The Danger Of Passive Drinking… Wait…What…?
I saw the headlines passing through my news readers regarding "passive drinking" this morning and I took it to mean some kind of social drinking situation where people who aren’t really drinkers and don’t much like alcohol drink anyway for the sake of socializing and fitting in. But…no. Via Dan Savage over at SLOG…
First They Came for the Smokers…
…and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a smoker blah blah blah.
Actually, the Stranger did speak up: We urged a “no” vote on Washington state’s smoking ban because of its unenforceable (and largely unenforced) 25ft rule. We did, however, endorse the concept of a smoking ban. It was a perfect Stranger position on a controversial issue: We managed to piss off everybody. Anti-smoking crusaders were furious that we urged a “no” vote and smokers were furious that we endorsed the concept. Yahtzee!
Well, anyway, just as some outraged nicotine addicts predicted in our comments threads… now they’re coming for the drinkers.
The campaigns to combat the effects of “passive smoking” are widely credited for Europe’s growing number of smoking bans. Now alcohol is in the sights of the public health lobbyists, and they have invented the concept of “passive drinking” as their killer argument.
I have seen a leaked draft report for the European Commission, which is due to be published some time in June. It makes claims about the high environmental or social toll of alcohol, the “harm done by someone else’s drinking.” The report is likely to inform proposals for a European Union alcohol strategy later this year.
Uh-oh.
Er…haven’t we already been down this road once…?
Well…"passive drinking" does have a more scientific sound to it then DEMON RUM…
You have to reckon the object is, as for tobacco, to ban the product without actually…you know…banning it. Because a ban would be unenforceable and create more crime and cost the America billions in wasted money and wasted lives, whereas simply making it illegal to use the product anywhere won’t be a ban as such and won’t cause any of the horrific social problems that the war on drugs certainly has not caused…or that Prohibition never caused…
In the meantime I’m going to engage in a little passive resistance and go out for a smoke and then come back home and pour myself some Kahlua… Burn in hell Carrie…
April 23rd, 2008 at 2:52 am
If you’ve ever been in a British town or city centre in the small hours of a Saturday or Sunday morning then you’d probably think they may have a point. It’s widely seen as acceptable – or even admirable – for both men and women to drink as much as possible, even to the point of being paralytic.
As a result the UK has one of the world’s highest and fastest-increasing rates of alcohol-related violent crime – typically assault, though murder and rape are both increasing as well. Police forces are spending increasing amounts on dealing with drinkers over the weekend. Likewise A&E (British ER) departments are increasingly focussing their resources on Saturday and Sunday mornings when, alongside increasing numbers of assault victims, they’re seeing increasing numbers of people being brought in with alcohol poisoning. Many doctors foresee the UK having the world’s highest rate of Cirrhosis of the Liver within a few years.
All this is despite the UK having some of the highest rates of tax on alcohol in the world – a drink in London can cost anywhere from £2.50 to £15 ($5 to $30) though they’re usually around the £4 to £5 ($8 to $10) mark. A night out can easily cost over £100 ($200) for drinks alone, and many will pay out several times that amount.
Personally I don’t think there will ever be anything as draconian as the Prohibition happen in Europe, but I do think that laws are likely to be tightened in the near future.