September 22, 2007
Why do people freak out about liquor?
Anna, a little town here in Texas north of Dallas, voted in 2005 to allow the sale of beer, wine and liquor. It narrowly passed. Now, it’s being brought up on the ballet again in November to see if sales will be banned.
A quote from the Dallas Morning News article about the vote:
“I know from listening to the community it was the liquor that bothered everybody,” said Ms. Luther, president of the Anna Chamber of the Commerce. She said she supports the anti-alcohol measure personally, but the chamber is neutral.
Later, another quote:
If the proposition is successful, the town could always come back and petition to sell beer and wine only, Mr. Deragon said. If they did, he added, “I don’t think you’ll see much of a fight.”
And here’s what I don’t understand: Why is it that Beer and Wine are just hunky-dory, but Liquor is some super-evil demon?
Did these people not go through roughly the same education system that I did that taught us that a glass of Beer, a glass of Wine, and a shot of Liquor all have the same alcohol content?
They say crime follows liquor, but it doesn’t follow beer and wine? I’m failing to see the logic. When I was living in Jersey City, NJ, we had a deli across the street that sold beer, wine and liquor 7 days a week from opening till closing. Crime wasn’t really an issue in our neighborhood. Not more so than anywhere else I’ve lived, which includes places that had no alcohol sales.
Can someone explain the mental jumping-jacks needed to allow beer and wine, but somehow make liquor this bringer of evil?
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9 Responses to “Why do people freak out about liquor?”
This is just speculation right off the top of my head, but the distinction, like so many unexamined beliefs, may have historical roots in notions of which none of its adherents are aware. In the early nineteenth century, in England and the US, anyway, a temperance movement arose whose proponents condemned the use of ‘hard liquor’ (such as corn likker and applejack here in the States). Later on the teetotalers and abstainers, those who frowned on wine and beer as well as the ‘hard stuff’, came to the fore, but it may be that folks have inherited the old beer and wine/hard liquor dichotomy through some kind of folksy transmission through the generations. Anyway, it’s the kind of shaky distinction that allows people to make political compromises, so in that sense it has some use for them.
I have an 1840s housekeeping manual, by the way, that not only features guidelines for making various herbal wines but which states that “beer is a good drink for families”.
Beer is a good drink for families. Beer is proof that G-d loves us and wants us to be happy. I read that on a bumper sticker, so it must be true. Following that unflawed logic, Single Malt Scotch, Vodka, and Kentucky Bourbon are proof of a love so profound, why, it’s almost Biblical. Here in our corner of the not-quite-Midwest-but-too-far-west-to-be-East (AKA Bible Belt), there are laws that prohibit the sale of G-d’s bottled love on Sunday. It’s a challenge for a mother to keep her family happy on Sunday with laws like those on the books. Something should be done.
Yep–that’s the way it is here in TX: no sale of liquor after 9 p.m. or before 10 a.m. and no sales on Sunday. Presumably a person could buy several cases at 8:59 and, waiting outside, give it away to friends who showed up late due to blurry watches. But Sunday? They actually used to have a thing here called “the blue laws” (?) that made it against the law for your basic retail stores to be open on Sunday. There was some strange argument always made about the need to make sure employees weren’t prevented from attending church because of work schedules–but this was apparently not a worry when it came to faiths that don’t typically hold their services on Sunday. The people who vote an area dry are the same ones who will shoot you for stepping on their lawns.
Can someone explain the mental jumping-jacks needed to allow beer and wine, but somehow make liquor this bringer of evil?
Wine’s fine
But liquor’s quicker
All answers can be found in great poetry.
It is a clear attempt to legislate the shopping schedules of normal Americans. Only Abnormal Americans would support such a diabolical plot. I think we should band together and boot out the Abnormals. Boot them right out, I say.
All the answers can be found in great poetry. Agreed:
But if at the Church they would give us some ale,
And a pleasant fire our souls to regale,
We’d sing and we’d pray all the live-long day,
And never once wish from the Church to stray.
Hey, Daryl, can you roll on Sunday in Texas?
Hey, Daryl, can you roll on Sunday in Texas?
No, and I don’t roll on Shabbas either.
Oh, wait…I think you’re okay with less than an ounce. Not like the old days when residue on the clip was time in Huntsville.
I reckon I used up four, maybe five of my nine lives back in them old days. Gives me the heebie-jeebies just to recollect.
“Mind if I do a jay?”
“Get a job, sir.”