109 / Is there anything we can do about alcohol-fuelled violence?
In this weekend's paper (SMH) Hugh Mackay makes some suggestions as to what to do about alcohol-fuelled violence, like increasing the price of alcohol after midnight, raising the drinking age or closing bars at 2 am.
None of them would make a difference. With each suggestion the problem of excessive alcohol consumption would be moved along into a different area. Only one issue will stop alcohol-fuelled violence: The culture of 'alcohol-consumption-to-the-max' for fun, as a rite of passage or a social lubricant has to be dealt with. And there is only one single measure that will be successful: Drunkenness in public must become illegal.
It is illegal to be drunk when you drive, the limit is 0.05% - if the limit for alcohol levels in the blood in public was 0.1% or there-abouts, the problem could be addressed before violence erupts.
It is an accepted social activity, one goes out 'to drink'. Often going drinking will end in too much alcohol, which will end in violence - which then results in injury, hospital, morgue and jail. But going out for a drink is not the problem - drinking alcohol, and drinking too much of it, is. Our drinking culture needs to be changed, it's a no-brainer. And the very first step is to make being drunk in public illegal. Pubs and bars will have breathalisers - and if you still get caught drunk in the street, you'll be stopped, charged, fined and - if that's not enough - locked up. The alternative is street violence.