Sunday, April 5, 2009

Alcoholism in Brazil

Alcoholism is rampant in Brazil. No wonder, you can buy alcohol practically at any corner. Even in padarias—which in Brazil is a liquor store-cum-bakery-cum-snack bar—you can buy booze. If you don’t want your kids to drink, why do we have bars and padarias serving alcohol across from schools? And many of them don’t even care if they are serving a minor, so if you like to be three sheets to the wind; Brazil is the place to be.

Am I a teetotaler? No. I believe people should be able to drink, but unfortunately, not everybody. Some people can’t hold their liquor and start making all sorts of trouble. Alcohol has been destroying families for a very long time in Brazil and it’ll keep on doing so for a very long time to come. Virtually every family has a pé-de-cana, drunkard. So of course, mine has one. Actually, we had three, but two of them are pushing up daisies now. I may sound callous by using that expression, but tipplers have that effect on me. We feel pity and anger all the time we are around them.

Brazilians need a lot of detox clinics. Lots of spouse beating and child abuse are caused by alcohol intake.

And neighbors are victims, too, not only of beatings but a lot of screaming, scandals, noise, because most boozers are loudmouths and troublemakers. If you do some research on emergency rooms, you’ll find how many acts of violence perpetrated by victims or aggressors are somehow alcohol related. Yes, lushes become victims too because one day somebody’s supply of patience runs out. And let’s not forget the number of people injured or killed by drunk drivers, do you need figures?

If you can buy easily, you drink more. Just check out the statistics. Booze is certainly not for everyone. If you realize you’ll become a problem for others, stop drinking now (if you can’t on your own, seek help), if you just want to escape reality, drink alone and don’t bug anyone. If you are able to hold your liquor, then, I guess you can take part in human interaction.

Drunkards are similar to manic-depressive types, or people with bipolar disorder.

I noticed that a long time ago. When they are drunk the id takes over and they do all sorts of evil stuff. Then, when they sober up many of them regret the harm they have caused and become nice to compensate for all the nastiness. So a lot of people say, “He is so nice when he is not drunk”, which becomes the motto of people who have to live with boozehounds.

Should we reenact the Prohibition laws?

No way!

That would just cause a crime wave because people need to get inebriated in order to escape the harsh reality of their empty lives or to relax enough to muster the courage to do something, etc. Should we decriminalize other drugs since alcohol is legal? No way, one legalized evil is more than enough; even though the fact people can’t take those other drugs cause crime all over the world for the same reason Prohibition generated gangster in the USA. The fact is it is better to fight crime and hospitalize junkies than to have more junkies around due to the fact it would be easier to get drugs since they’d be available all over like alcohol in Brazil.

And those people who want to legalize drugs are so naïve, they think everybody is responsible, they think people can control themselves. The truth is we need government or a big daddy because a great number of people are irresponsible and weak, which is one of the reasons I'm not an anarchist or an advocate of laissez-faire capitalism. Authority makes it easier for cowards to lead a good life, since if they were given freedom they'd trash their lives, and the lives of those around them as well. Fear keeps them from doing a lot of bad stuff. Some people can’t deal with freedom of choice, they mess it all up. The price of freedom is responsibility.

I’m actually in favor of the Dutch Solution.

We ought to have legalized drug zones in every city and prohibit consumption in other parts of the city, except at home, because how could any government enforce the law if people were not allowed to drink or take drugs at home, anyway? If we sectioned off parts of the city where people would be allowed to take drugs and deployed the police around those areas, it would be much easier to fight crime. And the detox clinics should be in those areas as well to make it faster to rescue overdose victims, etc. I guess that would be a middle-of-the-road solution. But I doubt very much that will ever happen in Brazil, the odds of that happening are the same as the pope becoming a member of the Igreja Universal, a Brazilian evangelical church, but that’s just my two cents.

The only way to control drugs is by controlling the supply, not the demand. Criminalizing drug or alcohol users will take us nowhere. We have to treat them as patients and detoxify them somehow, or as many as we can. But if drugs are so easily available, it is much easier for people to get addicted. And I don’t believe everybody is alike, I don’t believe everybody is equal, this is a pipe dream invented by democracy, which I defend even though I don’t like everything in it. Some people are able to hold their liquor, some aren’t. If you can’t hold your liquor, don’t hold me accountable for my actions if you give me hell on earth because of the drunken monkey on your back. I understand your situation but I’ll give you hell right back because I'm no saint. And I can always say I have a mood-control disorder when faced with a blotter, that can be a disease, too, can’t it?

Author: joedasilva.wordpress.com

No comments:

Post a Comment