Resistance is Phutile

Keep your iron levels up.

Guiness, they say, is good for you. Lots of iron. Forget "an apple a day keeps the dentist away" (or was it doctor?) or "carrots help you see in the dark". Of all the classic medicinal anecdotes, I hear the Guiness one most often. But then, I do work in a pub.

Shreds of truth buried in misleading packaging, these types of anecdotes have long featured in motherspeak, although the Guiness one is of course more at home slouched against a sticky bar somewhere. It is at this bar that the words of advice will be bandied around throughout the evening, more out of mock defence of drinking habits than a low level ambition of becoming a GP.

Yes, it seems we're pretty fond of these little pearls of wisdom which contain less scientific importance than their frequent appearance in everyday speech would suggest. However, I was nonetheless surprised to see New Labour's propaganda machine indulging in some irrelevantly accurate medical advice of their own.

As we learn that to qualify as a binge drinker you simply have to sink four pints in one sitting, those helpful Labour boys warn us that binge drinking can in fact lead to an eighty pound fine.

Now, unlike some, I think the current trend of health based propaganda is a not entirely evil thing. Damn those bastards, I've heard people say, force feeding us graphic messages of what smoking can to do us. They've even attacked salty, fatty food. Well, as someone who has pretty much quit smoking (all but the occasional one when drunk) after five years of trying, I was actually appreciative of the fatty deposit imagery which made me look away in disgust.

However, I really can't imagine the next time I'm buying that fourth pint that the threat of the fine will have the same effect.

Let's face it, the people receiving these fines will have likely far exceeded the four pint mark. This is Britain. Dominika, a Polish bar maid who lives with four hard drinking, vodka loving Polish lads tells me she cannot understand this country where people drink eight, nine, ten pints everday in the pub.

It is hard to know what to do about the drunken violence on Friday nights. Not that I want to work later, but I do think increased drinking hours will eventually have a positive effect. Eventually. But the eighty pound fine? Have a laugh.If the threat of mutilation or death does not prevent people drink-driving, the loss of an average Friday night's budget will never prevent them just drinking.

Besides, people will wonder, what's all the fuss? Guiness is good for you. Lots of iron.

posted by Phu @ 6:03 pm