Wednesday 15 February 2012

Save us from the nannying fussbuckets...

The Prime Minister - tempted here to call him "nannying-fussbucket-in-chief" - has visited a hospital somewhere in the North East where he's chosen to share his wisdom with us on the matter of alcohol. We're told:

...the last decade has seen a "frightening growth" in the number of people who think it is "acceptable for people to get drunk in public in ways that wreck lives, spread fear and increase crime", many of them under the legal drinking age.

A frightening growth, Mr Cameron? Show us where it's hiding for the truth is that consumption of alcohol, alcohol-related crime or anti-social behaviour and the incidence of binge-drinking have fallen over the past ten years. Yes, folks - fallen.  And the biggest fall in consumption has been among 18-24 year-old men.

So why do the nannying fussbuckets keeping on with this "growing problem" nonsense?

The objective of course is prohibition - the "denormalisation" of drinking. This is, for the Church of Public Health, a moral crusade, the abolition of a normal pleasure for millions of people simply because these people - these nannying fussbuckets - disapprove of it.

Injury from sports and physical exercise costs the NHS more than drinking does - the hospitals are filled with people suffering from breaks and sprains, bashes and bruises. Yet no-one is calling for rugby or horse-riding to be banned or for a gym tax.

These people simply disapprove of people drinking - especially young working class men.

So I have a suggestion for Mr Cameron - next time you want to make announcements about boozing make them in a busy pub in front of real live drinkers. See how they respond!

....

2 comments:

nisakiman said...

Yes, terrible, these young people getting drunk. I mean, when we were young we never got drunk, did we!

Did we?

Are you sure?

It's all a bit hazy...

Anyway, they should follow the fine example of Cameroid's old stamping ground, that paragon of sobriety, the Bullingdon club.

Anonymous said...

Why are you in the conservative party?