Neo-puritan young people are a threat to freedom and democracy -

I am an optimist. Tomorrow, in aggregate at least, will be better than yesterday. Our knowledge grows, technology improves lives and, given a fair chance, free markets raise further thousands from abject, life-shortening and painful poverty. But I am just a little bit worried as I peer into my scratched, dull and flickering crystal ball.

Pew found that 40% of respondents ages 18-34 said they agreed that offensive statements could be outlawed.

The over-65 generation does not accurately represent our country, because they are overwhelmingly white and actually vote. So, unfortunately, we're going to have to bar them from voting.

Millennial support for populist and authoritarian candidates conforms to several recent studies showing widespread youth disaffection with the whole idea of democracy. Only about 30% of Americans born in the 1980s think it’s “essential” to live in a democracy.

These are just three examples from a host - from support for bans on drinking through fat shaming to turning genuine concerns about harassment into witch hunts led by a frothing media mob. Everywhere I look I see attacks on the fundamentals of what I see as liberal democracy. It's not merely that young people - like just about every past generation - start off foolishly believing there's a better way to improve our world than freedom and choice but that they've gone beyond this to embrace a neo-puritanism that is anti-freedom, anti-democracy and definitely anti-choice.

And my worry isn't just that I don't agree with this neo-puritan authoritarianism - whether it's the young Austrians and Germans voting for the populist Right or British and American youth embracing the left-wing equivalent. Or for that matter "centrists" wanting to limit democracy because they don't like its results. No, my worry is that democracy and liberty will be restricted by governments seeking to pander to this neo-puritanism - an ever wider definition of "hate speech", classing any heterodox behaviour or belief as anti-social, banning of books and videos, all mixed in with cults of health and the idea of the 'good person'.

This anti-liberty, anti-choice new-puritan doctrine will be used by governments to stifle debate on-line, to close down challenging (and sometimes inaccurate) platforms or websites as 'fake news', and to police private behaviour to a degree never seen before. Each of these attacks on choice and freedom will be presented as protective of young people (allowing them to grow without fear of witnessing such unpleasantries). And, as we''ve seen with the response to Jo Johnson suggesting universities should promote free speech and open debate, many authorities with smile benignly as the mob screeches and screams at the few brave enough to challenge the right-thinking of neo-puritan youth.

If there is one thing people who believe in liberty and choice should do in 2018, it is to speak out - again and again - against these affronts to the core values of our society. For all our talk of "British Values", we seem very coy at saying that free speech, free assembly and democratic choice are right at the very heart of those values. Nor should we allow these neo-puritans to indulge their cult of health, to let them tell us that somehow we are not responsible for our own bodies and that the NHS is somehow greater and more important than our rights.

This isn't a resolution - I've been challenging the attacks on liberty for some while - but, as they extend their reach, we need to make more effort to say that freedom and democracy cannot be sacrificed on the altar of youthful insecurity, disappointment or distaste. They are too damned important for that.

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In which alcohol researchers discover something called a "party" - and want it stopped

Intrepid Alcohol Researcher learn about the Party

John Holmes the neo-puritan who runs the Alcohol Research Group at the University of Sheffield has stepped away from his usual reliance on using computer modelling as his source or evidence to look at actual human behaviour. And our intrepid researcher approaches this study with the arrogance of a 1950s social anthropologist describing the marriage practice of some previously unknown jungle tribe.

However, we also see occasions that are commonplace but attract less attention from policy makers and public health advocates. For example, 14% of drinking occasions involved domestic gatherings of family and friends, perhaps at house parties and dinner parties or to watch the football. On average people drank the equivalent of a bottle of wine or four pints of beer on these occasions and, in many cases, they consumed more than this. Yet such occasions are rarely discussed when identifying the kinds of drinking problems that need to be tackled.

The discovery that people have parties must have been pretty shocking really. Who knew? And what a delightfully neo-puritan statement concludes Holmes' discovery of the party - "...identifying the kinds of drinking problems that need to be tackled". You and your friends and family chilling round a barbeque (assuming we actually get some sunshine), celebrating a new job or maybe just getting together to share a drink and have a laugh - these events, my friends, are "drinking problems that need to be tackled".

Holmes goes on to fret a little more. You see the neo-puritan fussbuckets at Sheffield have been the main advocates of minimum unit pricing as a means of stopping people (in particular poor people) from drinking. This advocacy was almost entirely based on the torturing of Holmes' computer model plus some very creative interpretations of price elasticity. At no point did the Sheffield researchers ever consider actual drinking behaviour by real people. And now, having seen how real people consume alcohol, the conclusion is that something else must be done to stop all this partying, pleasure and drunkenness:

Introducing a minimum price for alcohol and providing drinking guidelines for those deemed lower risk might reduce habitual alcohol consumption, but these policies might do less to tackle heavy drinking where getting intoxicated and letting the hair down is the main motivation and where the location, company and timing are all conducive to sidelining concerns about price and long-term health.

You see the problem don't you. When we get in a few bottles, cook up a big chilli and invite folk round to celebrate a new job, a big win or a graduation, we're not thinking about our health or how much all that lovely booze is costing. We're just planning on having a damned good night and waking up in the morning with a hangover. This is, of course, exactly how parties work - unless of course, you're working in an Alcohol Research Group where, presumably, celebrations are more muted featuring only tap water and decaffeinated coffee.

The sad thing is that, now these researchers have discovered that people like to have a drink at parties, they'll be working overtime to develop 'strategies' intended to stop this happening. We'll get the usual finger wagging fussbucketry - ad bans, turgid lectures about drink, more licensing restrictions - and to this will be added new wheezes like limiting how much booze you can buy at a time. Of course what these neo-puritans actually want is prohibition and they plan on introducing it by stealth.

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