Prohibitionists Are Alive and Well

Posted by | Posted in Wine Politics | Posted on 10-13-2011

Ken Burns.

In the past, I’ve highlighted the work of the American Beverage Institute, a restaurant trade group that’s helping fight the good fight against neo-prohibitionists and HR 1161.

Sarah Longwell, the managing director of ABI, has an excellent oped in today’s Richmond Times Dispatch pegged to Ken Burns’ new documentary on Prohibition. In the piece, she explains how even though the Great Experiment ended nearly 80 years ago, “prohibitionists are alive and well today.” An excerpt:

“Decades after the repeal of the 18th Amendment, busybody activists are pursuing policies to make it more difficult for consumers to drink socially and urging governments to use every tool in their sheds to cut down on casual alcohol consumption…

Policies such as higher alcohol taxes, sobriety checkpoints, lower legal drunken-driving thresholds, restrictions on Sunday sales, alcohol advertising bans, and initiatives to put alcohol-sensing devices in all cars as original equipment are touted as solutions to problems such as underage drinking, alcoholism and drunken driving.

But in reality these laws aren’t about curbing alcohol abuses; they’re part of a neo-prohibitionist effort to restrict the consumption of alcohol no matter how moderate.”

Check out her full piece at the Richmond Times Dispatch.

Comments (2)

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  2. Misguided attempts by organizations, to curb alcohol consumption will not cease until society takes a deeper look at the human factors that lead to abuse and addiction. Effectively educating people, and specifically youth, about the physiological and psycological effects of all regulated substances, would go much farther in creating a society that seeks moderation, than attempting to make the symptom go away. Why should alcohol, which has been with humanity for millenia, ( and I believe is entwined with our DNA ) be singled out, when the products of big pharmacutical companies, carry equal, if not more potential danger, and manage to find social acceptance?