hell-raising, dope-smoking, binge-drinking, love-happy, free-will, lunatics, and they are afraid their kids aren’t mature enough to do the things they did. Hell, to hear them talk they single-handedly brought down a corrupt administration all while marching in the streets, smoking cheap, primo bud, and fucking like minks. Maybe they don’t trust their kids because they have always made the choices for their children. Even birds understand that young must “test their wings” before they are ready to fly free in the big, bad world. If you haven’t allowed your children to make their own decisions and sometimes fail, you have not allowed them to grow nor prepared them to deal with the real world. These people obviously believe that government regulations are the solution to our problems rather than the cause.
Aye, looks like it might be time to fire up the still in the north country.
The RWJ Foundations is clearly the result of Gay Marriage.
squeeze my liver….
Wade, that almost sounds like a caption for the Rasputin pic.
0.02%???
Isn’t that, like, one beer? I don’t know about you, but I have never felt impaired after one beer…