War on alcohol threatens individual freedom

Wednesday August 13, 2008

Suzy Dean urges people to stand up against the gradual criminalisation of an entire generation

With the summer holidays in full swing, the government’s attention has predictably turned to teenage drinking. Following a ‘successful’ pilot in West Lothian where a ban on selling alcohol to under 21’s at the weekends was implemented, the ‘Changing Scotland’s Relationship with Alcohol’ consultation paper suggested that a blanket ban on selling any alcohol to under 21’s become law across Scotland.

Moreover, it recommends that alcohol should be sold at a separate counter in supermarkets, like tobacco, to remind young people in particular that alcohol is different from other shopping products. As if they didn’t know.

Far from trying to promote a continental style ‘cafe culture’ as planned when the introduction of late licensing laws for pubs and bars was introduced, it seems that the UK’s political elite would rather try to control who can drink, how much and where, particularly when it comes to teenage drinking.

Disproportionate

It is hard to see how anybody can learn to drink responsibly if they are stopped from drinking. Policy is increasingly geared, naively, towards trying to discourage young people from drinking at all rather than encouraging police to deal with silly behaviour with discretion. The proposal to ban alcohol sales to under 21’s in Scotland follows a number of earlier disproportionate measures.

In several Cambridgeshire communities, plain-clothed officers have been given the task of seizing alcohol from under 18’s. And in Newcastle-Under-Lyme, police have been given powers to ‘dip-stick test’ young people’s soft drinks for alcohol. Leaving aside the consideration that police should have better things to be getting on with, it seems odd that what has traditionally been a sort of rite of passage for teenagers is now being so heavily policed. These proposals and policies mistakenly assume that holding your drink comes with age rather than experience.

The need to protect people’s health is an oft-cited argument for stopping young people from drinking. However, drinking policy seems vastly out of proportion to the impact that alcohol misuse has on individuals’ health. Last month the NHS Information Centre carried out a survey which revealed that not only is the rate of drug-taking, smoking and drinking amongst 11-15 year-olds falling, but the number of kids that have never tasted an alcoholic drink has risen from 39% in 2003 to 46% in 2007. Furthermore, yearly alcohol-related deaths stood at around 8,380 in 2004, a tiny number in proportion to UK population of nearly 60 million.

Concern

The key reason for the authorities’ concern over young people’s alcohol intake is the tendency to link drinking to anti-social behaviour. As one sergeant policing under-18s white lightening consumption in Cambridge commented, “We want to send a clear message that it is not acceptable for underage teens to be drinking and causing disorder in public areas” (1).

Similarly, in Newcastle-under-Lyme a local councillor commented that the council hopes the dipping tests on teenagers’ drinks will lead to a ‘trouble free summer’ (2). The idea of alcohol leading to anti-social rather than a pro-social behaviour is assumed without contention as the government increasingly regulates public space, demonising those young people that choose to drink, regardless of their behaviour.

The focus on teenage drinking has not only problematised growing up but damaged the authority of adults. Moving on from simply branding parents feckless for letting their teenagers have a drink, the government have started to actively punish them. Cambridgeshire police have already given out five penalties to parents for ‘supplying’ their kids with alcohol, making children of parents (as well as of teenagers).

Indeed, recently, a ban on happy hours in pubs was recommended by an independent review that sought to investigate the link between ‘price promotion and alcohol abuse’ (3) – the emphasis of course being on the inability of people, in this case adults, to control themselves while under the influence.

Problem

The view that the public has an alcohol problem is primarily one held by the government, rather than the public at large. While teenagers spend their summer experimenting – a necessary part of growing up – and adults, as they always have done, respond as they see fit, the government increasingly enforces its version of the ‘correct’ way to deal with a largely harmless, and ultimately banal social phenomenon – drinking.

As with lecturing adults on how much they should drink, measures to stop young people drinking are going to be painfully ineffective – indeed possibly even more so, if accounts of today’s wreckless, amoral ‘yoof’ youngsters are to be believed. Anti-drinking measures are today a symbol of government impotence rather than a nation of hedonists. With no sense of who the public are or how to connect with them in any meaningful way, they try to manage the trivial, everyday decisions.

While government interference of this sort is not often rebuked (and is indeed welcomed, on occasion), it is important that we make a stand against what is the gradual criminalisation of an entire generation, which effectively denies young people the space and freedom to experiment – a major part of growing-up and becoming an independent adult.

(1) BBC News
(2) BBC News
(3) MSN News

Suzy Dean is a writer and journalist and co-organiser of the Manifesto Club

Link
Manifesto Club

Event
The Manifesto Club will be hosting a provocation picnic ‘Against Booze Bans’ on August 25, 2008. The picnic will begin at 15.00, behind the speakers corner cafe. All are welcome, please bring your own picnic and of course, booze. There is a dedicated Facebook group which you can join HERE.