Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure • Hacker News Board

Re: Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure

#41

Post by dragonwriter » Sun, Jun 16, 2019, 3:23 AM UTC

bitcurious wrote: post #12

zzzeek wrote: post #6

Alcohol taxes, proposals to imprison people for drinking (see the same author's article about said program in https://www.vox.com/2016/2/9/10955138/alcohol-247-sobriety-p... ), all ways of spreading more suffering and incarceration among low income, vulnerable communities, while hardly affecting privileged communities at all. Alcoholism is a disease and should not be treated with incarceration.

Unlike most diseases, alcoholism has direct and often violent effects on second parties. Sure, “think of the children” is a cliche, but it exists for a reason. Second, you equate prison and taxes, and declare both to be morally unsound. It’s a neat rhetorical trick, but like my math instructor used to say: “show your work.” As far as I know, taxes work. Additionally you assume that alcoholism (even treated as a disea…

> Sure, “think of the children” is a cliche, but it exists for a reason.

Yes, and the reason it exists is that it's a thought-terminating rhetorical technique that has proven effective at getting people to support government actions without critical thinking about whether there is even a plausible argument that the action serves he nominal goal.

Re: Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure

#42

Post by shados » Sun, Jun 16, 2019, 3:31 AM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #32

baudehlo wrote: post #7

Are there statistics that compare other countries? I have found in my personal experience that countries that actually have lower minimum drinking ages seem to have better relationships with alcohol. Attempting to artificially force age 21 as the limit is foolish, creates de-facto criminals, especially in universities, and forces adults who want to try drinking to have to hide it. This isn’t a sane policy.

21 seems absolutely crazy to me. Three years into adulthood! Three years into dating and relationships where you can’t have a glass of wine with dinner on a date? Maybe it’s unhealthy but I can’t imagine the first three years of university without going out for a drink in a pub or bar at all. Are people graduating from high school and not able to celebrate with a glass of Champagne? If you don’t go to university are…

I don't have any issues with 18 as drinking age (that was the legal age where I grew up), but if you can't even imagine a world where alcohol isn't linked to dating and school, and where its possible to celebrate without requiring what is a pretty dangerous drug (lets get real here), there are bigger issues than the age where it's allowed.

Re: Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure

#43

Post by loeg » Sun, Jun 16, 2019, 3:33 AM UTC

xfitm3 wrote: post #35

pixl97 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, you're underestimating the attraction of vice. Trying to say it's the industry that says alcohol is a right completely neglects the enormous black markets for illegal drugs that don't have rights for. Education only goes so far, as DARE shows you must tell the truth and not embellish it or people neglect your whole message. Push taxes too high and you create a black market too.

DARE is a failure. As is the entire war on drugs in America.

GP was making a similar criticism of DARE, in a more oblique way. (They're saying DARE was both comprised of falsehoods and a failure.)

Re: Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure

#44

Post by shados » Sun, Jun 16, 2019, 3:35 AM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #41

bitcurious wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unlike most diseases, alcoholism has direct and often violent effects on second parties. Sure, “think of the children” is a cliche, but it exists for a reason. Second, you equate prison and taxes, and declare both to be morally unsound. It’s a neat rhetorical trick, but like my math instructor used to say: “show your work.” As far as I know, taxes work. Additionally you assume that alcoholism (even treated as a disea…

> Sure, “think of the children” is a cliche, but it exists for a reason. Yes, and the reason it exists is that it's a thought-terminating rhetorical technique that has proven effective at getting people to support government actions without critical thinking about whether there is even a plausible argument that the action serves he nominal goal.

Not wrong. If we take tobacco laws, with the cancer side effects, frequently going "omg don't expose the children to it!".

Really, the reason people pushed to ban smoking is because its fucking annoying and little more. "Think of the children and cancer" was just an easier way to get the point through.

Re: Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure

#45

Post by loeg » Sun, Jun 16, 2019, 3:36 AM UTC

StudentStuff wrote: post #5

vichu wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting to hear. I've heard the opposite in that in dry counties in the US the incidence of alcohol related driving accidents is 3x that of wet counties. A quick look at the Wikipedia[0] article corroborates this. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dry_county#Traveling_to_purcha...

A lack of healthy drinking culture and social norms leads to extreme, dangerous behavior. The same can be said for other ills of our society.

I think it's more: if you have to drive farther to drink or buy alcohol and people drunk drive at the same background rate, you simply get more drunk miles driven and proportionately higher incident rates.

Re: Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure

#46

Post by hdfbdtbcdg » Sun, Jun 16, 2019, 3:41 AM UTC

bitcurious wrote: post #12

zzzeek wrote: post #6

Alcohol taxes, proposals to imprison people for drinking (see the same author's article about said program in https://www.vox.com/2016/2/9/10955138/alcohol-247-sobriety-p... ), all ways of spreading more suffering and incarceration among low income, vulnerable communities, while hardly affecting privileged communities at all. Alcoholism is a disease and should not be treated with incarceration.

Unlike most diseases, alcoholism has direct and often violent effects on second parties. Sure, “think of the children” is a cliche, but it exists for a reason. Second, you equate prison and taxes, and declare both to be morally unsound. It’s a neat rhetorical trick, but like my math instructor used to say: “show your work.” As far as I know, taxes work. Additionally you assume that alcoholism (even treated as a disea…

Something must be done. This is something. We must do this!

Re: Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure

#47

Post by saagarjha » Sun, Jun 16, 2019, 3:41 AM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #39

chrisseaton wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

21 seems absolutely crazy to me. Three years into adulthood! Three years into dating and relationships where you can’t have a glass of wine with dinner on a date? Maybe it’s unhealthy but I can’t imagine the first three years of university without going out for a drink in a pub or bar at all. Are people graduating from high school and not able to celebrate with a glass of Champagne? If you don’t go to university are…

> 21 seems absolutely crazy to me. Three years into adulthood! Three years into dating and relationships Perhaps occasionally the second, but legal adulthood and the beginning of dating aren't things that are all that normally linked. > Maybe it’s unhealthy but I can’t imagine the first three years of university without going out for a drink in a pub or bar at all. Neurotoxins are not exactly an essential companion p…

And you still don’t have to drink at events that serve alcohol, anyhow.

Re: Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure

#48

Post by true_religion » Sun, Jun 16, 2019, 3:45 AM UTC

shados wrote: post #42

chrisseaton wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

21 seems absolutely crazy to me. Three years into adulthood! Three years into dating and relationships where you can’t have a glass of wine with dinner on a date? Maybe it’s unhealthy but I can’t imagine the first three years of university without going out for a drink in a pub or bar at all. Are people graduating from high school and not able to celebrate with a glass of Champagne? If you don’t go to university are…

I don't have any issues with 18 as drinking age (that was the legal age where I grew up), but if you can't even imagine a world where alcohol isn't linked to dating and school, and where its possible to celebrate without requiring what is a pretty dangerous drug (lets get real here), there are bigger issues than the age where it's allowed.

It’s not that they can’t imagine it, it’s that they can’t imagine the illegality.

Like I can imagine romance without candlelit dinners, but if you told be that couples dining together was now illegal without a chaperone, then I would act shocked.

Re: Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure

#49

Post by dikkechill » Sun, Jun 16, 2019, 3:48 AM UTC

WarDores wrote: post #14

The philosophical argument here is "To what extent is it the government's job to regulate substances?" The author seems to think that if it causes harm, it should be under the government's purview to curtail. The second-to-last paragraph demonstrates this position. We already have laws about driving while intoxicated and public drunkenness (among others such as carrying a firearm while intoxicated) which preserve ind…

The problem is not so much whether it's the government's job to regulate it, but that it is primarily treated as a criminal issue, and thus is 'solved' through police enforcement. In other countries people see it more as a health issue, this leads to completely different approaches and policies. What would happen if we treated e.g. education primarily as a criminal issue?

Re: Reconsidering whether Prohibition was a failure

#50

Post by true_religion » Sun, Jun 16, 2019, 3:49 AM UTC

zzzeek wrote: post #22

bitcurious wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unlike most diseases, alcoholism has direct and often violent effects on second parties. Sure, “think of the children” is a cliche, but it exists for a reason. Second, you equate prison and taxes, and declare both to be morally unsound. It’s a neat rhetorical trick, but like my math instructor used to say: “show your work.” As far as I know, taxes work. Additionally you assume that alcoholism (even treated as a disea…

> Second, you equate prison and taxes, hardly? > and declare both to be morally unsound. hardly? > It’s a neat rhetorical trick, but like my math instructor used to say: like my english instructor would say, "did you even read the book?" > The social drinker that misjudged their state and crashed a car? they'd be incarcerated for drunk driving, not drinking in and of itself. > The kid who fucks up his liver because h…

The truth is that if you make a law for the betterment of general society, it’s poor people who you want to target simply because there are more of them.

Trying to coral rich people with far greater resources to circumvent laws just leads to laws that are more oppressive and far reaching to yield the same effects.