BOOZE, BOOZE, BOOZE
The booze industry use to issue warnings to “binge” drinkers; they addressed the “Jekkyl and Hyde” women that “binge” drink. This is another one of the buzzwords. The booze problem is always laid at the feet of someone else—never the booze industry that makes the stuff that “binge” drinkers are made of. You understand that they’re not talking about the girls and fellows who stagger home quietly several times a week, usually over the weekend, drunk but not troublesome. They’re happy with such people so long as they don’t hurt the booze business’ reputation. No, they’re talking about those that stagger home drunk and on the way create problems, beat the blood out of one another in the street, lie in the gutter or smash up things and abuse or neglect whoever is at home.
[“Binge” language is no longer popular with the booze industry. It’s a bit too crass and, in addition, they’re assaulting some of their best customers. Besides, that kind of talk only generates images that the booze industry wants to keep out of the public eye.]
If you bring their reputation as
sellers of poison into question they call you names, like “binger” or
“Jekkyl & Hyde”. The most abused drug in the world—alcohol! The
first thing the booze hits is your power to discriminate—but the
booze-makers hold you responsible for not discriminating. Everybody is
to be blamed for the havoc in society in general and in the home in
particular—everybody, that is, except the booze industry! I’ve had more
than one person tell me that the problem lay in those who couldn’t and
wouldn’t control their booze intake. I had a woman tell me the same
thing about marijuana. And why not—if booze is fine why isn’t marijuana? [This same lady argued in favor of the responsible use of cocaine.]
The booze people feverishly
promote and sell the poison and the government spends multiplied
millions of dollars trying to keep up with the social carnage.
In light of the statistics on
planetary deaths, maiming, abuse, deprivation, crime, destruction of
families, and whatever else that comes with booze, isn’t it almost
laughable to still hear the serious announcements about passive smoking?
Is it not astonishing that there’s a law against driving without a seat
belt and no law against the sale of booze that necessitates laws
for fear of mayhem on the roads? Do you know what keeps this from being
humorous? It’s the tragedy that those in power are serious!
Though it’s true that the HIV =
AIDS scam no longer grabs headlines and good sense is in some areas
prevailing and needy people are being fed, given clean water, offered
medical treatment that truly does help [antibiotics and such]—though all
that’s true, governments are still pouring millions into paying for
anti-viral meds that the pharmaceutical companies now have a
phenomenally difficult time selling in America or in the West.
No one anywhere has proved that the (alleged) HIV virus has a functional/physical link to any disease of any kind much less the “marker diseases” of what’s called AIDS.
(The “marker” diseases are common medical problems that have been
around long before AIDS was invented. If you die of TB but aren’t known
to be HIV positive your death certificate has TB as the cause. If you’re
known to have the HIV antibody and you die of TB the death certificate
shows AIDS as the cause. Isn’t it marvelous?)
Serious war is declared against the
still [after thirty years of massively funded research] unproven HIV
theory while the open and before-our-eyes truth about the booze
industry’s product is grandly ignored. Worldwide, it’s involved in
death, maiming, killings, child and spouse and parental abuse, the
destruction of marriages, health problems, cost to society, police
presence and court time—it’s involved in all that and more beyond
calculation. It swallows up multiplied billions of dollars that could be
used to create jobs, further medical research, fund housing
construction, or whatever!
“It pays taxes!” It pays taxes? That’s what the tobacco industry said! “It creates jobs!” That’s what the tobacco industry said! “Tobacco is physically linked with disease.” Yes, and booze is socially linked with more agony and death than tobacco ever was or could be. If tobacco has physically killed its thousands the booze industry socially [and otherwise] has killed its tens of millions.
Arrrrgggghhhhh!
“It pays taxes!” It pays taxes? That’s what the tobacco industry said! “It creates jobs!” That’s what the tobacco industry said! “Tobacco is physically linked with disease.” Yes, and booze is socially linked with more agony and death than tobacco ever was or could be. If tobacco has physically killed its thousands the booze industry socially [and otherwise] has killed its tens of millions.
Arrrrgggghhhhh!
Western governments spend millions
of dollars urging drivers not even to take one drink because it’s too
risky. It’s too risky because the drinker might drink more and maybe
even go over the legal limit. Is that not revealing? Booze is a thief
and a robber! Why is a legal limit set? Because booze is booze and it
does what everyone knows it does.
Then the hypocritical booze
industry promotes its drug with beautiful young women and handsome young
men partying, deliriously happy. Then for a few seconds they add a tiny
worded appeal, “Enjoy our product responsibly.”
The tobacco industry has felt the
power of opposition but the booze industry bosses and stockholders? They
must laugh all the way to the bank as they’re driven in their big
Mercs or smile at their sizeable retirement money—they laugh at what
they get away with. No smoking adverts on television but booze and great
sex, booze and elegance, booze and “the great life”, booze and humor,
booze and holding on to your dreams, booze and happy family life—all
over the screen, day in and day out.
If society was peopled only with
people as strong as Michael the Archangel or as pure as Mary the mother
of Jesus or as uncompromising as Daniel who stared down the lions and
Gentile kings—if the world was populated with that sort of people booze
wouldn’t be a problem.
“I enjoy a beer [and I suppose a
vodka or some such thing if he feels he needs something stiffer] when I
choose,” one preaching type told me; “It’s a matter of drinking
responsibly,” he said.
And the booze industry smiles at such a wise man—a wise Bible teacher who shapes his congregation.
If you think sexual predators
groom children you need to remember that the booze industry does the
very same thing with its fruit juices and pop drinks with low levels of
alcohol in them. [“We’re teaching them to handle alcohol responsibly.”
They’re always doing us favors.]
Even liberties can become
sinful—Romans 14:13-23 and 1 Corinthians 8:11-13, for example [to be
reflected on theologically as well as exegetically].
In addition, there never was in the Bible anything like the modern booze industry with its high-powered booze. It’s a damnable plague and feeds on the vulnerable.
And it isn't enough to be able to
quote scripture to support a practice. The Pharisees did that in Matthew
to justify their abuse of women and Americans and other nations did
that in support of slavery when they quoted Peter and Paul.
To read scriptures to justify what
we want to do or to act on "liberties" that support an industry with
such a horrendous record as the booze industry has is no wise thing.
If we’re free to drink it then
we're free to share it. If we're free to share it we're free to sell it.
If we're free to sell it then we're free to own bars and distilleries.
Would that be “responsible”?
Paul, the apostle of the free
Spirit [F.F. Bruce called him that]! No one spoke more about
freedom—yes? But in light of the love of Jesus Christ did he seem to be
free? In 1 Corinthians 9 and in 2 Corinthians 5:14 he said he lived his
life the way he did because “the love of Christ leaves me no choice”
[NEB]. He said one died for all that they that live might no longer live
unto themselves but unto Him that died for them and rose again.
I don’t know how to work all that
out in daily living and it might well be that in some ways I don’t want
to know. If that’s the case I need forgiveness—and I certainly do
because my own life is an ongoing struggle with sin.
Still I think it’s true: the booze
industry is against everything a disciple of the Lord Jesus is for and
for everything a follower of Jesus Christ is against.
Iris Murdoch and Stanley Hauerwas are right; before ethics is a way of doing things it is a way of seeing
things. It isn’t that we choose different things from the same world—we
see different worlds. “We can only act,” said Hauerwas, “within the
world we can envision and we can envision the world rightly only as we
are trained to see.”
Could Jesus give the nod of
approval to the booze industry and quote texts to say his Holy Father
gave it to us to gladden our hearts? I don’t think so!
He who fought all that enslaves
people would surely fight such a business; a business that has shaped
society and has been shaped by our sinful human society, and even as we
watch it helps to destroy the peace and joy and health and usefulness of
multiplied millions of our fellow-humans.
I simply can’t see the Church’s
approval of the booze industry—tacit or otherwise—as giving the Lord
Jesus pleasure or furthering his kingdom purpose.