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I hate people who use alcohol as an excuse for any kind of negative behavior, whether it's pissing in someone's closet or killing someone over sports. Here's what it boils down to:
1) People should know their own tolerance levels unless they're new to drinking.
2) Alcohol really isn't a valid excuse for violent behavior. Chances are, if you're a violent drunk, there's more to it than just "the alcohol made me kill my wife and kid, I was possessed!"
3) Drinking alcohol is a choice, always.
Basically, alcohol doesn't kill people, PEOPLE kill people. We shouldn't ban alcohol because some dbags can't drink it responsibly. And we should NEVER allow alcohol to serve as an excuse for any kind of crime or misbehavior.
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1. 6 billion dollars of tax revenue gone.
2. Probably even more than that spent on law enforcement.
3. Very likely even more death and violence than it already causes.
I can't see any positive results an alcohol ban could bring.
On June 16 2011 15:28 madcow305 wrote:
According to AlcoholAlert, there were a total of 13,846 alcohol-related traffic fatalities in 2008.
Therefore, with some simple math, each person that died due to drunk driving is worth 14,759 alcohol drinkers.
To sum this up in more layman terms, the life of each person in America is worth the freedom of 14,759 other people to enjoy and consume alcohol. In other words, the right of 14,759 people to enjoy alcoholic beverages is worth more than the life of one person.
Would an assumption that the vast majority of these deaths were the alcohol drinkers themselves be correct? I can't imagine anyone cares about drunk idiots dying from a nationwide perspective.
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On June 16 2011 15:28 madcow305 wrote:
According to AlcoholAlert, there were a total of 13,846 alcohol-related traffic fatalities in 2008.
Good sir, I agree that alcohol is a huge burden to Western society, but I have an issue with your logic.
You argue that a minority of people are victims of other people's alcohol abuse. In the case of rioters vs police and shopkeepers, the two groups (the victims and the abusers) are mutually exclusive groups. However, in the case of motor vehicle fatalities, these two groups are not mutually exclusive.
How many of the above number were vehicle-pedestrian accidents, and how many were vehicle-vehicle accidents or vehicle-object accidents? Was it the pedestrian that was inebriated or the motor vehicle operator? And who actually died?
In an accident a drunk person is more likely to die than a sober person due to decreased lung function, a higher chance of vomiting, and that vomit blocking their airways if they become unconscious. A drunk pedestrian hit by a car will have a higher chance of dying than a sober pedestrian, as will a drunk driver in an accident between two vehicles.
Yes, it would suck if you were sober and just walking along at night, and a car driven by a drunk came out of nowhere, mounted the sidewalk and killed you. However, I suspect the death toll included many drunk people who were at fault as well, and the actual number of victims that died due to other people's alcohol abuse would only be a subset of the above.
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On June 16 2011 15:28 madcow305 wrote:Please read this thread entirely before posting, since the title is ambiguous and needs clarification.I recently read the thread about the riot in Vancouver following their loss in the Stanley Cup. Many of the posters in that thread claimed it wasn't a large percentage of the population starting trouble, but rather a small minority. They claim the riot grew because many of the rioters were drunk, and the situation escalated when these inebriated individuals, losing their sense of judgment, joined in on the rioting. This lead me to think about an issue where it's the lives or livelihood of a few weighed against the enjoyment of the many. The few, in this case, would be the officers and shop owners in downtown Vancouver at the moment. The cops are having to risk injury and possibly death in order to disperse the crowd, and the shop owners out there are going to have a bunch of smashed windows and vandalized property to clean up. The many, in this case, would be the population of Vancouver that consumes alcohol. If alcohol was illegal, less of them would be drunk, and they would be less likely to participate in the riot and vandalize stuff. So, how does our society weigh the benefits of the many vs the few? Well, one example would be to look at drunk driving. Every year, thousands of people lose their lives because of alcohol-related automobile accidents. These accidents would be less likely to occur if alcohol was an illegal substance, because less people would have access to it in large quantities. And yet, Americans tried banning alcohol in the 1920's, and Prohibition was eventually revoked because of wide-spread disregard for the law. So, this brings me to the point mentioned in the title of this thread: the American people, by having alcohol legal today, are essentially placing a price on our own heads. We are weighing the lives of the few (those that die to drunk drivers), against the enjoyment of the many (everybody that goes out to drink on a Friday night after work). So how does it stack up? Well, America currently has a population of 307,006,550 in 2009, according to the Census Bureau. According to Gallup, 67% of Americans drank alcohol in 2008. According to AlcoholAlert, there were a total of 13,846 alcohol-related traffic fatalities in 2008. Therefore, with some simple math, each person that died due to drunk driving is worth 14,759 alcohol drinkers. To sum this up in more layman terms, the life of each person in America is worth the freedom of 14,759 other people to enjoy and consume alcohol. In other words, the right of 14,759 people to enjoy alcoholic beverages is worth more than the life of one person. Interesting to compare, isn't it? You could never ban alcohol. Those that cause deaths because of their alcohol consumption are the few idiots in the bunch. Anyone can twist logic to their own reasoning, but in the end there is one cause and one effect. It isn't 14,759 per death. It is exactly ONE IDIOT how ever many deaths they cause. Now, I'm not trying to condemn everyone who drinks alcohol. After all, the few who commit the felony of drunk driving are hardly representative of the majority of alcohol consumers, who use the drug responsibly. However, if alcohol were banned, the amount of alcohol-related traffic fatalities would drastically decrease. The question is, are we, as a people, willing to give up the pleasure of the many, for the lives of the few? Poll: Would you give up drinking if it meant less deaths?No, I wouldn't. (520) 66% Yes, I would. (262) 34% 782 total votes Your vote: Would you give up drinking if it meant less deaths? (Vote): Yes, I would.
(Vote): No, I wouldn't.
User was warned for this post
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Noble thoughts by the OP, but you cannot pass judgement on an activity or good (in this case, alcohol) by only weighing its negative effects on society. Tax revenue, consumer pleasure, and jobs in the industry are all factors to consider before giving the "Price of a Human Life in Alcohol."
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Sometimes people like getting intoxicated. It's mind altering, it's fun. You can never stop people doing it.
Making it illegal won't stop people doing it, it will be like US prohibition all over again.
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There's too many people for me to respond to everyone individually, but I'll try a couple and then make my general point at the end of this post.
On June 16 2011 15:32 BumbleB wrote:
Nope. I'm not a bad drunk so it wouldn't make a difference if I stopped.
It's not about whether you are personally a responsible alcohol user.
The fact is, if you and most other people in America voted to make alcohol illegal, it would make it harder for the idiots who aren't responsible users, and get drunk and drive, harder to get alcohol.
Would you be willing to give up the responsible use of alcohol to make sure less idiots out there can buy a case of beer, drink it, and go drive their car?
On June 16 2011 15:32 dyonehara wrote:
What Mango said.
The only thing I found interesting thing about this thread was that 67% of Americans drank in 2008. How was that figure determined? Link me up to that if you get a chance.
Obviously I voted no on the subject. I'm a drinking enthusiast and love vodka as much as I love SC2.
Edit: You, as well as many others should consider alternative methods to reducing drunk driving. I'm a responsible drinker, so I'd be in favor of tighter regulation and more stringent policies that punish drunk driving and manslaughter. Those are way better answers than the one proposed.
Gallup is a polling company. They're famous for their election polls.
Here's their alcohol usage poll:
http://www.gallup.com/poll/141656/drinking-rate-edges-slightly-year-high.aspx
On June 16 2011 15:32 esla_sol wrote:
if they banned alcohol, how would anyone get laid?
sayin no on this one.
This is exactly why it's the pleasure of the many vs. the lives of the few.
By giving up alcohol, you make it harder for idiots to get out there and drive drunk. You also make it harder for you to score with girls.
On June 16 2011 15:33 sCfO20 wrote:rofl Honestly, I don't give a damn about alcohol. But, it's not the alcohol that kill people, or make people do stupid shit. It's about you not having control over yourself. Smoke bud, this shit will never happen.
I already mentioned that most alcohol drinkers use it responsibly. However, there are evidently thousands of cases a year where people decide to NOT use it responsibly, and get people killed.
Would you give up alcohol if it makes it harder for people to be stupid, and kill people?
On June 16 2011 15:33 LeperKahn wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2011 15:28 madcow305 wrote:
Now, I'm not trying to condemn everyone who drinks alcohol. After all, the few who commit the felony of drunk driving are hardly representative of the majority of alcohol consumers, who use the drug responsibly. However, if alcohol were banned, the amount of alcohol-related traffic fatalities would drastically decrease. The question is, are we, as a people, willing to give up the pleasure of the many, for the lives of the few?
This sounds like a pushpoll, and bandwagon propaganda. Drug prohibition doesn't do anything to help safe drug use. You can see it in prohibition and the modern drug war. If getting into a taxi obviously drunk was enough to get arrested you think that people would drive drunk LESS?
This isn't about how to make alcohol users more responsible.
This is about how to make it harder for idiots who irresponsibly use alcohol to get drunk and drive.
Also, this isn't about what would happen if Prohibition happened against the majority's will. I'm asking, would you voluntarily give up alcohol, and vote to ban it, if it meant saving lives?
Prohibition didn't work out in the 1920s because of widespread disregard for the law. But, if most people today abided by a Prohibition law, then there would be very little rise in crime and illegal brewing.
On June 16 2011 15:34 BloodNinja wrote:
Any background on where AlcoholAlert gets their numbers from? It is always interesting to see how "alcohol related" is defined when looking at numbers like that, and often times the numbers are grossly inflated.
Is this an issue of numbers for you? For example, would you give up drinking if it meant saving 100,000 lives a year, but not if it only saved 13,000 or less people?
On June 16 2011 15:36 ribeye wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2011 15:30 MangoTango wrote:
Pretty sure we in the US tried this once. It didn't work out too well. Hahaha, yeah. And it brought with it the rise of organized crime, which in its heyday, was arguably worse than the problem presented here anyway. All in all, I voted no out of the general idea that I'm not comfortable giving up rights that I am completely responsible with simply because a minority of others are not.
There was a rise in crime because people were mostly against the law. If everyone voted for it, and voluntarily gave it up, nobody would be brewing in their bathtubs because nobody would be buying.
On June 16 2011 15:39 solidbebe wrote:
youre confusing drinking some alcohol with getting yourself extremely drunk and then getting into a car. If you drink alcohol but you are never drunk than this doesn't work for you.
This isn't about you personally being responsible while drinking.
The fact is, even if you never get drunk, there ARE people in the world who get drunk and drive. Would you give up alcohol and vote to make it illegal if it means these drunk idiots have a much harder time finding someone to sell them beer to get drunk off of?
On June 16 2011 15:39 Doko wrote:
Its political suicide.
Depends on what the people think. If everyone was for giving it up to save lives, it'd be a fine law to propose.
On June 16 2011 15:39 Demonace34 wrote:
I don't understand how banning something like alcohol would stop this from happening. Making something like alcohol go to an unregulated black market wouldn't stop these alcoholic related deaths. Even if it did, the death and strain this would put back on law enforcement and gang violence would be equally bad. I rather people just be educated not to drink and drive and use public transportation when they are intoxicated.
I said no to the poll, I don't abuse alcohol and then drink and drive. I have enough personal responsibility to not become that statistic.
Who's going to buy alcohol on the black market if everyone is giving this up voluntarily and voting ban it out of consideration to the lives it will save? I'm not talking about 1920s Prohibition, where nobody gave a shit about the law and everyone wanted to drink. I'm talking about voluntarily giving up drinking.
Also, people are already educated, for the most part. Every alcohol label tells you to drink responsibly. Everyone knows drunk driving is dangerous. Some people are just irresponsible, and will do it anyway.
On June 16 2011 15:40 Daray wrote:
How many people died in traffic accidents when it wasn't their fault? Should we ban private cars and save lives? :O
Most people cannot go about their daily lives without cars, especially if you live in the suburbs or countryside.
Most people CAN go about their daily lives without drinking alcohol.
People that can't go about their daily lives without a drink are called alcoholics.
On June 16 2011 15:41 Nazarid wrote:
They tried to make alcohol illegal in the United States of America. You should read up a little on how that turned out. This post makes me feel like the OP thinks it 100% Alcohols fault these(I know he doesn't just makes me feel like he does) PEOPLE could not control themselves.
Addressed this in my post. Maybe you should read up on it.
On June 16 2011 15:42 N3rV[Green] wrote:
I don't drink already and believe alcohol to be one of the worst things in our culture today. It destroys the ability to think properly or have control over your own body, and there is actual proof to back it up.
It rips people apart, ruins lives, kills people by use alone (that liver can only take so much, you only have the one), is a factor a crime, sexual badshitingeneral, ALL SORTS of messed up shit come from that stupid worthless drug.
Seriously, why drink when you can just smoke a bowl? Nobody's ever smoked a bowl, and then gone and beaten his wife, nobody has died or killed somebody while significantly impaired driving while baked, nobody has died from toking, and so many other things.....Really now that I think about it, the only time anybody EVER dies because of weed is because it's illegal and it's a part of the criminal world.
Nobody has ever had to smoke a gigantic bowl, then go drive somewhere either.
The reason you don't see weed related traffic fatalities is because everyone who uses weed knows it's illegal, so they only use it in private places and make sure to get sober before they go anywhere a cop might see them.
On June 16 2011 15:48 Swede wrote:
Harsher regulation and education are what's needed. History has shown us that prohibition can lead to more problems than it solves. The problem is that most people are so infatuated with alcohol and the pleasures it brings them that they're willing to turn a blind eye to the facts, or the facts are never presented to them.
Governments should be encouraging vigorous campaigning a la cigarettes. Not with the goal of banning alcohol, but with the goal of educating people about its risks and how it damages society.
Is there anybody that lives in the western world and doesn't know you can't drive well when drunk?
These drunk drivers aren't uneducated, they're irresponsible and reckless. There's a difference between not knowing something is dangerous, and knowing something is dangerous but doing it anyway.
And it's funny you bring up cigarettes. Nowadays, cigarettes basically tell you in giant letters on the packaging that they will kill you. Doesn't stop millions from smoking them anyway. These people aren't uneducated about the dangers.
On June 16 2011 16:01 KimJongChill wrote:
The alcohol related fatalities are probably symptomatic of some kind of mental malaise within the drinkers, and shows that people need to find healthy ways to cope with their problems. I'm sure some of those accidents were caused by careless party-goers, or poor judgment on a weekend after a few too many, but the alcohol itself isn't entirely at fault. If alcohol were prohibited, then I'm sure there would be new ways to self-medicate, or new forms of self-destructive and dangerous behavior.
Would a ban be effective? I think it might, since alcohol is an enjoyable, and easily consumable drug which has become irremediably tied with social culture. But I have a hard time believing that a ban would be justifiable. I think if it were a serious enough issue, then there would be more outcry, more legislation, or simply more of a reaction. I suppose people just implicitly agree that the benefits of having alcohol outweigh the potential dangers, and that the rules and regulations surrounding alcohol are at least sufficient.
I wouldn't say it's a symptom of a mental problem.
Plenty of people get DUIs. Celeberty DUIs are talked about in tabloids all the time. Are these people mentally in distress? No, they're just irresponsible.
And the argument that these people would replace alcohol with another drug is not accurate.
How many frat boys or drunk office workers on a Friday night would go get some Cocaine or Heroine if they couldn't find a drink?
On June 16 2011 16:02 Hypertension wrote:
My counter question: would you campaign to legalize drugs if it would reduce gang violence, save lives and restore the people's trust in their police?
Depends. How many drug related deaths would we have once people got easy access to hard drugs? IE, driving while under the influence of Heroine or Meth or LSD, something like that.
On June 16 2011 16:02 travis wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2011 15:33 sCfO20 wrote:Pretty sure we in the US tried this once. It didn't work out too well. rofl Honestly, I don't give a damn about alcohol. But, it's not the alcohol that kill people, or make people do stupid shit. It's about you not having control over yourself. Smoke bud, this shit will never happen. I agree with this guy, alcohol is not the problem, only a factor. Show nested quote +On June 16 2011 15:45 Atasu wrote:
Alcohol causes so many problems, to the point were I ask my self has man lost all common sense? Its worthless and I can never see my self drinking it, those who get pleasure out of it are in denial. Hey lets drink poison...seriously... lol mr judgemental im sorry you've never enjoyed recreational alcohol
Yes, alcohol is only a factor. Drunk retards being irresponsible is the root of the problem.
But, would you voluntarily give up your drink if it meant that those drunk retards out there won't be able to drink and drive either?
On June 16 2011 16:05 Geo.Rion wrote:"However, if alcohol were banned, the amount of alcohol-related traffic fatalities would drastically decrease. " HAHA The New York Five Familys, the Chicago outfit and about a hundred more organizations say hello :D Banning alcohol is like the biggest fuel the US could have given to organized crime back in the twenties thirties. Show nested quote +On June 16 2011 16:05 travis wrote:On June 16 2011 16:03 splcer wrote:On June 16 2011 15:30 MangoTango wrote:
Pretty sure we in the US tried this once. It didn't work out too well. WINNNNN how is that "WINNNNNN" ? the guy addressed it in his post if people bothered to read it Addressed it? Like, he stated the US did it, this is hardly addressing it Regardless of this, i voted no.
Read my earlier responses to this argument. If we're voluntarily banning it, organized crime will have noone to buy their bootleg beer, so they can't make money off it, so they can't grow bigger.
Also, I said prohibition was tried and due to widespread disregard for it, the law was revoked. What more detail do you want?
On June 16 2011 16:10 Sanctimonius wrote:
The attitudes to drugs and alcohol are strangely confused in politics. I'm against alcohol being banned, simply because alcohol doesn't kill people, people do. Unlike guns, it doesn't even make it easier, it just makes you dumber. If a person is shitfaced, they should know enough not to drive. i have never, ever been in a condition where I thought I would trust myself behind the wheel of a car when I've obviously drunk too much. I refuse to believe that I have some kind of amazing self-restraint or common sense.
What the world needs is a great Japanese invention called a daiko. It's a taxi for you and your car - the taxi has two drivers in it. One drives your car behind the taxi, making sure your drunk self and your car gets home safely and legally. Works fine here, along with a practically zero alcohol tolerance for driving - seriously, you get banned and fined and face prison if you have a sip of alcohol before getting into a car. And considering the drinking culture here, with people regularly passed out on the streets on a weekend, they seem to be dealing well with drink-driving. People just need to stop being dicks.
That's one other way to handle it. Instead of making it harder for dicks to get drunk, make it easier for drunk dicks to get home without driving.
However, the lower rate of drunk driving accidents in Japan probably also has something to do with car ownership levels.
Most people in Japan probably don't know a car. Most people in America probably do own cars. Hence, it's easier for drunk dicks to kill people in the USA because there are more drunk dicks with cars here.
On June 16 2011 16:10 Slithe wrote:
X number of people drink alcohol, Y number of people die from alcohol related incidents. Should we ban alcohol?
X number of people drive cars, Y number of people die from car related incidents. Should we ban cars?
We can continue this line of thinking until almost everything we own gets banned. It's a flawed idea. Instead, people should be allowed to do whatever they want to themselves, as long as they don't hurt others. If you hurt other people, then you're punished for it. Don't preemptively punish the majority just because a small minority is irresponsible.
This isn't about the government putting prohibition back on against our will.
It's about whether we, as responsible individuals, are willing to give up a portion of our pleasure (drinking), in order to ensure that a few irresponsible individuals cannot take our pleasure and kill people by using it recklessly.
The cars example I addressed earlier.
On June 16 2011 17:03 carbonaceous wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2011 15:28 madcow305 wrote:
According to AlcoholAlert, there were a total of 13,846 alcohol-related traffic fatalities in 2008.
Good sir, I agree that alcohol is a huge burden to Western society, but I have an issue with your logic. You argue that a minority of people are victims of other people's alcohol abuse. In the case of rioters vs police and shopkeepers, the two groups (the victims and the abusers) are mutually exclusive groups. However, in the case of motor vehicle fatalities, these two groups are not mutually exclusive. How many of the above number were vehicle-pedestrian accidents, and how many were vehicle-vehicle accidents or vehicle-object accidents? Was it the pedestrian that was inebriated or the motor vehicle operator? And who actually died? In an accident a drunk person is more likely to die than a sober person due to decreased lung function, a higher chance of vomiting, and that vomit blocking their airways if they become unconscious. A drunk pedestrian hit by a car will have a higher chance of dying than a sober pedestrian, as will a drunk driver in an accident between two vehicles. Yes, it would suck if you were sober and just walking along at night, and a car driven by a drunk came out of nowhere, mounted the sidewalk and killed you. However, I suspect the death toll included many drunk people who were at fault as well, and the actual number of victims that died due to other people's alcohol abuse would only be a subset of the above.
You bring up a good point in that the 13000 fatalies include the drunk drivers themselves.
However, a percentage of those are obviously innocent bystanders.
Would you give up drinking and voluntarily ban alcohol if it saved those innocent lives?
General Point:
This post isn't about whether our politicians should bring back Prohibition against the majority's will. That will only lead to an increased demand for black market alcohol, giving crime rings increased funding and such.
This post is about whether you as an individual would voluntarily give up the pleasure of drinking if it meant that there were less stupid people out there getting drunk and driving, and killing people.
Now, the obvious result according to the poll is that most people would NOT give up their drink to save some lives. However, I'm not sure whether this is what the voters truely believe, or whether this is because people misunderstood the poll to mean banning alcohol against the majority's will, leading to increased crime.
Travis, since you're reading this thread, could you wipe the poll, and make it a new one with the title as "Would you voluntarily give up drinking and vote to ban it, if it meant less drunk driving fatalities?"
Thanks.
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People don't realize how dangerous it is to drive, let alone to drive drunk. Everyone thinks like they're going to war.
"Yes people die, but not me."
I'm well aware of the price of alcohol after finishing my studies at the University of Kentucky. Every year a student died because they got drunk, and not just because they were driving.
One year a student got hit by a train while trying to run from the cops. The next year a kid fell of a mountain the day before classes started. One grad student just walked out of a bar fell and hit his head on the sidewalk to died instantly. Even a star volleyball player who had just graduated swerved and hit a tree while driving.
It's disgusting, but what can you do? Banning alcohol doesn't work and telling people not to drink and drive doesn't stop it. Some people just simply won't be responsible about it, and I guarantee you that not a single one of those 13,846 didn't know that what they were doing was wrong. It's a catch 22 with trying to stop it.
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I was quite an alcoholic, I used to drink every night until i felt I could sleep. Alcohol is a bad thing I wish I was never involved with to be quite honest. Don't make it illegal, but if your smart you would just steer clear of it. drink moderately and only on special occasions.
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@Madcow, The issue for me is I didn't vote in the poll, because I don't agree with any of the options. Alcohol, drugs, cars, guns and so forth, kill people. But in the end it's the people who kill them not the item itself. Some people here stated some stupid things, but the majority knows that it's the people themselves.
One guy said he drinks and drives, I'd just have him executed already personally, he's eventually going to kill someone, people like that are just ticking time bombs always being uneducated, but not realizing that they are uneducated, I don't care if he has a "Masters" in College or 7 of them, if you don't have the brains to realize that doing something dangerous could injure others, other than yourself, you are taking an unnecessary risk, and putting it on others too.
How many 100,000+ Stories are there of people who drank and drive and their friends died in the accident, and yet they've done it 100's of times but nothing happens, or 1000's of times. It only takes 1 time to make that mistake and regret it, or not regret it for the rest of your life.
Education is necessary but so are more severe punishments for DUI's. Doing it is literally taking a chance at killing someone every time you get behind the wheel.
Like the guy who wasn't caught drinking and driving in this forum, he should have his car confiscated, and be fined a sum of money and imprisoned. Well if only American Prisons weren't as shitty as they are.
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Alcohol is something disgusting. Somehow, weed is illegal, but the most dangerous drug of all is completely legal! Not only that, the majority of people on the planet even support drinking alcohol!
I will never touch alcohol. I'm not drinking a toxic that causes me to lose control over myself.
[sarcasm]Yeah, I can totally see how well 'drinking in moderation' is turning out![/sarcasm]
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On June 16 2011 15:40 Cyber_Cheese wrote:
No way is banning alcohol ever going to be good, maybe tax it higher or something, make it less accessable.
By the way, that's less than 0.01% of people
Instead of blaming alcohol, try banning Vancouver from losing hockey
No but really teach them it's just a game...
No way is banning alcohol ever going to be good? Alcohol doesn't really bring anything good into society in the first place. Not sure why a vodka red bull couldn't just be replaced by a coke if it was going to benefit society...
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You know I've given this a lot of thought, and I think that if it comes down to it we ought to give up driving instead. You'd save a lot more lives, rescue the environment, have an enforceable law, improve nationwide fitness (people are going to have to walk liquor store), and still retain one of those precious activities that makes sitting at home without a car fun in the first place.
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To be completely honest, I would change alot of my habits if I had the oppertunity to save others lives. Even if it meant to give up *exagerated breath in* starcraft(I dont know how that would save someones life, but it is just supporting my idea from line one). However, if motions were to be made to prevent these "killer" habits, it would lead to more cons (organized crime, etc.), so it is basically common sense for in this case alchoholics to stop drinking for the better of everyone including themselves.
Just my opinion(dont trash this comment please, just my honest answer).
Also, I am very surprised on the poll results, but hey, everyone has opinions, none are right nor wrong.
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lel what bs by this argument why not ban cars then there would be less car accidents and organize huge amounts of public busses for pendlers or stuff it just cant be done .
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There are no deaths caused by my drinking. My own personal discontinuation would achieve nothing.
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The kinds of people who are stupid drunks are not likely to give up drinking, and the people with the ability to stop often have the self control to not do stupid things while drunk. Obviously this is a generalization but i think it holds true in the majority of cases.
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General Point:
This post isn't about whether our politicians should bring back Prohibition against the majority's will. That will only lead to an increased demand for black market alcohol, giving crime rings increased funding and such.
This post is about whether you as an individual would voluntarily give up the pleasure of drinking if it meant that there were less stupid people out there getting drunk and driving, and killing people
I still stand by my point that the idiotic subset of society that we're discussing are predisposed to make terrible choices well before they got drunk. You're asking if I would make sacrifices to forgive someone from personal responsibility.
Ask Jesus for a free pass from vigilant personal responsibility. In my society if you "slip", you go to jail.
On June 16 2011 15:28 madcow305 wrote:
According to AlcoholAlert, there were a total of 13,846 alcohol-related traffic fatalities in 2008.
Therefore, with some simple math, each person that died due to drunk driving is worth 14,759 alcohol drinkers.
To sum this up in more layman terms, the life of each person in America is worth the freedom of 14,759 other people to enjoy and consume alcohol. In other words, the right of 14,759 people to enjoy alcoholic beverages is worth more than the life of one person.
Just awful, D minus.
The inherent worth of people cannot be judged by the legality of a substance and the statistical death ratio. To put it in layman terms: You're argument is invalid and based on the hope that your reader will not think.
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Me and my friend got into a debate regarding this a while ago. He is hardcore "let people do whatever they want, as long as they don't interfere with other peoples lives". He thinks we should legalize all drugs and etc. While I somewhat agree with him, I always viewed alcohol/drugs as something that should be illegal, but can't be. Making alcohol/drugs illegal just leads to bigger problems, which is why they have to be legal, whereas he just believe everyone should be able to do whatever they want to themselves. In a perfect world, we shouldn't have to use drugs, but this isn't a perfect world I guess.
edit:
I don't drink/smoke/anything
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"Would you voluntarily give up drinking and vote to ban it, if it meant less drunk driving fatalities?"
Would never happen so no. There is zero realistic possibility of alcohol ever being banned again in the United States, in any future relevant to my life, that enables me to make that kind of decision in which society would collectively give up alcohol.
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EPT
