There are many paradoxes be about the use of alcohol and the country of U. S. of America.
Consider, if you will, a nation which
1. Prides itself in the prevention of most diseases, but which has no program for the prevention of one of its major diseases: alcoholism.
2. Is adamant about the accurate labeling of food and medical products, but has virtually no standards at all for alcoholic beverages.
3. Insists that consumers have full knowledge of the interactions with other drugs of prescription and over-the-counter drugs, but doesn’t require any of this of the drug, alcohol.
4. Advocates the imprisonment of drug pushers, but actually honors those whose push alcohol.
5. Has a nation-wide telethon on TV to raise millions of dollars each year for Muscular Dystrophy, an affliction affecting about 600,000 people, yet has no such campaign for alcoholism, a disease affecting well over 30 million people.
6. Has laws preventing the sale of alcohol to those under the age of 21, yet works in many ways to undercut these same laws, for example, through advertising.
7. Is concerned about the health of its children, yet doesn’t warn about the effects of alcohol on the developing child nor acknowledge that giving alcohol to a child/adolescent may be a form of child abuse.
8. Advocates law and order, yet overlooks the high correlation between crime and alcohol especially when developing crime prevention programs.
9. Is concerned about the high cost of insurance and medical care, but does little to reduce self-inflicted medical problems arising from the use and abuse of alcohol.
10. Is concerned about the possibility of the social security system not being able to meet its financial obligations in the future, and yet, is oblivious to the present monetary erosion resulting from disability claims due to diagnoses of alcohol addiction and psychoses.
These are just a few of the paradoxes about alcohol and America.
Modified from V. Peterson, B. Nisenholz, & G. Robinson, A Nation Under the Influence: America’s Addiction to Alcoholism @2003.
Points 2 and 3, like the other 8 items you take up are really important to highlight. Thanks Vince! It’s amazing to see society’s hypocrisy in a nutshell.
And when it comes to points 2 and 3, I think that alcohol should be treated like a drug, which for me means that 3 is more important.