Idiots and alcohol

[dktd]

Illegalising stuff is not the way to go - look how successful anti-tabacco laws have been without illegalising it, much more enlightened. And now, in Australia, you can't even have fancy packaging.

Also, look at Portugal, how they've dealt with drugs, where it's a civil crime instead of a criminal crime - http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1893946,00.html

Driving these things into illegalisation, you drive the production underground, and make the open discussion about treatment quieter than it should ever be. As for drinking, I think it's a symptom of culture, and its not the individuals to be necessarily blame, they're a product of a boozy culture, where being educated about these things is sneered at, etc. It's all education. John Lydon had a point, even if he does go a bit 'Uncle Johnny' -
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xj5R5o-yhcc

 

[Andrew_Culture]

A side of Lydon that shows his brightness, and he didn't take the perhaps easy route some debaters do of claiming personal experience through loss, and deciding it empowers the wider choice that should be enforced upon everyone. Let's not forget Lydon's best friend's (very public) death was as a result of drug use. If you've seen Julian's Temple's film 'the Filth and the Fury' you'll know how emotive Lydon's description of that episode is.

 

[CopperCyclist]

Totally, I think (probably like a lot of people do) of gentle creative types when it comes to soft drug users, and I know that as with anything putting the criminals in charge (by making soft drugs illegal) they get horribly altered for profit and become something very negative. In the case of weed the fact it's now so damn strong would certainly induce paranoia and general mental hell.

I'm not saying drug use or drinking is either good or bad, but the current controls appear to exacerbate the issue and the folk who get it in the neck are the poor buggers trying to police it all. I say this with the greatest of respect for the police.

It's ok, to be fair you had a point to a degree - on a Friday/Saturday night we certainly get less problems (note 'less' not 'none' though!) from the groups that hang around certain areas of the city centre smoking weed than we do from the groups that get out of their face on alcohol. However, I felt it necessary to make the point that there ARE downsides to cannabis use, which can be pretty major - the same can of course be said for any drug.

When I went to University, more than a few of my friends used cannabis. More than a few of my friends regularly got pissed too. As far as I know, none of them (from both groups) either got into any issues from either habit, which probably says more about my friends than the habit.

If the wrong person drinks too much - bad things happen. If the wrong person smokes too much - bad things happen.

It may surprise you to know that my stance on drugs would actually be to legalise absolutely everything, shove the health warnings on, and tax it, combined with coming down more heavily on misuse - have 'but my client was on drugs/drunk at the time' be an aggravating factor rather than mitigation.

 

[ColinJ]

What are manacles for if not these 'people'?

I'm not sure that chaining them to the beds is the way to go!

 

[swee'pea99]

If the wrong person drinks too much - bad things happen. If the wrong person smokes too much - bad things happen.

That's true. But despite your experience - which I in no way denigrate or undervalue - my experience (speaking as a lifelong abuser of both, who's hung around with similar for 30 years)suggests one major difference: those who smoke too much tend (not without exception, but overwhelmingly 'tend') to damage themselves; it's the drinkers who fill the A&E wards every weekend with other people - victims of everything from glassings to road 'accidents'.

From the point of view of damage to the user, of course, there's absolutely no question that alcohol (along with its close companion tobacco) is far & away more damaging. The jury is out on links between marijuana and serious disease (and this despite 50 years of the best efforts of some very monied interests with a definite agenda to find some), but there's no question that both alcohol and tobacco are responsible for a truly horrible catalogue of early mortality: everything from heart disease to diabetes to cancer.

Unfortunately, drunkenness is seriously rooted in the British culture, and once there, it's very hard to shift. Some other places are worse - many Russians, for just one obvious example, think nothing of breakfasting on vodka - but we're pretty bad, and likely to remain so. It might help if the political parties weren't so reliant on brewers and distillers for a good chunk of their income, but probably not that much, in truth.

 

[asterix]

I'm not sure that chaining them to the beds is the way to go!

Eh? Where do beds come into it? I thought just above the low water mark would do. That would teach 'em to drink too much.

 

[Night Train]

As for drinking, I think it's a symptom of culture, and its not the individuals to be necessarily blame, they're a product of a boozy culture,

Personally, and this is my own unsubstantiated opinion, I think that a person who causes problems (not all do) following excessive consumption of drink and/or drugs is entirely to blame for their actions.
They may be 'acting under the influence' towards the end of the event but it was their own choice to begin and continue the binge.

I don't think society or culture encourages, and so is the cause, of the problems, rather the problems caused by the increasing numbers of individuals have become a 'social/cultural norm' that is not dealt with strongly enough.

 

[Andrew_Culture]

It's nice to hear some really balanced discussions.

 

[jefmcg]

I wonder if being blind drunk makes him seem funny?

I know it's all getting pretty serious here, but my first thought as I read the first post was "I wonder how drunk I'd have to be to sit through Michael McIntyre?"

 

[dellzeqq]

Am I being too much of a puritan for expecting fellow Britons to exercise just a smigeon of resatraint when it comes to alcohol consumption, maintainance of basic behaviour when out with friends and the ability to see reason? Thoughts welcomed.

to a degree. By which I mean this....

People go to events, whether they be football matches, the opera, films, Michael McIntyre gigs for a variety of reasons. Some go because they want to let off a bit of steam. Others go because they want to be moved or amused. Others go to be with the person or people they're with and enjoy their company. It doesn't matter whether you paid to go and have certain expectations of your night out - they paid as well. So..............there's got to be a kind of consensus.

I've never gone to see Mr. McIntyre, and I never will, but I have been to both the Brixton Academy and the Hackney Empire and the only disappointment I've experienced is at a Dandy Warhols cocnert where the audience just sat in their seats and applauded politely - I'm afraid I got so bored I walked out. My point is that if I go to a gig I expect to be excited and for the audience to be excited and involved.

'Comedy' (which I despise) is an odd one, because it's making its way from the confines of clubs to big sit-down halls, and that's a bit of a problem because the consensus for the first doesn't hold for the second. It's a bit like adolescence - prone to stumbles and misunderstandings. While I quite appreciate that thirty five quid is a shed-load of dough, it doesn't buy you a one to one experience.

As for the Holiday Inn..........I'm afraid that I kind of think you might be a bit out on a limb there too. That's what happens at Holiday Inns. That's why old people like me don't go there.

 

[dktd]

Personally, and this is my own unsubstantiated opinion, I think that a person who causes problems (not all do) following excessive consumption of drink and/or drugs is entirely to blame for their actions.
They may be 'acting under the influence' towards the end of the event but it was their own choice to begin and continue the binge.

I don't think society or culture encourages, and so is the cause, of the problems, rather the problems caused by the increasing numbers of individuals have become a 'social/cultural norm' that is not dealt with strongly enough.

Well, yes, I do take back that not putting responsibility on the individuals shoulders is wrong - I don't think I was completely thinking about what I said in that line. Yet, to blame the individual as only responsible for that problem is wrong - we are results of both nature and nurture; how our nature tends to come out is at least massively influenced by our nurture. Monkey see, monkey do. To clamp down on individual actions tends to do little in the long run; to change the culture tends to do much more.

 

[Night Train]

Well, yes, I do take back that not putting responsibility on the individuals shoulders is wrong - I don't think I was completely thinking about what I said in that line. Yet, to blame the individual as only responsible for that problem is wrong - we are results of both nature and nurture; how our nature tends to come out is at least massively influenced by our nurture. Monkey see, monkey do. To clamp down on individual actions tends to do little in the long run; to change the culture tends to do much more.

I wasn't picking on your post in particular, just using the sentence I quoted as a view to respond to, but yes, there is more to it all overall.

I see it a bit like soaps on TV.
They claim to represent real life but real life also reflects the soaps. It becomes a sort of 'negative' positive feedback loop.

It is difficult to change dealing with it only as a social/cultural thing or only a personal thing.
The loop needs to be broken much like the way drink driving is seen by most people nowadays.

 

[perplexed]

I've never gone to see Mr. McIntyre, and I never will, but I have been to both the Brixton Academy and the Hackney Empire and the only disappointment I've experienced is at a Dandy Warhols cocnert where the audience just sat in their seats and applauded politely.

Da mind boggles!

 

[MrJamie]

Totally, I think (probably like a lot of people do) of gentle creative types when it comes to soft drug users, and I know that as with anything putting the criminals in charge (by making soft drugs illegal) they get horribly altered for profit and become something very negative. In the case of weed the fact it's now so damn strong would certainly induce paranoia and general mental hell.

I'm not saying drug use or drinking is either good or bad, but the current controls appear to exacerbate the issue and the folk who get it in the neck are the poor buggers trying to police it all. I say this with the greatest of respect for the police.

I think there's a bit of a problem with cannabis being considered common and safer than harder drugs, especially as like you say it seems to be getting stronger and stronger and from my limited recent experience less enjoyable. As a teen people would smoke it all night at a party at various levels of intoxication, but now it seems to transform a lively social gathering into a room of vacant silent corpses in about 15 minutes. I've also known quite a few stoners to smoke and drive - thinking about it all the car owning ones did so regularly, one of whom even used to roll up on the steering wheel on the motorway and traffic queues

 

[Andrew_Culture]

To quote a biker friend of mine - ' when I was a lad it was the drugs that were safe and the cars that were dangerous'