Cranky Aussie|A better class of whinging…

I often like to sit and watch the news so I can keep up with what’s happening in the world. Sometimes I learn something educational and sometimes I want to put my head in a blender and switch it to Frappe.

This is one of those times.

The Australian Government has decided to save binge drinking teenage girls by raising the price on “Alcopops“. Alcopops, for those that are wondering, stands for pre-mix drinks like Bacardi Breezers and such.

The thinking behind this marvelous piece of societal crap is that teenage girls won’t be able to afford to buy these “Alcopops” and will therefore stop drinking and go on to live happy and fulfilling lives.

At this point I would like to warn our younger and/or more impressionable readers that there may be some profanity on the next line.

BULLSHIT!!

Ah, much better. Now, unlike politicians I live in a place I like to call REALITY. Anyone who has spent more than fifteen seconds with a teenager, or even possibly been one themselves in the deep distant past, will know they are not idiots.

Mostly.

If they can’t afford to buy these drinks then they will simply switch to cheap wine and beer like the rest of us did when we were their age.

Ah yes, I have fond partial memories of spending many a Friday night, Saturday, Saturday Night, Sunday getting hammered on beer and goon (look it up), though not necessarily at the same time. That was saved for special occasions.

Remember Passion Pop? I do, I even have some memories of actually drinking it. Passion Pop, for the uninitiated, is an extremely cheap wine that has the uncanny ability to effect the drinker from the ground up. You can sit and drink for hours, just so long as you don’t try to do something silly like drive, operate heavy machinery or stand up. It is evil tasting crap but you didn’t drink it for the taste, you drank it to get cataclysmicly drunk.

This is what today’s youth are doing with these Alcopops, they might taste sweet and have the extra function of being something pretty to look at after losing the ability to speak in coherent sentences, but the basic intention of drinking them is to get drunk. You take them away and kids will drink something else.

“Okay,” I hear you say, “But what does this have to do with you?”

Well I’ll tell you, if you would be so kind as to stop interrupting.

I have been known to have the occasional tipple and my drink of choice is Johnny Walker and Cola. This is not the choice of your average teen single-mother-to-be yet the cost of my drink will also increase.

Why?

Am I a binge drinker? Not as far as you know, yet I must suffer so someone in the federal government can say they’re doing something to address the problem of teenage binge drinking.

Sure, I could buy Scotch by the bottle and make my own drinks but nothing beats the convenience of NOT NEEDING TOO.

But what choice do I have now? The price will go up whether I like it or not which means my simple pleasures will cost even more than they do now.

But wait, there’s more.

Anti-smoking groups, not happy enough with being able to fine people for smoking, are now demanding the same tax to be imposed on cigarettes. It’s a filthy, disgusting habit that offends many in the community yet they still insist that people stop smoking.

This is a free society, I should be able to kill myself in the slowest, most pleasurable way possible without some loony jumping up and down and demanding I pay extra for the privilege.

Why must we continually be harrased by wankers who seem to feel it’s their God given duty to tell us how to live our lives?

Honestly, it’s enough to drive a man too drink. Now where did I put that case of Passion Pop?

Of course I am talking about that race of people that no one likes. They’re filthy, disgusting throwbacks to a bygone era. The sooner they’re eradicated from the face of the earth the better it will be for all of us right thinking folk.

No it’s not the rebirth of Eugenics, it’s the new found sport of smoker bashing.

That’s right, it’s fun for all the family. Come one, come all and join in the bigotry that we can all partake in (well mostly all) because we’re the majority and they’re a minority.

Plus, they smell.

Smokers, the great unwashed masses that are easy to spot, they’re the ones huddled together outside their place of work, trying vainly to warm themselves over the smouldering embers of their chosen vice. Come rain or shine, if they want a smoke they are OUTTA HERE!

Here in sunny Queensland, the only Australian state worth mentioning these days, our lovely Premier Peter Beattie took it upon himself to ordain the legalisation of minority bashing by making it a criminal offence to smoke.

Yes, you can be arrested for smoking.

Sharon stone would be rolling over in her botox grave.

Well okay, you can’t really get arrested, well at least not straight away. If you don’t pay the hefty fines they throw at you for lighting up within 4 metres of a doorway, or in a wide open area like a beach, then they can do whatever the court says they can do to you, and that includes locking you up and throwing away the key. Ironically once inside prison then you can smoke with impunity, as well as take drugs and other… things.

But public clubs and bars are the best. They are allowed to have smoking sections, but they must be outside and way from everyone else, plus they have to be in special sealed off areas. These areas are typically small, I mean what establishment wants to spend a fortune one what is basically a minority client? So you get a pile of people crowded into a small smoke filled area. If you didn’t have lung cancer before you went in there you will most likely have it by the time you leave.

I wonder how many law suits will ensue from enforcing lung cancer on smokers.

Not that it matters really. They’re a small minority and getting smaller by the minute. Dying off or converting to the majority, these smokers really are a dying breed.

Pass the Winnies Dear, I’m starting to feel stressed.