shuggy's blog
"We've the best whisky!
We've the best Bucky!
We are the best wee country in the world..."
As YouScotland had it.
You think that's bad? Canada ranks 19th in the world for beer consumption (don't know about alcohol consumption as a whole, mind you), which should be a cause for national embarrassment.
I hope you had your tongue firmly in your cheek when writing this. The logistics of how to make this work need looking at but there is no doubt that Scotland has a BIG problem with alcohol.
Forget drugs - as far as we are concerned this is about the biggest societal problem there is.
Like you, I enjoy a pint or three from time to time, so I am no teetotaller, but booze in Scotland is well beyond a joke. The level of violence, crassness and just plain bad behaviour down to booze is appalling.
Most weekend nights down my road pissed up idiots come staggering howling like Beelzebub, screaming, swearing fighting and frightening my wee boy in his bed.
Pools of vomit, broken bottles and blood are common and it simply isn't safe in large parts of town on a Friday night. Its not as if these are happy drunks. Look at them the wriong way and you are likely to get glassed.
Booze i used an excuse by every l;ittel twat with a chip on his or her shoudler _ "I didn't mean it","I was drunk", "we were just having a laugh", blah, blah, blah.
There is far too much fuss made of booze in Scotland, a juvenile attitude that drinking is what the grown ups do and a huge amount of social pressure to conform.
I know you are joking, but losers sitting in parks knocking back bottle of Bucky just isn't funny . Its tragic.
Scotland has a big issue with booze and any attempt to try and address it gets my vote.
"The level of violence, crassness and just plain bad behaviour down to booze is appalling."
Then presumably it is even worse in countries that consume more than us?
Except that it isn't, because booze isn't the problem.
I hope you had your tongue firmly in your cheek when writing this.
Oh for goodness sake! I live in Glasgow - what do you think? But see the comment below yours - booze is not the problem. Is there any town or city in Germany that looks like Glasgow on a Saturday night? No there isn't - so try again.
I think a few Scandinavian countries plus Finland (do they count as Scandinavian?)have a bigger booze problem than us and they are taking some pretty draconian steps to deal with it too.
The part that scares me is that although heavy drinking has always been a part of the culture it seems now to have gone totally over the top.
It is part of a wider move towards a culture that sees being totally without restraints as somehow more authentic.
One guy I worked with said he went "a bit mad" at weekends after the end of the working week - him having been tied to the nine to five routine etc. But having known him well for 2 years he behaved completely without inhibition at all times anyway. The only differrence at the weekend was that he was more likely to throw up or punch someone.
There is an element in our culture that seeks to remain forever a child and that includes constantly being "mad for it" "up for it " (AKA Drink lots, throw up, act silly, pass out).
This all sounds incredibly arsey, but I am just sick to the back teeth of drunken pricks pretending that their nasty behaviour is part and parcel of a good time.
So,the problem with you scots is not the price of drink but rather something more existential?
This all sounds incredibly arsey, but I am just sick to the back teeth of drunken pricks pretending that their nasty behaviour is part and parcel of a good time.
So am I. If I'd written a serious post I would have talked about how the issue is not one of alcohol consumption per se but one of public order. There's a limit to what one can achieve through increases in prices because the demand for booze is relatively inelastic.
So,the problem with you scots is not the price of drink but rather something more existential?
Absolutely. Compare the price of alcohol in France, Spain, Italy, Greece - I would have thought this goes without saying.
Thank God for the Mail on Sunday.
"The results showed that people with slow reactions were 2.6 times more likely to die prematurely from any cause. Smoking was the only factor linked to a larger risk of death – as it made it 3.03 times more likely.
Physical exercise, blood pressure, heart rate, waist-hip ratio, alcohol consumption and body-mass index all had a lesser effect."
So, avoid the cancer sticks and you can enjoy a drink, and survive being a fatso, as long as you've got good reaction times. Excellent news.
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