On June 16 2011 17:53 Fraidnot wrote:
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.
Banning alcohol would work if it was the majority's will. Then, nobody will have easy access to alcohol, and there also won't be a rise in crime because most people will be voluntarily abstaining, and won't be out on the black market looking for a drink.
The question is, are people willing to do it?
On June 16 2011 18:12 GertHeart wrote:
@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.
Alcohol makes it easier for stupid people to do stupid things, like get drunk and drive.
Why would you be in favor of killing drunk driver idiots, but not in favor of limiting the chances they can get drunk and drive?
After all, besides the commercial value of the alcohol industry, the drink itself serves no essential function in our society. Even Morphine and Marijuana, both illegal to the majority of people in the world, have legitimate medical uses. Alcohol does not.
On June 16 2011 18:32 HULKAMANIA wrote:
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.
There are plenty of places where people literally cannot go about their lives without automobiles.
The same cannot be said of alcohol.
On June 16 2011 18:47 Voltaire wrote:
There are no deaths caused by my drinking. My own personal discontinuation would achieve nothing.
Personal discontinuation and vote to ban alcohol.
I swear, it's like people stop reading past the first 3 sentences in the OP.
On June 16 2011 18:58 Probe1 wrote:Show nested quote +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.
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.
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.
This isn't about keeping idiots out of jail by not allowing them to kill people while drunk driving.
This is about saving people's lives by keeping idiots away from something that makes them more idiotic.
Your Jesus metaphor is quite ironic and applicable to this situation. Jesus supposedly died to save our souls. Would you give up drinking and vote to ban alcohol to save a stranger's life?
And how is my argument invalid? By allowing people to consume a destructive substance, society is placing a price on people's lives by saying that the consumption of said substance has greater value to the community as a whole than the loss of the few people that die due to this substance.
You want to try again without the ad hominems, give me a call.
On June 16 2011 18:59 stevarius wrote:
"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.
Pretty sure in 1800 people thought slavery would be around forever too. Then, a few people gradually began thinking "hey, maybe we shouldn't chain them up and call them niggers." Then a war and a few protest movements and a lot of time went by, and suddenly in 2011 African Americans have the exact same rights as white people.
Change starts small. And, it starts with just a few people. Are you one of those people?
On June 16 2011 19:03 Probe1 wrote:
The overall point I want to stress is I'm not giving up something so others do not die. I'm giving up something so others are not killed by being irresponsible.
Even at that, if you drink and drive or drink and riot or drink and drink until you OD, if you cannot drink surely you'll find a new way to put yourself and others in harm for a good time.
If your argument is that idiots will get find something to replace alcohol, what other widely available substance on the market will do what alcohol does to you?
Everything else I can think of is already illegal.
On June 16 2011 19:08 dakalro wrote:
I don't even see the connection between people drinking alcohol and drunk people causing deadly accidents. Really, there is no connection, if you're an idiot you'll still be an idiot even without the alcohol and I hope you die at the moment you run your car over someone else while under the influence of alcohol or drugs.
Alcohol makes an idiot even more of an idiot. Not only will they be mentally stupid, their physical reflexes will also be retarded by alcohol. Would you give it up and vote to make it illegal so these idiots have a harder time impairing their senses, then getting in a car and killing people?
On June 16 2011 19:25 Tuczniak wrote:
There need to be balance between freedom and safety.
Sure we could ban anything slightly dangerous, let goverment monitor every piece of infromation, where we are, what we do and say. It would be safe world, but it's not something people look for.
Giving up your freedoms does NOT ensure your safety. It merely makes you more safe against external threats. But, it makes you more vulnerable to your own government.
So, while allowing the government to wiretap your phones without notice, and arrest anyone without charge will keep you more safe from terrorist attacks, it will make you easier to oppress by your elected officials.
On June 16 2011 19:26 AlecPyron wrote:
The problem in giving up the right to drinking alcohol wouldn't alleviate this in slightest actually. I don't see the problem in the drinking, but the lack of respect and self-control. Alcohol is an already controlled substance. You need to be 21 or over which supposedly people should be old enough to make good judgement on themselves and it cannot be sold to people under influence (now it depends on the judgement of retailers and clerks).
Maybe the right way is how we can make people do more reasonable choices in their lives voluntarily that benefit the whole than the individual. I don't think we should make laws prohibiting alcohol consumption, but make people choose to not consume alcohol. Like with cigarettes, make them choose to stop smoking than forcing them to stop smoking. Maybe it's up to education to solve this question.
The very phrase "make them choose" is inherently contradictory. You can't force anyone to choose anything, or it wouldn't be a choice.
Everyone knows cigarettes cause cancer. Millions still choose to smoke. And the highly ironic thing is, cigarettes aren't banned in most countries, while suicide is illegal in most countries, even though smoking cigarettes is tantamount to slowly committing suicide.
And how would voluntarily giving up drinking and voting to ban it NOT alleviate drunk driving deaths? Alcohol would be far harder to access, so there would be less drunk drivers out there.
On June 16 2011 19:28 Klive5ive wrote:
You've hugely oversimplified the problem by combining casual drink with binge drinking and combining your enjoyment drinker with your semi-suicidal drinker or your too stupid to know what he's doing drinker.
Realistically only 100 or so out of the 14,000 risk taking someone's life. It's those few that are the danger not the vast majority.
Casual drinkers can kill people while under the influence of alcohol just as easily as a binge drinker can.
Are you actually one of those people that believes drinking while "buzzed" doesn't impair your senses? That it's ok to drive after drinking if you've only had "a couple" beers, and no liquor?
On June 16 2011 19:31 Herculix wrote:i will drink when there is cause to celebrate something, and by that i mean like get married, meet a friend i haven't seen in years, visit people i've known online forever but am seeing for the first time, etc., and i'll be complete control of it like i was the last 5 or so times i've done it. i look down on everyone who takes pride in self-destruction by any means with a sense of pity and disappointment. i don't look at everyone who drinks this way, but i look at the people who have to get drunk to get women, the people who use it as an escape, the people who get peer pressured into drinking because it's cool, etc. i pity the people who can't restrain themselves and the people who end up causing fatalities are those who take that to it's final step.
unfortunately, outlawing it would do nothing, because people will just find other means to do it illegally which is SO much worse. now they're breaking the law on top of what drinking does to you anyways, and they'll be making criminals rich in the mean time. the fact that it's a drug heavily ingrained into the culture of society would basically cause an even worse version of the response to Prohibition since the population of people who drink it are much larger than back then. if you actually want to do something about it it needs to be minimalized in various ways.
Show nested quote +On June 16 2011 16:33 ZergOwaR wrote: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...
man i hope you dont drink soda.. like cola, sprite, pepsi.. whatever.. cause then you wouldnt be drinking poison.. you'd be drinking acid
that's the most retarded counter argument i've ever heard for alcohol consumption. maybe people shouldn't drink various fruit juices either. you won't disentigrate by drinking lemon juice or soda over time if you use a tooth brush every once in a while, but you can't brush out the acid destroying your liver that comes from alcohol. i assume it wasn't an entirely serious argument but your little wink emote as if you thought you were clever baited me.
The majority of drunk drivers out there aren't hardened criminals with connections to the mafia that can illegally brew them drinks.
If the majority of people vote to give up alcohol, there won't be a huge criminal organization that immediately steps up to provide black market beer, because there would be very little demand for it. After all, the ban is VOLUNTARY. This isn't 1920's Prohibition, where everybody was against it and nobody followed it.
On June 16 2011 20:04 Plague1503 wrote:
A better solution would be absolutely DRACONIC penalties for DUI. Like tens of thousands of dollars or months in prison. If you kill someone while drunk driving, you get murder two, no discussion.
Fix'd.
People already do get 2nd degree murder charges in some cases.
http://greensboro.injuryboard.com/automobile-accidents/update-ian-michael-smith-charged-with-seconddegree-murder-several-felonies.aspx
On June 16 2011 20:24 zatic wrote:
Germany: 82 Mio, Alcohol related car fatalities: 428 (Numbers from 2008)
85% of the population drinks. Germany has the 5th highest alcohol consumption in the world. Random fact not supported by numbers: There is generally no speed limits on German highways.
Following your logic that makes 162,850 drinkers per fatality.
Maybe you guys should just not drive under the influence instead of discussing a ban of alcohol.
Different nations have different car ownership rates.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_vehicles_per_capita
Unites States has 779 cars per 1000 people.
Germany has 558 cars per 1000 people. USA has more idiots with cars than Germany.
Different nations also have different population densities.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_population_density
United States has 32 people/km^2.
Germany has 229 people/km^2. This means more Germans live closer together. This means it is easier to organize a highly efficient public transportation system to bring drunk idiots home without them driving.
There's a reason why my OP only mentioned United States statistics. Different standards apply to different nations.
On June 16 2011 20:26 Skvid wrote:
@OP you are thinking 2dimentional about this, because you are not considering the lives that would be lost if the people couldn't drink, a lot of factors and nuances would arise... i'm sure everyone gets the point that im trying to make so i wont try to explain it any further.
The best approach is pretty much what society is doing right now, trying to raise the awareness of the dangers involved in alcohol abuse, so the people make decisions by themselves.
I really don't get this one, who is going to die from not drinking alcohol?
On June 16 2011 20:46 CaptainCrush wrote:
You claim an awful lot of factual information but still draw a factual tie with your statement "The American people, by having alcohol legal today, are essentially placing a price on our own heads"
I couldnt disagree more.
For starters, I'm not sure why this is an American thing, alcohol is legal in most, if not all countries around the globe. Secondly, if we are doing anything to put a price on our own heads, its the blatant stupidity often exhibited by so many people every day, not alcohol.
It's texting while driving, drug use, speeding, not getting enough sleep, etc, etc, etc. I am plenty responsible when I drink as many other people are. It's the stupid ones who put a price on the heads of themselves and others, not the ones who choose to drink.
This thread is about American alcohol usage only because other nations have different statistics regarding alcohol related traffic fatalities. Whether this be from different cultural attitudes, better public transportation system, you name it.
Also, it's funny that you should bring up texting while driving. Many states are making it illegal to use your cellphone with one hand while driving. You must be using a handsfree setup, and even then some places are outlawing that as well.
Also, yes you are placing a price on the heads of your fellow people. By not voting to voluntarily give up alcohol for the lives of a few, you are given idiots a greater chance to be idiotic. You are then weighing your personal pleasure of responsible alcohol usage against the lives of those who are killed by idiots misusing alcohol.
On June 16 2011 20:48 Madoga wrote:
You could allso forbid unhealthy food, since this is the biggest cause for premature death in modern society.
Moreover, if you would ban alcohol, it would become exciting for teenagers/adolescents and instead of selling it legally (in usa 21+ i think) they would buy it illigal, which would increase crime rates and maybe even increase accidents caused by alcohol.
Besesides that I doubt the main problem is alcohol, I think crowd behavious is a more important factor in most riots.
More than unhealthy food, the AMOUNT of food that modern people consume is what is killing them.
You can eat 1500 calories worth of pig lard and raw sugar if you wanted, you still won't become obese. You would probably even be nutritionally deficient, and LOSE weight.
However, you can eat 3000 calories of salad, lean protein, and carbs and be a fat motherfuker.
But, that's an argument for a different thread.
Teenagers already illegally consume alcohol before they reach legal age. How many people that you know who drink now, did not drink before being legal?
Just because people break laws doesn't mean laws shouldn't exist in the first place.
On June 16 2011 20:52 Sadist wrote:
lots of self righteous posters here. Alcohol is a fun social drug, it calms nerves for many people and allows them to socialize without the self imposed pressure of being out and about. Some people dont like alcohol, fine, they have probably had a bad experience with it. If you haven't tried it and drink not to drink while at the same time looking down on people........
you are ridiculous.
So in your view, it's perfectly OK that your social life hinges so heavily on alcohol? Without it you wouldn't be able to function at a party or something?
Isn't that more of a personal, psychological issue on YOUR end, rather than us sober people "not being able to have fun?"
On June 16 2011 20:55 Probe1 wrote:
Ineffective and authoritarian?
Why do we always suggest banning something instead of teaching responsibility? Wtf Humanity, w t f?
Everybody who drinks and drives KNOWS it's wrong. But, they're drunk and don't give a shit, and they're moronic anyway even when sober.
Education only works on the uneducated. This is like saying "we need to educate people so they know smoking is harmful!" Everybody who smokes today knows it causes cancer. They do it anyway.
On June 16 2011 21:00 VGhost wrote:
I would give up drinking if I knew for certain that it would either prevent me from being responsible for a death, or that my example would keep someone else from doing something that would lead to death.
But as-is, I don't believe my drinking is going to cause deaths (because I am careful about how much I drink, what I do afterwards, etc.), so I see no reason to stop.
Not sure how to approach the poll.
It's not about you personally being responsible. It's about making it harder for irresponsible individuals to acquire things that will make them MORE irresponsible. Particularly when this case of irresponsibility can get innocent bystanders killed.
Would you give up alcohol to make it harder for idiots to get drunk and kill people?
On June 16 2011 21:05 Probe1 wrote:
The whole debate is just as squalid as a would you trade 1 life for 1,000,000 scenario.
Except, this argument is would you trade 1 life for the Friday night drinking party of 1,000,000.
1 life is not worth 1000000 lives. But, is 1 life worth 1,000,000 people's Friday night buzz?
On June 16 2011 21:09 mcc wrote:
Banning alcohol ,even assuming it is a good idea, would just simply not work. Black market would appear immediately and incredible amounts of money would have to be sunk into enforcing it. Just punish harshly DUI, not much better can be done.
Already addressed, NUMEROUS times.
Voluntary, self-imposed ban by the majority of the population in a vote = very little people trying to get drunk on the black market = no crime rings making illegal booze.
But, are the majority willing to self-impose this ban?
On June 16 2011 21:16 simansh wrote:Show nested quote +
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.
Show nested quote +
"Would you voluntarily give up drinking and vote to ban it, if it meant less drunk driving fatalities?"
I don't understand the question. Are you asking if we would vote to ban alcohol in order to save people's lives.
Or
if we would personally stop alcohol to save lives?
Also both of these questions seem really hypothetical to me, so could someone clear this up?
Would you, given the choice, voluntarily give up alcohol consumption and vote to make it illegal, thereby making it harder for idiots to get drunk and kill people?
On June 16 2011 21:49 StarBrift wrote:
In my opinion we just need to come together as a society and mature at earlier ages. Wine and Beer are both beverages that are drunk because of how they taste. They have their social contexts and should not be banned or stopped to be consumed.
Now hard liquor is where the big problem is imo (Whiskey, Vodka etc). It does not taste good. Any pleasure you get from drinking hard liquor is if you are feeding an addiction. The only reasons people start drinking hard liquor is to be cool or manly. The only reasons people continue to drink it are either that they have an addiction that they need to feed or that they want to numb their emotional or physical pain/stress. Alternatively they keep doing it to be cool or fit into a certain crowd.
We need to get rid of the fratboy mentality that getting drunk off your ass is something cool and awesome. It's childish and pointless. Enjoy alchoholic beverages that you think taste good, not the ones that you think makes you cool.
Did you know that many Asian countries eat a type of melon called the Bittermelon? As the name suggests, the melon tastes bitter. In fact, the more bitter the melon is, the more valued and "delicious" it is considered.
Same thing with hard liquor. I know people who enjoy the taste of Whiskey. Asian people in particular love drinking rice wine, or sake, etc, which has a very strong flavor.
Are these people drinking to be cool? The point is, people enjoy the taste of some very foul-tasting stuff, and they eat it because they enjoy it, not because it is cool.
On June 16 2011 21:50 Ibaneyou wrote:
I hate they way the OP worded the bolded part (I assume an edit?), it made an already stupid sounding post even worse.
The correlation between alcohol sales and drunk driving deaths is obvious, but there's no correlation between MY drinking and ANY drunk driving deaths.... Hell, I don't even drive.
Any1 who drives drunk is as bad as some1 who murders or... but that doesn't mean we should ban knives, as a way to reduce stabbing deaths.
It seems like the relative polls for other crimes would be...
"Would you give up cooking with knives to it meant less stabbing deaths?"
or "Would you give up sex if it meant less rapes?"
Complete BS topic.
Except cooking is a vital part of the diet of many cultures, without which people would starve. Very little people in the world can dig up a carrot or catch a fish, and just eat it without cooking, peeling, or at least gutting and removing the scales and whatnot.
Sex is a vital part of the survival of our species.
Putting alcohol up there in importance with sex and cooking really shows you have no grasp on relativity. You might as well suggest we ban breathing because of the number of people who die to anger-induced heart attacks from hearing their enemy's verbal insults.
General Point 2:
I've been hearing the same arguments over and over even though I already addressed them, so here is the final response to them all:
1. Banning alcohol will cause more crime - Not if a large majority voluntarily gives it up and votes to ban it. Then, only a small minority will be on the black market looking for a drink, so there will only be a relatively small rise in crime funding.
2. I don't drink and drive, so I don't see why I should give up drinking - If you, and a large majority of your peers gives up responsible alcohol usage, you make it much, much harder for some dumbass on a weekend to get drunk and kill someone with his/her car. So, while not PERSONALLY saving lives, you are saving lives by not giving an idiot a tool to be more idiotic.
From this point on, I will not be responding to any of the above arguments unless something new and compelling is brought up. I apologize if you made another point and it was lost in the sea of posts, just remind me again and I'll respond to it.
EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/qe1oT.jpg)
