Here’s to Kevin, he’s true blue...
I’m watching the highlights package of this week’s Question Time and I’m remembering the first time I became thoroughly inebriated. Sprawled on the grass, predicting the deaths of my nearest and dearest while three of my responsible, more experienced friends kept me from sustaining any permanent injuries; apparently, these were the Good Times.
My drink of choice? An alco-pop (or several), no doubt recommended and purchased by somebody else, then consumed with no warning as to its particularly potent effect upon my virgin liver. But why recall this now? Why not let it settle into the ‘Ahh! To be young again!’ sector of my mind that also fondly recalls crushes on Jonathan Taylor Thomas and Jesse Spencer?
Some old guy bought me some alcohol, we got drunk at the mall!
On television, Opposition Member Joe Hockey has just produced two bottles of alcohol; a Yellow Glen bottle of champagne and a Bacardi Breezer, the former of which ‘is the same price as an alco-pop yet has twice the alcohol and half the tax’. Rather than commenting that ‘Nobody told me this would taste like Berocca!’ as I did when first encountering a Breezer, he is using these drinks as an example that proves that the alco-pop tax is ‘just a tax grab’.
For in this week’s budget, Treasurer Wayne Swan announced an increase in alco-pop taxes; the alco-pop referring to a pre-mixed alcoholic drink, presumably for those who do not want to mix their own. According to Labor, the alco-pop is a favourite of underage drinkers and increasing the excise will reduce consumption by 43 million bottles in 2008-09 alone. This would be a considerable result and a successful one for a government that has declared war on binge-drinking.
However, the Opposition finds this increased tax to be inequitable; leader Dr Brendan Nelson has argued that it is an imposition against ‘the responsible Australians who happen to enjoy a pre-mixed Bundy and Coke or a Scotch and Dry’, while Mr Hockey believes that ‘young people’ will simply replace the alco-pop with an equally cheap but perhaps more alcoholic alternative. Implicit in all of this is the notion that Australians have a right to drink, which is of course informed by the state of our collective cultural memory and its celebrated drunken history.
We wanna have fun and we wanna get wasted!
Consider the Six O’clock Swill, David Boon’s 52 cans of beer on the plane from Sydney to London and the clever advertising that takes place mid-wicket or pre-conversion that has only recently begun to advocate responsible drinking. Consider the scepticism and suspicion we subject New Australians to if they are culturally opposed to drinking. Consider the pub crawl that took place in my hometown: a school day, Mad-Monday celebration attended by the Under-Sixteens football team, sanctioned by parents and probably known to police.
Now tell me that raising the price of alco-pops is going to make a difference to the binge-drinking culture.
If Labor had done their research correctly, they would have also increased the tax on the humble ‘young person’s’ staple of ‘goon’. If the Liberals wanted a snappier retort they could have argued that once you reach eighteen, drinking alco-pops or ‘chick drinks’ becomes socially suicidal, but binge drinking becomes a mechanism through which reputations are really earned. Moreover, if the ‘powers-that-be’ truly want to reduce rates of binge drinking and cultural dependency upon alcohol, they should investigate the complicity that exists at all levels of Australian society, where alcohol appreciation has become a pre-requisite to being considered Australian.
This night is gonna end when we’re damn well ready for it to be over
Why not create alternative sources of entertainment for young people so they do not feel the need to drink? Why not address the propensity of bartenders to continue serving drinks, until such point as a thuggish, failed-footballer Bouncer feels the need to ‘start something’? How about we add something more entertaining to George St than the legions of drinking barns that are separated only by a cinema? Could we possibly, in any way, use a tiny proportion of the billions of dollars that comprise next year’s surplus to fund alternative entertainment for young people in regional areas?
While we may be expected to drink socially, we are obligated to behave responsibly. But this is a decision that is made for us, through advertising, peer pressure and a top-down approach in which few if any other options for ‘adult’ entertainment are provided.
Note: I do not advocate underage drinking, particularly in rural towns where there’s nothing else to do; in situations where the behaviour is learned from parents and peers; after witnessing a barrage of persuasive advertising at a sporting or music event; or on pub-crawls in the presence of adults who should know better. I'm sure that Anti-Flag, Andrew W.K., Against Me! and some old guy from back in the day would agree with me too.
Affected by binge drinking yourself or know someone who is? Check out the binge drinking fact sheet on our sister site http://www.reachout.com.au/default.asp?ti=2113
How do I know this?
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/05/16/2246478.htm
www.newmatilda.com/2008/03/13/teetotallers-plight
http://au.news.yahoo.com/080515/21/16vme.html
