Alcohol and community attitudes damned

Alcohol and community attitudes toward it were questioned, and soundly criticized, by a recent letter writer to the Shepparton News, the Goulburn Valley's daily newspaper.

Alcoholic drinks 

Orhan Sheriff, a medical scientist with Goulburn Valley Health Pathology, told of the social damage he witnesses in Shepparton every week.
Ironically, while his Page eight letter carried a message we all need to imbibe it was dwarfed by a Page Nine message encouraging readers to imbibe the very product that prompted his concerns. A further full-page advertisement for alcohol appeared on two pages later.
To add to the complexity of the difficulty, Melbourne’s two national daily newspapers – The Age and The Herald Sun – each carried, on the same day, three full-page advertisements for alcohol.
Orhan experiences the outcome of our alcohol ignited behaviour, a behaviour that even when shown in the best possible light is questionable.
Interestingly, if alcohol was discovered today it would, without question or discussion, be added to our list of illicit substances as it can be shown to be far more damaging to our social infrastructure than any of the hard drugs now included.
Obviously a market exists for alcohol; however it is presented, as outlets in Shepparton are as common as the hangovers alcohol is responsible for.
That in itself is not the real issue for in our free-market world if people feel something will be successful, then they should be allowed to pursue it.
The real issue is the socialization of alcohol, the sweeping momentum from the highest echelons of our communities to you and I that makes alcohol the first resort when people are tired, stressed, troubled or simply looking for a good time.
The costs so eloquently articulated by Orhan are repeated with alarming frequency in every community destroying lives, whole families, eroding communities and dismantling our wider society.
Most claim a few drinks don’t hurt, and that is probably true, but the complexity arises when those same people appear to endorse a paradigm which sees alcohol as a medium for celebration or commiseration.

Alcohol is a depressant, removes social inhibitions, leaves society with alarming debts and fuels the abattoirs of hope.

Violence never resolves an issue, rather leaves a weeping wound

Violence has never resolved an issue, rather it has left a weeping wound that will undoubtedly flare-up again ensuring further distress.



Moamar Gaddafi

 Memories are usually worsened and enriched by time and although a return to confrontation, be it verbal, cultural or violent, may appear new, a cursory look at history will show how the past influences the present.
What had been happening in Libya was simply not decent and what is happening now with Western powers attempting to restore what they see as decency with what is an indecent act appears a contradiction.
Articulation of a workable solution is difficult, if not near-impossible, but the answer is not to be found in killing people and destroying the country’s infrastructure.
History illustrates, repeatedly, that violence will bring a brief period of calm when people, regardless of whether they be the aggressor or those being attacked, are exhausted and retreat from the fray to refresh their resources or consider their wounds.
Once that moment of calm passes, and sometimes it can be years or even decades, a cultural memory will re-ignite stories, right or wrong depending on your view, passed from generation to generation and disenchantment that sees a solution in violence will erupt.
Developed countries have always turned to violence to achieve their aims, and while that brutality is seen to be to mostly people and infrastructure, the real, and largely unseen, damage has been to the world’s finite resources and its biosphere.
What’s happening in Libya is a symptom of how many in the world resolve their difficulties today and so they mostly act with little regard for questions beyond what they can see.
Questions obviously need to be asked about Moamar Gaddafi’s appropriateness as a leader, but to simply demolish his infrastructure to remove him, if not kill him, is equally inappropriate as it simply allows another with similar qualities to fill the void and so the cycle begins again.
Revolutions need not be inculcated by force, rather, with most successful changes such an uprising needs to filter up from the bottom embracing care, compassion and kindness as it assumes control almost by osmosis.