Vikings in the piazza

[randomness]

From http://www.economist.com/world/europe/displayStory.cfm?story_id=3536125:

"Britain's cities are already among the booziest in the world, and the worry is that they will become more alcohol-sodden once the old restrictions are done away with. The new act addresses some fears by giving local authorities more powers to move against troublesome pubs. But as Andrew McNeill, director of the Institute for Alcohol Studies, an independent think-tank, puts it, “It's not that the Pig & Whistle is badly managed. The problem is that there are 40 Pig & Whistles in a tiny area.”

"Drink has become more of a problem partly because Britons are drinking more. The average adult consumed 11.2 litres of pure alcohol last year—12% more than when Labour came to power, and more than twice as much as in the middle of the 20th century. While most Europeans have cut back in recent years and Americans continue in their moderate ways, the British and Irish are both on seemingly unstoppable benders.

"But the real problem is the way Britons drink. Like Scandinavians, they like to get very drunk, but their drinking habits are as sociable as more moderate Mediterranean tipplers. British institutions such as the round and the pub crawl encourage group boozing and clusters of outlets—a trend that has accelerated since the early 1990s as a result of more liberal licensing. The hope was that allowing people to drink when and where they want would encourage self-restraint. The effect so far has been akin to letting Vikings loose in the piazza."

Comments

re: drinking in eng-a-lund

[yoshimi.livejournal.com]

hi there. i'm friends with a few of your friends, specifically tenzil (real life, extended) and bronzemountain (real life, brief) and welcomerain (l.j. life only) so i came across you on my friendsfriends page.

that being said ...

my husband & i took all our prenatal classes recently and discovered this fun fact from a couple who spent the first five or so months of their pregnancy in the u.k.: apparently, in the classes there, they recommend that you drink "only a pint or two per day" and that you "moderate" your smoking, presumably based in large part on the trend identified in your post! we were fascinated ... while i'm not completely opposed to a glass of red wine while p.g., two pints of guinness would pretty much get me looped!

it's different over there, i tell you ...

At first I thought this was a restaurant review

[ddreslough.livejournal.com]

For "Vikings in the Pizza". :) Those Brits have such terrible drinking problems...tsktsktsk...Not like us Americans! Where's my coffee? gotta have more coffee...

[lillibet.livejournal.com]

We noticed this when we lived there. It does feel very different, somehow--it's much more socially acceptable to drink what Americans (well, this American and the crowd I run with) would think of as "a lot" and to be drunk in public. Friday night on the tube can be quite exciting. A sign that things are getting worse: when we were in London last week we noticed a pretty substantial and expensive campaign against drunk driving (or "drink driving," as they put it) that included some quite shocking ads (e.g. guy is encouraged by buddies to have another pint as girl eyeing him begins walking over...just as she reaches the table, there's the sound of screeching brakes and she's thrown to the floor, obviously badly injured or killed--very startling).

The other thing we noticed is that London seemed much more violent than any city either of us have ever lived in. Not only did we frequently witness fights on the street (personal favorite: a man attempting to fight his way onto a bus against the combined efforts of the driver and conductor while his girlfriend held his suit jacket and whacked his opponents about the head and shoulders with her purse screaming--well, slurring--"don't you touch my boyfrien'"...and this was in posh Kensington), but there were well over 400 violent attacks against tube personnel in 2001 (according to posters in the tube). While I know some people credit this to guns being scarce, I can't help but think that the omnipresence of alcohol probably fuels it.

[tyellas.livejournal.com]

Regrettably NZ has picked up on some of the UK's drinking habits, with the resulting dramatic anti-drunk-driving ads. I can deal with the ritual of the beer-on-Friday-afternoon at the workplace - at about 4:30, my co-workers down tools and have a beer or a glass of wine, sponsored by the company. They've gotten the idea that I don't drink, but the atmosphere here makes me understand where "social drinking" comes from.

Worst of all, for me, is how this impacts dating. The usual dating procedure here is to go out drinking, hook up with someone, and if you fancy them the next day, start seeing them. Honestly, I'm not making this up. I once had someone who was interested in me say, upon learning that I didn't drink at all, "But if you don't get drunk, then how can I get you to go to bed with me?" -smacks forehead-

[nafe.livejournal.com]

It's almost a statistical certainty that I've told you my story of the one time I haplessly took part in this particular mating ritual. But, now that folks are talking about it, it seems less odd that the guy I went on a pub date with in London, brought me home after I'd splorfed all overmyself at a club, stuck me in the shower, pulled me back out, and then proceeded to have sex with me regardless. Ah, romance.

[amelia-g.livejournal.com]

I once made the mistake of trying to keep up with real Brits (as opposed to my mere being born there status) during a photo shoot. Not the best pix I ever shot.