Friday 18 November 2011

Can you see what it is yet, CAMRA?

Clicking should bring forth the engraved Puritanism on this grave to free choice.

The picture is not outside some church somewhere, nor is it, unfortunately, the Tomb of the Puritan. It is an old water fountain in a public park in Aberdeen. Maybe I'm fussy, but when I approach a water fountain I expect to get a drink of water, not a lecture on the evils of booze. This thing wasn't even within sight of a pub when it was installed although now there is a new bar right next to it. Some sports club or other.

It no longer works anyway. With wonderful irony, the only way to get any kind of drink in this park is now in the bar. The fountain that provides the only drink life needs no longer provides it. If ever I become wealthy, I will buy this thing, install it in my garden and run malt whisky through it. The wording will still be appropriate.

That is, of course, if it is still there on that future day when I have three pennies to rub together. Under EU law, the claims chiselled into its surface are now illegal.

Instead it could be put to use dispensing booze to help the poor nine out of ten people in the UK who can't manage a drink a day. Dick Puddlecote points out that the Boozophobes are following the Smokophobes' template exactly, and this article in the Daily Ooomissus shows it in action again.

One in 10 Britons admit they can't go a day without a drink - more than double the international average, a new survey has revealed.

Admit. Can't. These words imply that one-tenth of the country are blotto within moments of waking up in the morning and they cannot stop. They don't like it and want to stop. Here comes addiction. The truth, naturally, is that this figure includes all those who might have a sherry at teatime, or who might like to finish the day with a wee nip of whisky before bed. Even with all those included, ninety percent of the people in this country do not drink alcohol every day and yet there is a big problem that requires... money.

'Whether that is due to the lack of awareness about the effects that alcohol can have - or whether we are simply in denial - there is clearly more work to be done to raise awareness of the associated risks and the real impact it can have on lives.' 

Yes, all those drinkers are in denial about the health risks and more funding is needed to slap them down. Sounding at all familair yet? How about this part -

'It's not about total abstinence, but it is about drinking responsibly and being aware of the effects that heavy drinking can have.' 

No, it;s not about a total ban. Just as the push for all those smokefree spaces was never about a ban, and when it became a ban there was no question of extending it to outdoors, and when that happened there was no question of extending it toprivate property, and when that happens in cars there will be no question of extending it into the home...

The same justifications are being tried. Here's a tip, drinkers. They didn't listen to real numbers from teh smokers and they are not listening to you. You are an addict and in denial, you see? Therefore nobody needs to listen and you must be controlled.

Our country has drank for centuries and there is evidence to say we are drinking less even in this article in10 dont drink every day. The pubs are shutting at 48 a week tax has gone up 42.3% since the budget 2008, drink is not cheaper here than in Europe, we are only second for duty behind Finland, 2008 tax take from alc 29.4bn, 2011 tax take 11.4bn cost to the nhs in those three years estimated) 4.8bn. Cant people see why ppl drink at home when you are paying £3.50 in your local or £8.60 for a double mixer then that is why. All those who think minimum price will work then look at prohibition, we have not yet had full gov intervention and already gangsters are setting up speakeasys and factories were they brew alc. Think about it logically for a second if we start drinking illict and/or homebrew the gov is not getting tax yet we are endangering our health so how is the Nhs going to be saved? Cigs in Brit & Ire are the smuggling & counterfeit capitals in Europe.

What are the publicans, those whose livelihoods have already collapsed and share prices plummeted after the smoking ban, doing about this?

They are doing a CAMRA. "Not us. It's them, get them over there. The supermarkets. Punish them."

I don't need a drink every day. In fact I haven't had one for days because I am close to finishing something and need the income, but I'll be having a few tomorrow night. What I don't want is someone telling me I can't have a drink whenever I damn well feel like it. Some people like to have a quick snifter every day and some like to take a spell off the booze and some don't drink at all and some like to chug down a bottle of vodka in an hour. What other people do is not my business, just as what I do is not theirs.

By the time all this nonsense is over, and it has failed over and over in the past, I expect Smoky-Drinkies will have reached the point where all they'll need is a sign outside.

Then we can all get back to normal until the next batch of pompous, self-important asses come to town.

15 comments:

zepp blürter said...

very awful ding - i alzo hates itz ven zie puritanks starten zeir blasting on me; und nowz i haz ze herr cameron ontop mein arsch - wize iz it he dozent notz settlen zer afghan krieg viz ein handysheik?

Anonymous said...

The monument in the pic is now used as a pisspot. Funny!

Mark Wadsworth said...

Anon beat me to it.

Woodsy42 said...

Water fountains are useless anyhow now that we know from the EU that water doesn't hydrate you.

Frank Davis said...

What does it say on the side, Leggie? It seems to be something like:

"Wine is a ....
Strong drink is ......
And .......
is deceiver ......
is not wise"

It would appear to be a quote from somewhere.

Frank Davis said...

Answered my own question.

King James Bible:

Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging: and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise.

Anonymous said...

"Thus having, as I truste, sufficiently answered the most principall arguments that are used in defence of this vile custome, it rests onely to informe you what sinnes and vanities you commit in the filthie abuse thereof.

First, are you not guiltie of sinnefull and shamefull lust? (for lust may bee as well in any of the senses as in feeling) that although you bee troubled with no disease, but in perfect health, yet can you neither be merry at an Ordinarie, nor lascivious in the Stewes, if you lacke Tobacco to provoke your appetite to any of those sorts of recreation, lusting after it as the children of Israel did in the wildernesse after Quailes?

Secondly it is, as you use or rather abuse it, a branche of the sinne of drunkennesse, which is the roote of all sinnes: for as the onely delight that drunkards take in Wine is in the strength of the taste, and the force of the fume thereof that mounts up to the braine: for no drunkards love any weake, or sweete drinke: so are not those (I meane the strong heate and the fume) the onely qualities that make Tobacco so delectable to all the lovers of it?"

- King James

http://www.laits.utexas.edu/poltheory/james/blaste/blaste.html

Well worth reading, he makes the current crop seem positively tame.


"But by the contrary, if a man smoke himselfe to death with it (and many have done) O then some other disease must beare the blame for that fault.

So doe olde harlots thanke their harlotrie for their many yeeres, that custome being healthfull (say they) ad purgandos Renes, but never have minde how many die of the Pockes in the flower of their youth.

And so doe olde drunkards thinke they prolong their dayes, by their swinelike diet, but never remember howe many die drowned in drinke before they be halfe olde.

All stirring stuff.


Rose

Anonymous said...

It does seem to have lost something in translation since 1604 though.


"this use of Tobacco, as a stinking and unsavorie Antidot, for so corrupted and execrable a Maladie, the stinking Suffumigation whereof they yet use against that disease,

making so one canker or venime to eate out another."


Rose

old buggers' bench-chat - the weekly bevvy review said...

i got completely schlonked on two cans of oranjeboom 8.5 doppio malto the other night - and, being brewed in accordance with traditional gothic purity legislation, using only water, yeast, maize and hops, it even tastes quite good...leaving one naturally inebriated without being vitiated by the skunky residual chemicals which are unavoidably imbibed when partaking of the british super-strength vintages. at only 1 quid a tin, it's a must buy, buy, buy - although, on reflection, the two (nearly the equivalent of a bottle of red-wine) probably took me a slosh over my recommended daily quota.

bottoms-up to good king james.

sit-in bull said...

07:45

that's a pissoir in polite circles...

01:11

...but good to see that zepp has joined the peaceniks and is taking a stand against the blitzkrieg on afghanistan - hopefully, at the next international, we can look forward to him peforming a supine streak on the centre-spot of wembley, decorated with a necklace remembrance wreath.

hypo-writical harrassment said...

anyone know why old holborn's attempting to big-up his blog with leftie-irritating publicity stunts and claims about how his site is the natural home of free-speech...?

...strange how all the past comments disappeared during the run-up to the last general election and didn't re-appear until about six months later - by which time he'd probably published a tittilating selection in book format and been paid-off by the politicians most peeved at being panned...

...yeah sure, you can write anything you damn well want on the old holborn lav-wall - but the other side of his schizoid coin is that, if you don't write there, he'll send the boyz 'round...

...no, obviously no-one knows who old holborn really is...except the mask and silly hat are a bit of a giveaway...

...indeed, i have it on good authority that he blogs in full costume and even wears the kit to bed...

...i suppose his missus must like that sort of thing...

...kinky stuff man (if he is one that is...)

messyspace monopoly said...

21:49

look, it's hardly a secret that commenters on blogs like guido fawkes, old holborn, and the nationals get paid for their contributions...but only if they're called 'sandra', of course...

...amazing woman, really gets around...writes just about everything on every blog and gets to keep all the loot for herself.

extra-terrestrial eavesdroppings said...

anyone know what it means if you get a missed call on your mobile from "*" (asterisk)? phone-tapping i guess...?

what's new

little miss ping-pong's little game said...

22:06

oh, yes...i know her...she said 'something' to the effect that there was something in it for me if i commented on old holborn (again)...

not likely, after she'd already ripped me off when i commented on guido fawkes (and old holborn)...and had my mobile-phone tapped, and had my computer bugged (it was basically set-up to broadcast anything i did, even before i bought it from an individual who was supposed to be a friend)...

...then tenants of rooms in my multi-occupied house were assaulted...then tenants in other rooms began monitoring all my internet activity...and then there was the constant surveillance...

vodafone dongle is easily eavesdropped said...

anyway, fuck this for a game soldiers - i can't even afford to top up my mobile broadband internet and i'm being evicted from my bedsit.

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