Victoria’s Irresponsible Service of Alcohol
When people
get drunk they often turn ugly, doing and saying things they wouldn’t normally.
Waking up the next day only to clean up the mess. These mistakes seem to often
be accepted as part of the deal, the mere consequences of too much fun. The
reason for this is that when you’re drunk the people around you most likely drunk
and behaving badly too. The culturally accepted way to handle drunken incidents
seems to be to laugh, wink and say no more. But is this really what socialising
and friendship is about? People need to take more responsibility for their own
drinking and look out for people around them.
On Saturday
night, while I was working in the function room at an inner-city hotel, my life
flashed in front of me as I had to call an ambulance for a man who appeared to
be dead. I saw the fine for serving an intoxicated person, the fine for not
having a current RSA and my boss firing me flash in front of my face, not to
mention the horror at the thought I’d contributed to somebody’s death. The
customer was lying on the ground, still as a rock with blood pouring out of his
mouth. His mother hysterically crying. Luckily, the man eventually came around
to consciousness and was okay. But I couldn’t help but thinking that we’d been
lucky.
I’ve worked on the not so fun side of the bar for five years
now. Serving drunk people week in, week out. I’ve seen people throw punches at
strangers, cut friends with broken glass, vomit on the floor, and then yell at
me for refusing to serve them more alcohol. According to VicHealth, alcohol was responsible for 24,714 hospital
admissions in Victoria and 759 alcohol-related deaths in 2011” Sean O’Rourke,
the senior project officer at VicHealth said.
Yet, Employees still see it as ‘easier’ to keep serving customers than to have to deal with
cutting them off.
One of the main problems is that there is so much
money to be made from selling alcohol. Drinking venues have a vested interest,
and therefore cannot be assured to self regulating when it comes to ensuring
lawful alcohol service practices. Management doesn’t encourage people to cut
people off early because they leave and take their friends. Individuals need to
take responsibility for alcohol service before something eventually does go
wrong.
The reason there isn’t a movement to stop this is because
it’s so socially acceptable. Alcohol is such an intrinsic part of Australian culture that people no
longer see it as a choice. "In our eyes alcohol is not a choice, it's a
cultural expectation," he said. Society encourages and glamorises binge
drinking. “people see drinking alcohol as a normal, healthy choice” O’Rourke said.
Realistically, people aren’t proud and often drink to hide
psychological problems. One reason excessive drinking is so culturally accepted
is that people secretly want to bring other people down with them. People
encourage each other to drink so that the mistakes they make will go unnoticed.
“The harm alcohol causes
is directly related to how common it is in our community” O’Rourke said.
Society needs to break down the
social acceptance of unhealthy drinking. “Permanently reducing alcohol-related
illness and accidents will require a range of coordinated initiatives, rather
than one single approach. community organisations, alcohol manufacturers,
retailers and suppliers, and individuals within the community need to be
involved.” Sean O’Rourke said.
We need to ensure everybody is educated on the ugly side of alcohol and stops
encouraging others to binge drink. John Eyre the CEO of Arbias says people need
to focus on harm minimisation principles, “recommending people know and
understand the level of alcohol consumption that will likely do harm to the
brain over a period of time and conversely the maximum levels that are unlikely
to harm.”
Wake up and smell the vomit Victoria. Being drunk
is not pretty. We
all need to make an effort to fight the unhealthy
Australian drinking culture and urge friends family and even customers to drink
less. Don’t like the disgraceful drunken pictures on facebook, buy your drunk
friends ‘wet pussy’ shots or harass a friend when they have decided not to drink.
Instead, help make an effort to change social acceptance of heavy drinking by educating yourself and others,
whether they are family friends of simply customers, on the health and
wellbeing consequences.
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