4 - Wednesday, June 5,

Forty million already are.
And some [6 per cent of all
Soviet babies are born with
brain damage due to drinking
by their parents.

The report. apparently
States: “‘In 12 to 15 years we
will cease to exist as a normal
state. A state in which half
the adult papulation is
alcoholic won't be able to de-
fend the country, net to men-
tion produce anything.”’

Meanwhile, in the U.S.,
according to Time, the trend
is toward Perrier water. Only
67 per cent of the adults ad-
mit to drinking liquor at all,
and a third of them have cut
down it: the last few years.

More than just a part of
the fitness craze, the drying
up of America reveals a new
set of values. As one
psychology prof put it: ‘It
has become a sign of status,
as a whole, sensuous human
being, to have the ability to
control your impulses."’

Does this tell us something
amazing about the future?
Instead of World War Three

1985 - North Shore News

strictly personal

by Bob Hunter
News on booze

ooze is in the news again. In Russia, where
vodka is sold with a throw- -away~ caprrat
kiosks, gift shops, food stores, just about

everywhere, a secret report warns that within a
decade or so, half the population will be alcoholics.

being a nuke exchange,
maybe the flat-tummied,
Perrier-sipping Yanks will
just jog in and take over from
the vodka-soaked potato
heads without a Pershing be-
ing fired.

Imagine being in Russia,
probably best described as
being like a country where
the post office ran
everything.

Would you have any faith
in a national alcoholism con-
trol program run by Com-
rade Smirnoff The point is,
alcoholism has become an
epidemic in the U.S.S.R. Yet
it seems to be abatin, as a
disease in the U.S. Surely

there must be lessons for us

here, apart from the obvious
political implication, which is
that Communism is enough
to drive people to drink.
The availability of booze
behind the Iron Curtain is, by
all reports, phenomenal. You
can buy it in your taxi, at a
bus stop, even sometimes
from the police. In this
regard, booze is even more

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pervasive there than in
France, which used to be con-
sidered the hardest-drinking
nation, and where one-half
the hospital beds are taken up
with alcohol-related
disorders,

Yet, as we all know, bouze
is available almost anywhere
in the States, 100. | love step-
ping into an American
grocery store, grabbing a six-
pack from the fridge, scoring
a@ newspaper, some sand-
wiches and any number of
other goodies all in one
sweep, instead of lining up in
a government liquor store,
being served by beatific (sic)
civil servants.

The Yanks, with their
capitalist ways should surely
be as blotto as the Russians
and French. But the polls say
no, they're going in the other
direction. They're becoming,
good grief, wholesome!

985-8291

N. VANCOUVER
1905 LONSDALE AVENUE
Mon.-Wed. 7:30-5:30
Thurs.-Fri. 7:30-9:00
Sat. 9:00-5:30

In British Columbia, as
you know, booze is in the
news, too. And as usual we

are) wandering somewhere
between Ivan and the
Yuppies.

Despite estimates that
alcohol abuse costs the public
purse some $2 billion a year,
the government is going
ahead with the gradual semi-
privatization of the liquor in-
dustry, making booze more
‘convenient’ to get: being
able to drink in an airport on
Sundays, allowing wine
stores to hang out their vine,
draft beer in restaurants, that
sort of thing.

Thank gosdiess for the
airport bit, | say. Scratch an
absolutely calm frequent
flyer and what do you find
inside? A white-knuckler cry-
ing to be let out, I fly enough
to know that a little false
courage goes a long way.

Yet, happy as I am to be
able to pull down some cool
suds at whim, I know perfect-
ly well that, regardless of
how moderate | may per-
sonally be, how totally in
control of my urges 1 am, and
how utterly immune | happen
to be to sales pitches aimed at
stimulating my thirst (stop
laughing), there are others,

St Clair

The paint and paper people

plenty of them, who haven't
got that kind of iron grip on
themselves.

There'll be slightly more
abuse. No way around it. So-
meone will get hurt who
would 't have got hurt other-
wise, whether it's in a car ac-
cident or thanks to a rotting
fiver.

Ata family party the other
day, I noticed somebody giv-
ing my year-old daughter a
sip of beer. Oh, she liked
that! Her face lit up. She
grabbed for ike glass.
Everybody Iaughed. And of
course she liked the atten-
tion, too. More beer. At
which point Daddy stepped
in to say that's enough, to
everybody's disappointment.

You can sce the pattern so
clearly. Social approval. Bar-
tiers coming down,
Liberalization. Privatization.

A lot of people
call life p
“The Survival of
the Fittest”
You know, a lot

of people are q
right.

PaRTIGPaTON ™

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1 wonder how my beloved
daughter will fare in her per-
sonal encounter in life with
alcohol? Certainly, if is going
to be much more available to
her as she grows up than it
was to me. And f have no
reason to think that’s a good
thing, trends in the U.S.
notwithstanding.

fi Ronald J. Schmidt

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