From the BBC via The Agitator:
Some of the world's largest alcohol companies are facing a US lawsuit from angry parents worried that adverts are aimed at teenagers.Diageo, Heineken, Bacardi and Coors are among seven producers named in a lawsuit that accuses them of deliberately targeting young drinkers.
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Health groups link a surge in underage drinking to aggressive advertising.
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The US Federal Trade Commission said in a September report that it "found no evidence of targeting underage consumers" in the alcopop market.
That hasn't deterred the parents and guardians who are demanding the companies pay damages and return profits.
As if the current crusade to put the tobacco industry out of business wasn't enough some people now want to blame their inability to control themselves on the advertising of the alcohol companies. When my town enacted its "smoking ban" in restaurants I told everybody who would listen to me that law like that, on the local, state and federal levels, set a dangerous precedent for other lawsuits aiming to shift the responsibility from the one using the product to the one producing it. Here's exactly what I said in a post on this website:
Smoking is not a popular habit with most of us, but he next time you vote on a law about smoking start thinking about what they could ban next, it might be something you enjoy.
Already this year we've seen lawsuits against the fast food industry and the gun industry. After these people are done with booze, what's next? Salt? Are we going to go after the salt industry?
Listen, if your kids are out binge drinking it isn't Coors' fault, its your fault. Be a better parent. Kids don't learn about drinking from liquor ads, they learn most of what they know about drinking from their parents or older siblings or other kids at school. If you are a strong parent, set a good example for your children and stay involved in their lives they are not going to have a problem with alcohol. All the advertising in the world can't counteract good parenting.
I'm also not sure how the alcohol industry can be accused of irresponsible advertising. The ads I see always depict people of age enjoying whatever beverage is being hawked. I see loud parties and cool guys with good looking girls. And, at the end of most of them, I see a "21 Means 21" logo or some other voluntary indication that underage people should not consume alcohol.
I would also question the age 21 drinking law in the first place. I think that law should be abolished, or the age should at least be greatly reduced. Right now we have people over in Iraq fighting for this country who could not legally partake of a champagne celebration should we win the war tomorrow. Do you want to know why kids "binge drink?" Its because they're trying to thumb
their noses at their parents. I am not so far removed from my adolescence that I don't understand this. Teenaged kids like to do what they're not supposed to be doing. If we lowered the drinking age the current crop of teens would probably take to partying like nobody's business, but for future generations it would soon become common place. Drinking and partying would still exist, but it would be controlled because its something they're allowed to do anyway. They probably wouldn't keep it a secret from their parents anymore either. No more binge drinking because they don't have to cram all their drinking into a few short hours on a Saturday night.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - jadester
altho i agree, i would like to point out that at least with the tobacco companies there was the point that for so long they had evidence that smoking was bad for your health but they claimed otherwise. It was still pretty stupid but this and the fast food lawsuits are *slightly* "stupider"
2 - Hal Pawluk
"Well that's just not the case. The implication that we only do what commercials tell us to do is insulting."
That's an inaccurate statement of the opposition's case.
I've spent 35 years making a good living in advertising and marketing because advertising does influence behavior.
Surely you don't think that companies would spend billions upon billions of dollars on advertising year after year if it didn't?
3 - Rob
I resent the implication (which I consider lawsuits of this kind to be) that I am forced to consume alcohol or hamburgers simply because I cannot resist the temptation of a commercial.
4 - jadester
ah, but maybe the problem that they should actually be addressing is that (apparently) the majority of people, or at least enough of an amount to matter, are sheepish enough to let advertising have a big effect on them. If this actually *is* the case, perhaps what should be happening is better education about how to think for yourself, and make your own decisions. Then again, if enough enough people are like sheep, it might be in the interests of their governments to let that situation remain so - a compliant, unthinking population is so much easier to control than an independently-thinking one.
To be honest though, there is enough information out there, "even" in the mainstream media, about the dangers of tobacco and alcohol (amongst other drugs) that i think it could be more a case of people initially deciding they don't care, they just wanna do these things. then later they realise they want to live for as long as possible but their lifespan and quality of life have been affected by their use of such drugs so they decide they're gonna try and sue a company that makes those drugs so that they acn at least be uber-rich in their last days.
But what would i know, being cynical at heart?
5 - Eric Olsen
I would draw a very bright line between tobacco and all the others: the tobacco industry lied about the effects of its product for 50 years, it marketed to children, its product is absolutely addicting, it owes BIG.
The government has the right to regulate how products are marketed and sold because in aggregate marketing has a powerful affect. The problem with alcohol is that a substantial percentage of the population has a biological and/or psychological predisposition to alcohol addiction and this leads to severe social ills. The drinking age was raised across the board to 21 largely because of impact younger drinking has on driving. At an age when people are outrageoulsy stupid and being battered by hormones, adjusting to responsibility, dealing with vast social pressures, the very last thing they need is a societal invitation to join the merry alcohol party, drive and kill themselves, me and my children. Hell no the age for drinking shouldn't be lowered, it's a recipe for disaster.
Of course people under the age of 21 drink but as long as it is illegal it is harder for them to get alcohol, there will be less of it, and the official societal stamp of disapproval is a statement that needs to be made.
I am sympathetic to the military "fight and die for your country but can't get a legal drink" argument and perhaps there should be some kind of exemption for those in the military WITHIN A MILITARY ENVIRONMENT ONLY. The absolutely last people I want to run into in a bar are a bunch of amped, pumped up, testosterone-engorged, drunken 18-21-year-old assholes just itching to beat the shit out of someone, who with my mouth and attitude is likely to be me.
6 - Craig Lyndall
What do you think of the forbidden fruit argument? Sure the lowered age would be bad for a while, but wouldn't we ultimately just grow accustomed to it? I don't know. Maybe I am asking too much.
7 - Eric Olsen
The forbidden fruit argument just doesn't add up by the numbers: since the drinking age has been 21 across the board in the U.S., all motor vehicle accident numbers have improved. There's just no way round it. They have the rest of their lives to drink, let them learn how to drive for five years first.
8 - Rob
How long has the "age 21" law been in effect? I have heard the decrease in motor vehicles accidents attributed to more than the drinking age.
In defense of dropping the legal drinking age, I would say that it would be better for the kids to start drinking at home where their parents can have an influence over it and can teach some responsibility. By forcing them to wait until 21 you're waiting until they're out of the household (usually) and on their own to turn them loose on the bars.
Also, a percentage of the population is going to have problems with alcohol no matter what, so I don't see where the advertising is really going to matter. There were drunks before television and massive ad campaigns and there would be drunks if all that stuff went away.
The point I'm trying to make in the end is that we cannot keep blaming our problems (obeisity, alcoholism, gun violence) on commercials and marketing. We have to keep the blame where it belongs.
9 - Eric Olsen
Other than with tobacco, I agree if we are talking about legal culpability that individuals must take responsibility for their own actions. But, looking at society as a whole, things like legal drinking age, marketing, advertising, etc. have a great impact on overall statistics, and from a policy position it is these numbers that you are looking at. You can't ignore cause and effect on a societal level.
10 - Natalie Davis
I remember when the drinking age was 18. From my experiences and seeing how people my age behaved way back when, I was pleased when the limit was raised to 21. And the number of accidents and deaths dropped dramatically -- just from changing the age. The gummint needs to let things be or watch stupid teenagers die. Again.
11 - Eric Olsen
I remember how I felt about this when I was in the age range - they had "Low Beer" in Ohio when I was between 18 and 21 so I was legal for that - but obviously my perspective has changed. This really is more about the driving safety angle than anything else, and from tht perspective I feel very strongly about it. I don't have a problem with parents letting older kids try alcohol at home, or even with 18-20-year-olds drinking at college AS LONG AS THERE IS NO DRIVING INVOLVED. I pretty much feel that way across the board for older teens as long as there is no driving involved.
I know either directly or indirectly just too many dead young people to feel much sympathy with changing this law.
12 - Natalie Davis
Indeed. When I was in high school, too many of my classmates ended up not making it to graduation thanks to two things: alcohol-involved car crashes and suicide. I recall a PE class, saying goodbye to a friend named Alison who said she was cutting class to hang with her boyfriend, who had a couple of six-packs. They didn't make it back to school. I still see one friend's picture, 24 years later, adorning a list of victims in a MADD brochure. I am so glad I was not part of the drinking crowd. Kids have their whole lives to imbibe, if they choose to take that road. Leave the limit where it is and let them make it through high school and college with some shot at safety.
13 - Craig Lyndall
I am not indicating the answer with this question, but do you think the high drinking age has anything to do with the amount of pot kids smoke? Even popular kids were smoking pot when I graduated high school in 1997.
14 - Rob
Yeah, let them make it through high school and some college only to cut them loose on a drug with which they have absolutely no experience with.
I say drop the drinking age and increase education by encouraging parents to take a more active role in bringing up their children.
I would say that if more kids could call their parents for a ride home from a party without any worry about the "trouble" they'd be in you'd see less drunk drivers on the road.
15 - jadester
how come, for example, in some european countries they have it as part of their society that even kids are allowed some wine with their evening meal, and yet they have less problems with teenage/underage/excessive alcohol drinking than e.g. England? (excluding the holiday resorts where the problems are often caused by us English, and sometimes other countries too)
They have a different culture, which is fair enough, but i think it'd be interesting to lok at this one bit of it. The parents effectively educate their children on how to "respect" alcohol - i.e. don't overdo it that often, adn certainly don't drink and drive - from a pretty early age. Here in england, for example, most kids won't come into contact with alcohol until they are (minimum) 14. I didnt go out drinking until i was 16. The prevalent driking culture here is you go out and get quit drunk then stagger home, but you only realise how stupid it is to do it alot and for no other reason than being bored when you get older and see the young kids who try and buy 2 and 3 litre bottles of cheap cider on any night of the week, just so they can go get drunk bcos they are bored (and possibly their parents are shit/don't care about them)
I started working at a newsagents at home and i saw that it was the same groups of kids that would try it, that wanted to get drunk. it was depressing
16 - Hal Pawluk
"how come, for example, in some european countries they have it as part of their society that even kids are allowed some wine with their evening meal, and yet ...[you] ... see the young kids who try and buy 2 and 3 litre bottles of cheap cider on any night of the week, just so they can go get drunk bcos they are bored."
That about wraps it up for me. Thanks for the compelling refutation to the original post.
17 - Eric Olsen
A key difference between most of Europe (and Japan) and the U.S. is that social pressure is still much more effective there. In the U.S., with our culture of intense individualism, we just don't care very much about social pressure and therefore have to be more legalistic in order to keep order. This is a perhaps subtle, but hugely important difference.
I am all for parental involvement, education, "easing" kids into alcohol with a little here and a little there under supervised circumstances, BUT none of this tells me why the legal drinking age should be raised from a public safety standpoint.
It's pure statistics and direct cause and effect: if you lower the legal drinking age you increase drunken driving and resultant death and devastation. There is always going to be a bump in drinking at whatever age you set legality - 21 is the age of full majority and people are going to be able to handle access to alcohol much better at 21 than at 18. I'd make the drinking age OLDER if I could but I don't think that's legally supportable or politically feasible.
18 - Natalie Davis
I feel the same way about regulating pot that I do about regulating booze, Craig. (Although on principle, I think pot is righteous and booze is wicked. Of course, I don't take anything beyond the occasional ibuprofen.) Over 21? Go for it if you want, but if you drive under the influence, I hope the book is thrown at you. I have NO tolerance for DUI.
Even the popular kids did pot in '97? Wow. I graduated from HS in '79 (was a goody two-shoes) and the popular kids drank, but pot didn't become a huge thing until college (where I was still a goody two-shoes).
I don't trust parents to teach their kids anything responsible. I'm with Eric in wishing they could raise the drinking age. But yes, that won't happen.
19 - JR
Maybe we should issue people under 21 either a license to drink or a license to drive. Let them decide which one they're going to do. I prefer that they drink, as there are already enough bad sober drivers on the road.
20 - Natalie Davis
Better to drive (responsibly, defensively, safely) than to drink booze, which is just pointless. Many teens need to work and to help their parents out with chauffeuring around younger family members. Let teenagers be useful for once.
21 - JR
"Better to drive (responsibly, defensively, safely) than to drink booze, which is just pointless."
I'm not so sure. Driving has costs in natural resources and risks to other people. If someone can drink responsibly and get as much enjoyment as they would from driving, I'd say that's the better choice for them. (I'd go for the driver's license myself.) And if they can't be responsible, better they only put themselves at risk.
"Many teens need to work and to help their parents out with chauffeuring around younger family members. Let teenagers be useful for once."
That is of course where my idea falls apart. We really need to provide better mass transit and plan more efficient cities so that we become less dependent on cars. In much of America not having a car is like not having legs. Which by the way might have something to do with why we have such a problem with drunk driving.
And what's the fun of being a teenager if you have to be "useful"?
22 - Natalie Davis
Who says being a teenager is supposed to be fun?
Oh, and I am a big believer in mass transit (which indeed sucks). I didn't get a drivers' license and vehicle until my 29th year, and then only because I had become a mother and wanted reliable transportation to the hospital in case of emergency.
23 - Rob
Natalie,
Are you serious with this statement:
So who do we trust? Commercials? Congressmen? Who do you hold responsible for the upbringing of our children if you don't trust parents?
I think that statements like those are a big problem in this country. You're underestimating the ability of parents to do their job. You're giving up on them. I'm not prepared to do that.
24 - Natalie Davis
Serious as a heart attack.
I absolutely hold parents accountable. I just believe most of them are worthless and do a horrible job with their children.
25 - Rob
I too hold parents responsible. That's why I think they should be encouraged to take a larger role in their children's lives. It would solve so many problems.
But I guess you've already made up your mind that most parents are worhtless and so want to legislate all our problems away.
What a sad and cynical outlook. Good luck with that.