Great piece Greg. I would another contributing factor here is sexism to. Many people cannot cope with Women drinking, for some reason a drunk Women is some how worst then a drunk Man.

I don't drink myself but also don't think the State should be telling me whether I can or not, or how much I can have.

Apart from the incursions into our freedom, the other aspect of politicians in this mode is that is yet another make-work project.

Once you establish that x or y is no longer socially acceptable and needs to be curbed, the next thing is to set up a department to watch over the implementation of those curbs. And to report every so often, using barely-credible and highly selective statistics, to prove they are having an effect.

It happens all the time, at every level of government. "Someone" decides that there are too many people dying on the roads, and puts together a plan to reduce speed limits on all roads. After spending profligately on study trips to Sweden, the creation and disbanding of numerous committees, massive "educational" advertising campaigns, and endless changes and adjustments to the master plan, they put up a few signs. A year later, they find an obscure statistic somewhere that proves they were right, and then move on to the next project.

Drinking. Obesity. Building regulations. Rules for open spaces and enclosed spaces. Rules for disabled access ramps. Rules for the height of guard rails at public monuments. The list, regrettably, is inexhaustible.

I know that the idea of small government is old-fashioned, and dangerously out of step with the current climate of nanny-state political correctness. But it would be really good if we could somehow stop the incoming tide. Just a little.

Incidentally, I had to laugh. Only a couple of days ago we were told, with great fanfare, that we are officially the fattest nation on earth, having overtaken the USA.

Today we find that we are now second only to Japan in longevity.

Can we now expect a campaign "eat lots, live longer?"

Nicely said Greg.

It's quite simple - if people want to drink to excess, that's their choice. Whether it's a stupid choice or not, is their call.

BInge drinking is a buzz word
we have very real problems with booze

Sure while everyone can have their nightly tipple everything is sweet,
the same can be said for heroin
the problem isnt revealed till the booze runs out [or the heroin]

Violence is mostly alcohol fueled [note much violence occurs when the pub closes[thats drug addicts casting blame ]

The average city hospital gets 35 booze deaths per day, be it from rotted orgons, or accidents in cars , or violence 85 percent of violence and 45 percent of crime has the booze ingrediant

Yet to read govt statisitcs 2400 alone died of booze as a cause of death
[even then via some method of accounting] that allows for the benefit of a few drinks turns even that low lie into a minus 2000 [who didnt die?] yet 19,000 were attributed the cause of death by smoking.

No media is going to question nor report on the matter
as they all love their drink
[how often you seen a current affairs team doing a drinking story that is negative? [its allways got some positive spin to it [read your local news paper every 2 de page is a booze add]

The money spent by the booze industry carefully in the media and politics has kep the plant [cannabis and illegal drugs as the only drug problem], but the death rate from adverse drug reaction to perscribed drugs kills 5 jumbo jets equivellent [in usa alone] each year

We need to get real on drugs [all_drugs] its a personal choice till it injures another ,
till then all drugs need to be taxed at true harm costing

,booze hasnt been paying its way [mariuanna that in qld alone raises 65 million in fines [plus many hours of jail time has taken the blame for too long [yet it cures cancer]

But at least we finally talking about booze [but its more than the binge-drinking ]
thats just an obvious symptom,

ASK why are we needing that drink or smoke?
ASK why is my habit any better than your habit?

According to Greg Barns: "alcohol is not inherently harmful in the way that cigarettes are."

Really? Both substances are poisons. Alcoholic drinks are usually manufactured in some way to ameliorate the poisonous taste and we call these concoctions spirits, wine, beer or alcopops. Tobacco just tastes foul. Nonetheless, both are addictive even though many social drinkers wouldn't dream of calling themselves alcoholics. All alcoholics started off with only a few drinks.

Cigarette smoke of course harms other people (just ask an asthmatic). However, being smashed in the face by an angry drunk is also considered harmful by most people. As for the "Nanny State" argument, give me a good reason why the state shouldn't lay off people's enjoyment of ecstasy. Especially people who only do esctasy in moderation.

You can't get away from the fact that alcohol is a lethal drug and wreaks havoc on addicts and society. Forget binge drinking, why do we need to drink this poison at all?

What appears to have been glossed over is the huge amounts of revenue raised by both alcohol and tobacco for the state, territory and Federal governments. Not to mention the manufacturers, marketers, distributors, advertisers and such.

Freedom of choice, certainly - the health issues...well another matter entirely, aren't we the so called 'Thinking Ape' and supposedly able to discern what is good or bad for us individually? To allow the government to take this away faculty is paving a pathway to social control of great magnitude.

Education, again is the key, but will governments who gain so much from the sales be willing to curtail consumption/useage at the likelihood of less revenue? Do the current monies raised by sales equal the cost to society in regards to its impact or is it simply a rule of diminishing returns already? If so, then perhaps the government needs a mandate to curtail supply of these substances into society.

In the NT we have seen the control measures taken in remote communities fail in the majority, as the abusers of substances - legal or illicit, simply move location and now fill the streets and surrounds of Darwin, Katherine and Tennant Creek, creating a more concentrated problem in these locales. Prohibition simply has not worked, but created problems in another location.