Under The Influence
Inuman or drinking sprees are widely accepted “social events” wherein the men gather for rounds of gin, rum or beer. It’s considered unmanly if you refuse to join (makes me thankful that I’m not a man). The test of “macho-ness” is measured by how much of the drinks you can down, no matter if your speech starts to become slurred and you can’t even stand up straight. You even wonder where they get the money to indulge in alcohol, when their wives are having problems budgeting the meager income they bring in for the basic necessities and their children miss school. I don’t know if a free (if there is such a thing) Alcohol Rehab would work for them since they probably won’t even acknowledge that it’s a problem, because, hey, everybody’s doing it and it’s not as bad as drug addiction! The thing is, alcohol IS a drug, and alcoholism IS and addiction, albeit a more socially acceptable one. Hence the need for Alcohol Treatment.
Now, while alcohol is okay in moderation, statistics do show that it has directly or indirectly caused a lot of deaths, accidental or otherwise, if too much is imbibed. Driving while under the influence of alcohol is a particularly common, and preventable, cause of a lot of road accidents. Not to mention other crimes, like rape, for which the perpetuator could only offer a weak excuse of being under the influence of alcohol.
This does not even take into account the fact that too much alcohol does things to your body. Things like cirrhosis, pancreatitis, epilepsy, heart diseases, alcohol dementia etc. It’s linked to increased chances of cancer. And for those who are very particular about it, it actually decreases sexual performance.
While I’ve began the subject stating that drinking sprees are common among the lower income bracket, this is not limited to them. We’ve heard of people from the other side of the social pole who have similar problems with alcoholism. Their families, if they acknowledge the problem, could afford to send their erring loved ones to Private Alcohol Rehab for treatment sans the publicity and the pain.
Now what do we do with the people who can’t afford rehab and still deny that they have a problem with alcohol?
Alcoholism is a form of escape from a wretched life. Though there are other forms, alcohol has had the widest variety that fits into ones budget.
However, the problem of alcoholism, I believe, cannot be solved by any rehab. It is like trying to cure the effect and not the cause. There’s a reason why the lower income brackets suffer from this precarious habit. It runs deeper, and unless it’s identified any form of escape is welcomed: be it alcohol, drugs or violence.
September 11th, 2009 at 5:42 pm