h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Traveller in Time on top
" 'prosit', 'skobva' Hail Bacchus. "

I live on a street between the bars and the student housing in a University town. Wednesday nights you can get a 12 oz. beer for 25 cents. Most of the students drink from a thirty pack ($9.62 at Walmart) at home and then head to the pubs after. The noise and DESTRUCTIVE attitudes of the male students on their way home is terrible but the cops would rather have them walk than drive. BTW, cheap American beer resembles British beeer in that they are both liquids - that is the only similarity.

As wrong as it sounds, I'm an under age social drinker. I don't say this to 'big myself up' or sounds 'hard'. I'm just stating a fact. My parents have a lot more trust in me because I know when enough is enough. I hate idiots who drink just for the sake of drinking because the fact is usually it's all just going to come back up and go over them.

I personally put it down to the fact the easily access to spirits these days. A bottle of vodka for 5.75 in a corner shop and bob's your uncle you have some little prat sat on a street corner mouthing off. If you went into a bar or a pub how many people do you see necking back vodka? No, instead you see the majority of people sat down chatting.

That's my 50 pence anyway.

Hmm .. I think there's a fair amount of younger people like yourself out there. My old boss at the pub I worked in always said it was worth the risk of getting caught serving underagers because a lot of them had left school at 16, and so if they could hold a job down, then they should be allowed a drink on the weekend. ( Alan!!)

We also noticed that these kids learned how to act in a pub situation because they realised that they were being allowed to get away with it, and so never took the mickey..

I have also always took the line with my kids that they're not allowed spirits untill they're 18, but they're more than welcome to join me in a glass or two of half-decent red wine, or a pint of (good quality) beer or lager, no alcopops allowed either. They are now learning to tell the good stuff from the bad, and my daughter (Now 17 and has only drunk herself to the "Throwing Up" stage twice, my son never has, despite having a more active social life. Which is nice!

I don't think that we have any more of a problem than we ever had, it's just that I feel that parents are not taking their responsibilities seriously enough (for whatever reason) as kids should learn how to drink properly from somewhere..
Sorry about the rant...

Having visited a few cultures and their drinking habits I'd have to say that everywhere has a binge drinking problem, just in vastly varying degrees. Steve K, I must say the first time I visited Dallas a few decades ago I walked around with my jaw scrapping the floor most of the time. Drive-throughs that ask if you want plastic cups and ice with your bottle of whiskey? Restaurants that are *dry* on one side of the street and *wet* on the other, because of different counties? Tennesee was a bit of an eye opener as well. *Dry* or *Damp* counties that compensate by having unlimited firework access? btw, *Damp* means low alcohol content beer, wine and coolers (alcopop).

The first time I visited Britain I enjoyed the social atmosphere of a local, but there were wild drinkers even then (the 70's). I think the gap of 15 years before I visited again with the subsequent abundance of alcopop and foreign beers with a higher alcohol content may have increased the yahoos, but it may have been social pressure as well. The second time there were people sleeping in doorways where as the first they were invisible if just not there. A few years ago the problems seemed to have doubled.

The contintent changed over the same period with the only possible exception being Norway, where the drunks seemed to all come from Finland. (My apology to the Finns but I think they may take that statement as a kind of odd compliment.) France had it's problems, although admittedly small. Germany has it's beer gardens and October. Switzerland seems to have paid the problem away. The poor parts of most other countries (notably Italy) all have their problems.s

I come now to my country, Canada or more specifically my province, British Columbia. It has only gone through a few centuries of drinking but it has gone through the same problems other countries have experienced. When I first was able to go to a pub for a beer legally there were two entrances, one for the workers (men) and one that led to a raised platform for Gentlemen and Ladies. Every establishment had to be part of a hotel so at least there was the excuse of a possibility to sleep it off. Beer was served in 12 ounce glasses with a plimsol line and was often ordered by the table (filling the 2 foot diameter pedestal table which was invariably covered with elasticised red terry towel). Food was popcorn, pickled eggs, pickles and a bizarre warm sandwich called a *Cubanette*. This was a place for loggers, fishermen, construction workers, miners and ironworkers. There was no television, music was rare, live music even rarer. It was a place to get drunk. *Lounges* were places to meet (usually clandestinely) for liquor. They were so dark it took a few minutes to find a chair. Both opened at noon and shut down at 11:00 pm and were closed on Sunday.
Today we have pubs, many of which serve very good food and real ale. There comfortable clubs and sports bars, live music venues, a wide variety of food and drink and widely expanded open hours.

My point is this, both those eras had violence and binge drinking so is regulation and restriction effective or is it a social and economic?

Zoomer, I'd say it's a social problem. America tried prohibition for a while, and the result was that alcohol consumption skyrocketed. It was only when the stuff became on longer a forbidden fruit that people started drinking less. In recent times, there have been similar experiences with marijuana.

The way to stop binge drinking and its resultant evil behaviour is to give kids an honest education about it. At present, they are pretty much told "Don't go near alcohol, it's terrible!" However, they see adults drinking it all the time, and so figure that the teachers are lying to them. It is also, in their view, an act of rebellion against the repressive, stultifying laws passed by adults to prevent kids from having any fun at all.

So what we should do is get some people who know all about alcoohl to teach kids just what it does to your body, the health risks involved, the nasty stuff it makes you do, as well as just how much is safe and enjoyable.

On an unrelated note, WTF is up with alcopops? Even regular drinkers despise them, so why do they sell?

I think coolers and cider and alcopops are an easy *entry level* drink for immature drinkers. In my youth the equivalent was Gilby's *Lemon Gin*, a horrible concoction that was referred to by those *in the know* as *panty (knicker) remover*.

There is also seems to be the odd perception that drinking 10 alcopops at 5% alcohol is somehow *better* than drinking 2 drinks at 40%.

This is all down to education and acceptance/understanding of that education, for as long as I can remember I had wine with Sunday dinner and often sherry before dinner if we had guests. I used to have mine in a stainless steel egg cup as my parents didn't allow me to use the wedding present cut glass! I'm now in my thirties and certainly don't have a drink problem although there are about 10 times in my life when I've drunk so much I was sick.

My youngest sister on the otherhand who is eleven years younger than me always refused any offer of alcoholic drinks at home. From the age of about 14 or so she was regularly carrying a half bottle of vodka in her bag, she even got sent home drunk from school once. I think she's an alcoholic and the sooner she herself realises this the better it will be.

Broadly speaking my sister and I had the same alcohlic education but she chose to ignore the advice and good example set. Of course it is also likely that she is pre-disposed to being an alcoholic but that's another issue...

I have only ever drunk myself to vomiting point once though that was later proved to be down to an extremly shoddy curry I had had before going out and left me with food poisioning for a couple of days later. Wasn't pretty.

But really in response to the alcopops question it's because they have a sweet taste, don't get you drunk till you've threw twelve down your neck and are resonably cheap compared to a pint. It's the same with cider (or at least the White Lightning brand). It's that a light a taste and that cheap a product that people just throw it down their necks.

You even get this problem to some extent with lagers like Stella and Carlsberg. People tend too disagree with me on this one though and say they are only light compared to what I drink (Guiness and Brown Ale).