Why do the majority of them need to drink less?

Unfortunately the consumers of drink may have a responsible attitude to drinking but the producers want you to drink. That’s why in so many of the larger outlets, on most Sundays (usually a quiet evening) drinks cost either half or ‘buy one get one free’. And the supermarkets are no better with their cheap offers on alcohol (the price is so low that the alcohol must be a loss-leader)
Restruants are also offering free bottles of wine with meals, in fact, it only falls short of forcefully giving young people an intravenous alcohol drip.
Politicians who state that they are concerned with the binge-drink culture speak with a fork tongue, there will be no positive action to address excessive alcohol consumption just a few empty phrases.

I’m sorry, but I think you’ll find that drinking is on the decrease in the UK. Yes, a few idiots have a problem, but that’s always been the case. I’m ancient enough to recall parts of Liverpool and Manchester in the 50′s and 60′s that were no-go zones. You couldn’t walk past some pubs without risking a drunk throwing up on you or biffing you one. Drink was incredibly expensive then compared to average wages.

As for young people, my company sent me to study engineering in the late 60′s. Every student I knew regularly got off his or her head with drink. Underage drinking was widespread, indeed I well remember getting drunk on my 18th at a pub I’d been frequenting for a year or more.

People like drinking; it has always been thus. So really, all this righteous wailing about drinking, obesity, smoking, drugs, etc has to stop.

Northern Worker is bang on the money here. Can the Righteous please sod off and be miserable all by themselves.

Our research on young people’s drinking paints a pretty straightforward picture: young people drink because it’s fun and because it’s a key part of making and maintaining friendships. They are drinking because they want to get drunk, but they don’t want to get so drunk they make idiots of themselves – walking an ‘intoxication tightrope’. They feel that they are at a time in their life when cutting loose and drinking a bit too much is normal, and assume they will settle down when they get a job or start a family.

So what might influence them to drink differently? Responsibly?

If they are walking a tightrope between being drunk and between making idiots of themselves, and they feel they are drinking a bit too much and assume they will settle down, they are drinking responsibly.

They are weighing up their actions, they are aware of the potential consequences, and they know its something they can’t do forever. They are pretty much the definition of ‘responsible’

Work by Stirling University and the Open University on public health interventions that have successfully changed attitudes and behaviours provides some useful insights (http://www.jrf.org.uk/publications/tackling-alcohol-harm). It highlights factors that make behaviour change initiatives more likely to work, including a need to understand and address the real views and experiences of the people you are trying to influence.

Whats truly frightening is you have no idea how sinister you sound. I’m reminded of B.F. Skinner’s ‘Walden Two’: he had utopian ambitions about conditioning people ‘for their own good’ too.

“People like drinking; it has always been thus. So really, all this righteous wailing about drinking, obesity, smoking, drugs, etc has to stop.”

Aye, and whilst you’re at it, the state should stop using punitive taxes to moralise and wail against those who make informed decisions about what the hell they want to do with their lives.

Duty on fags and booze in this country is outrageous.

I’m young, and I like getting smashed. I don’t ruin my life, or that of others. My first reaction is to tell you to piss off and mind your own business.

My second reaction is to ask you to think a bit about why your definition of “responsible” drinking is right, why it matters, and why you should be allowed to go around trying to change other people’s lifestyles and attitudes.

A plausible answer will be: en masse, too much heavy drinking has negative health and, in turn, economic effects at a national and varying local level. Fine, make a utilitarian argument about government policy.

In the meantime, I reserve the right to tell you to piss off and do something more useful than analysing my mind set and the attitude I have to my Friday nights.

Just to make the point a bit more clearly: getting off your tits is loads of fun, and that’s why people do it. Direct and indirect economic costs of this may (excuse the pun) be the price we collectively have to pay for that (and we’re already recouping the losses by large duties on alcohol and tobacco products already).

I don’t really want to live in your sober utopia. It would be boring as hell.

2. jojo

Unfortunately the consumers of drink may have a responsible attitude to drinking but the producers want you to drink.

So what??As the article points out, most drinkers are responsible and most young people are sophisticated consumers of media. I might want people to vote me Supreme Overlord of Great Britain but it ain’t going to happen either.

That’s why in so many of the larger outlets, on most Sundays (usually a quiet evening) drinks cost either half or ‘buy one get one free’. And the supermarkets are no better with their cheap offers on alcohol (the price is so low that the alcohol must be a loss-leader)

And so? Adam Smith pointed out that countries with cheaper alcohol tended to have less of a problem with drunkenness. It seems to be true.

Restruants are also offering free bottles of wine with meals, in fact, it only falls short of forcefully giving young people an intravenous alcohol drip.

I doubt they do. Where?

“we don’t talk about love, we only want to get drunk, and we are not allowed to spend, as we are told that this is the end, a design for life”

I feel alienated so I drink, want me to stop drinking too much? stop the fucking alienation bred by Capitalism (i.e. destroy fucking capitalism)

10. Rory

I feel alienated so I drink, want me to stop drinking too much? stop the fucking alienation bred by Capitalism (i.e. destroy fucking capitalism)

Yeah because Russians never f**king drank before Yeltsin.

Your problems are your’s. Not our’s. Not Capitalism’s.

3
The point about the 50s and 60s is that alcohol was confined to licensed premises, you knew where to avoid, moreover, it was only cheap in working mens’s clubs etc, now young kids (some as young as 10 years) are getting hold of cheap alcohol from supermarkets etc. and consuming it in public places.

9
Leave me your address and I’ll come and vomit over your wall at the week-end,
your ‘so what’ suggests to me that you have not been the victim of underage and legal age binge drinkers.

Blimey, it’s good to see that there are still some vestigial liberal instincts among the readers and regular commentators of ‘Liberal’ Conspiracy.

I want to endorse Shatterface’s objection: the drinkers described in the article ARE acting responsibly, that’s exactly what responsible drinking looks like. It is a country mile more responsible than me and my friends were in our late teens where the drinking ‘culture’ was pretty much just bombs away! So leave the kids alone and go bother someone else. There’s that lonely looking bloke lives on your road. Have you seen him? Perhaps he hasn’t been saved yet! Go help him find Jesus!

Like SMFS, I want to know where I can get a free bottle of wine with my meal?

I know the idea of Brits being like the French is very attractive but we aren’t the French. Next you’ll be asking like Henry Higgins “Why can’t a woman be more like a man?”

“Young people are sophisticated consumers of media” what, all of them?

13,14

I get the idea that young kids binge drinking doesn’t figure much in your lives, as I said @12, leave your addresses.
As I am also quite liberal I don’t like being the victim of other people’s bad behaviour, even if you don’t mind.

“I know the idea of Brits being like the French is very attractive but we aren’t the French. ”

I don’t even see why the idea of the Brits being more French in their outlook is attractive. Surely a world of variety with very different national cultural expression is preferable? I think the bleating about a ‘cafe culture’ in England is just the reverse side of the idiotic American tourist of folklore complaining loudly that he can’t get a decent hamburger in Paris.

So what might influence them to drink differently? Responsibly?

Nancy

As others have pointed out your impulse to ensure others act according to your criteria of responsibility is utterly pernicious.

And when that impulse is translated into concerted action to achieve “public health interventions that successfully change attitudes” and the power of the state is harnessed to achieve that action, we have an effective tyranny.

The masses are no longer undeserving poor in need of “guidance” and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation is a well meaning anachronism.

Yet omnipotent moral busybodies remain the most dangerous of potential tyrants because, as C.S Lewis pointed out, you torment us with the “approval of your own conscience”.

Shatterface @5, seconded (or, sheconded).

They feel that they are at a time in their life when cutting loose and drinking a bit too much is normal, and assume they will settle down when they get a job or start a family.

So what might influence them to drink differently? Responsibly?

Speaking with a degree of experience here, I’d suggest that getting a job cuts down your drinking a fair bit, and that starting a family more or less rules it out altogether, for a while at least.

Moral of the story? For God’s sake, enjoy it while you can. Hangovers are even less fun when you have to get up at 7 and make breakfast for a toddler.

“and that starting a family more or less rules it out altogether, for a while at least.”

I managed to rule it back in, but you are right, the fear of a hangover when your day starts without fail at 6.30 with wiping someone else’s arse, is a powerful disincentive to overindulgence.

Restruants are also offering free bottles of wine with meals, in fact, it only falls short of forcefully giving young people an intravenous alcohol drip.

I’d be grateful for the names of any such restaurants in the Liverpool area.

Thanks!

@ 12 Jojo

“Leave me your address and I’ll come and vomit over your wall at the week-end,
your ‘so what’ suggests to me that you have not been the victim of underage and legal age binge drinkers”

Well, I HAVE been the victim of binge drinkers (i.e. I have suffered due to the actions of others, which they wouldn’t have done if sober) – although that whole think is something of an ad hom anyway. In any case, I have no problem with supermarkets selling cheap booze. When we get all shocked about people selling alchohol below price, we forget that booze is far more expensive here than it is in most countries due to tax rates.

The OP seems mainly to be talking about educating people, which is fine. You, however, appear to be against supermarkets selling affordable alcohol, which basically means that it’s ok for the affluent to drink but not the poor, and also sound like a rather sanctimonious attempt to rule the details of people’s private lives. No particularly liberal, whatever you say!

22
If you look at my original post @2, I was actually critisizing polititcians who make the ‘right’ noises about young children binge drinking but do not enact positive policies to address it.
And even if you ‘like’ being the victim of binge drinking isn’t it rather illiberal to infer that, because I don’t, then I am somehow being illiberal, or is it the ‘liberal fascism’ that sometimes occurs on this site? – I’m liberal and you’re just plain wrong.

Campaigners against ‘binge drinking’ culture would get a bit further if they didn’t endorse the current ‘recommended’ daily units which seem to me to be set ridiculously low.

Alright, if you drank, say, 5 units a day every day your liver wouldn’t thank you for it and you might pile on the pounds even if you rarely got seriously sozzled. But if I drank 5 units on a Friday and Saturday night (and I fully intend to do so tonight with my curry) that’s what, three pints of beer? Half a bottle of wine is over my limit?
And that’s too much? F**k off!

@ 23 jojo

“If you look at my original post @2, I was actually critisizing polititcians who make the ‘right’ noises about young children binge drinking but do not enact positive policies to address it.”

I know. My disagreement is on whether making alcohol prohibitively expensive is actually a positive action.

“And even if you ‘like’ being the victim of binge drinking isn’t it rather illiberal to infer that, because I don’t, then I am somehow being illiberal, or is it the ‘liberal fascism’ that sometimes occurs on this site? – I’m liberal and you’re just plain wrong.”

Firstly, I don’t like being the victim of binge drinking. Are you doing that thing where, because I’m prepared to accept the negative consequences of something, you’re pretending I actively enjoy those negative consequences?

Secondly, commenting on whether or not you are liberal does not make me illiberal. I’m really not sure what basis you had for that statement.

And no, the fact that you dislike the negative consequences of binge drinking does not make you illiberal. What makes you illiberal – at least in the context of this particular issue – is that your solution to this appears to be to use prohibitive pricing to effectively force people to choose the option you approve of in what should be a personal choice.

Say a poor person called Fred wants to buy some beers and get drunk, but he can’t because the policies you advocate have priced him out – that’s an infringement on Fred’s liberty, on his right to choose. And I don’t see why poor drinkers should be penalised for the actions of anti-social drinkers.

Alright, if you drank, say, 5 units a day every day your liver wouldn’t thank you for it and you might pile on the pounds even if you rarely got seriously sozzled. But if I drank 5 units on a Friday and Saturday night (and I fully intend to do so tonight with my curry) that’s what, three pints of beer? Half a bottle of wine is over my limit?
And that’s too much? F**k off!

Its about two pints of anything decent so if you are in a round, and have more than one friend, its downright unsociable.

No surprise the Islamist run rag “The New Statesman” hosts this.

We all know what their ‘Infidels are animals’ Muslim Editor thinks about drinking.
Allah would not approve.

And the binge drinking culture is all thanks to weak Liberal agendas that saw teens rise above adults as far as rights were concerned, that saw the Police rendered powerless by ‘don’t be too rough on people’ Lefty pussies and saw the fledgling Chav breed defended by ‘right on’ Socialists in their quest to drink all day on benefits.

Drink is not the problem.
Castrated/weak willed enforcement of the Law and Lefty sponsored (the ONLY time The Left actually cares about evil White Englanders) ‘Chav Rights’ are the problem.

@ 27 Davey Boy

Perhaps you could provide a source for the claims that a) the New Statesman’s editor thinks “infidels are animals”, and b) that teenagers have more rights than adults? Because the impression I have is that he doesn’t and they don’t.

25
Are you sure you are responding to my posts, I have not made any suggestion about how to deal with binge drinking, although I believe that it warrants attention. And do you really believe that I am unaware that legal age, affluent drinkers aren’t also a problem?
As a liberal, I am not concerned about the individual’s consumption of alcohol it’s the problem it causes to others (usually in town/city centres), drink yourselves to oblivion is my view, but don’t get into my space.

@ 29 Jojo

Well, @2 you were talking about cheap beer in supermarkets then complaining that politicians fail to take action. If you weren’t supporting laws against selling cheep booze I’m not sure what your point is on this thread. Have I misread you? If so, what action were you talking about?

30
I was replying to @3 who was asserting that kids in the 50s and 60s were basically binge drinking, I argued (and I haven’t received a counter argument) that cheap alcohol could only be obtained in clubs and it didn’t spread to other public places. I also infered that easy, cheap access to alcohol in supermarkets was one reason why kids are now obtaining alcohol. If anything, I would be more in favour of restricting licensing to sell alcohol rather than looking at the price.

http://vladtepesblog.com/?p=19405

Sunny thinks he was taken out of context (that old bullshit defence again).
You know the stuff.
Just because a devout Muslim quotes obnoxious garbage from the (never to be questioned) Quran does not mean he believes it (despite being devout and it being the unquestioned word of God!) or that the Quran is indeed full of obnoxious garbage.
Just because it looks and sounds exactly like what it is does not mean it actually is that.
Context you know.

But you only have to read ANY of his endless anti-American, Anti-British, Anti-English, anti-Israel, Muslim victimhood, ‘Islam is really a peaceful religion you know and only Nazis say otherwise’ articles in ‘TNS’ to see the truth of the man.

If the articles and speeches were reversed and said by a non-Muslim ‘liberals’ would be up in arms.
If an EDL member was in charge of such a publication and he used ‘nigger’ to describe Black people in a speech there would (RIGHTLY) be uproar.
But Mehdi Hassan just throws out the non-Muslim equivalent ‘Kuffar’ as if it is nothing.

But hey! He hates America, Republicans, the EDL and Conservatives. So he’s okay in the Left’s eyes.
Oh and he hated Bin Ladin, which is good, but seemingly mostly because (as always) he was a Muslim terrorist who mostly killed Muslims.

@ 32 Davey Boy

You said that the New Statesman’s editor made these claims and that the magazine was therefore run by Islamists. That appears to be a story about its political editor. I will check out the vid (although not now as I’m at work), but you’ve already changed your story.

@ 31 Jojo

Fair enough – although booze sold in supermarkets, however cheaply, is far more often used for home drinking, which is surely not a problem at all in terms of public order. What do you mean when you talk about restricting licensing? Do you mean the on-trade, off-trade or both?

Fair enough – although booze sold in supermarkets, however cheaply, is far more often used for home drinking, which is surely not a problem at all in terms of public order. What do you mean when you talk about restricting licensing? Do you mean the on-trade, off-trade or both?

I remember ‘restricted licensing’ in Wales and it was largely founded on religious taboos abot the Sabbath.

You do realise that all the government producing more effective ads to limit alchohol consumption would achieve is better ads by the drinks companies (unless you want to ban those…)?

Which to be fair, considering how crap most alchohol ads are nowadays, would be a positive result for my viewing pleasure (I’m at the age where TV adverts are now probably more important than alchohol consumption – horrible thing to realise). But a bit of a waste of public money I would have thought?

@ 36 Watchman

“You do realise that all the government producing more effective ads to limit alchohol consumption would achieve is better ads by the drinks companies”

You think so? Even drinks ads say “enjoy responsibly” now. Regardless of whether that actually has an effect, I imagine the adverts are more important for competing with other drink brands than encouraging people to drink more. Kinda like cigarettes.

@ 32 Davey Boy

OK, I watched your vid, and I admit that he doesn’t exactly come off well. I’d like to hear Sunny’s side of the story RE this potentially being taken out of context, but for now it looks like the guy is a chauvanist.

HOWEVER: see above RE him not actually being the editor of the magazine, and hence not running the magazine. I’m still interested in your source for teenagers having more rights than adults. Y’know, considering that they can’t vote, can’t drink, can’t smoke, can’t sign binding contracts, can’t get married without parental consent etc. etc. I think you’ve got a bit of a mountain to climb there.

@ 36 Watchman

“You do realise that all the government producing more effective ads to limit alchohol consumption would achieve is better ads by the drinks companies”

Err yeah Chaise, Watchman makes a valid point.

Before cigarette advertising was banned, fag advertisers were legally restricted on what they could put on a poster and every poster carried an obligatory health message. Advertisers could not associate fags with sport, pulling a partner or being cool. The creative people at Gallagher’s were, for once, creative and delivered the Silk Cut campaigns around pop or surrealist art.

Today we have very strange social media campaigns from the likes of Betfair. Designing a bus shelter poster for a bookie is challenging, so Betfair skipped it completely.

@ 39

Was that the point he was making? I thought he meant that anti-drinking ads would cause alcohol firms to raise their game in the hopes that people would keep drinking. I probably misread it.

Incidentally, I read that the only effect banning fag adverts had was making cigarette companies richer – the adverts weren’t leading a notable number of extra people to smoke, just making people move between brands, so when the ban came in they stopped spending millions on ads but still had, between them, roughly the same amount of income.

Of course, this was presented as being deeply ironic, but it’s not. The point of anti-smoking legislation is not actually to make cigarette companies poor.

The “truth” campaign advert makes me want to smoke myself to death because then at least I won’t have to live amongst all this gross misogyny.