After realising a large amount of my classmates were concentrating on women, I decided to try to find a different subject more unique to my essay. I began to explore, in the same way that Hogarth had, how drinking alcohol effects culture. In today's age and in British culture it is impossible not to absorb the views that drinking large amounts of alcohol is normal in the young population; whether its right or wrong.
Hogarth depicted the good and bad of alcohol by showing the positive effects of beer in his print Beer Street, and by showing the negative effects of spirits in his print Gin Lane. In my essay I explore the context behind his reasons for creating these prints and the immense effects these prints had on the public opinion and subsequent laws on spirits.
I have decided to thoroughly research into alcohol in Britain today and below are some images of some of my written up findings:
Experts have warned that liver disease is on the rise among people in their early 30s.
'Working in clubs now, I see people lose control constantly - they arrive looking great, dressed up for a night out, and often leave in a total state. It's really put me off to be honest.'
The DrugScope report says about 1.4 million people aged over 65 exceed recommended drinking limits.
And between 2002 and 2010 alcohol-related hospital admissions for men aged 65 and over have risen by 136% and for women by 132%.
Office for National Statistics figures show alcohol-related deaths among the over-75s are at their highest level since 1991, when records began
"Drugs and alcohol issues may affect older people differently, but that does not make them less real or important. They may be a symptom of other problems, such as loneliness and isolation, caring for a partner, bereavement or the struggle to make ends meet."It's time to bring this largely 'invisible' issue into the light and to improve the support for older people with drug and alcohol issues”
Research has clearly shown that most cases of melanoma are caused by overexposure to UV rays - you can reduce the risk by avoiding sunburn”
Risk increased proportionately with alcohol intake - those who drank 50g of ethanol daily (the equivalent of a few strong beers) were up to 55% more likely to develop the deadliest form of skin cancer called melanoma compared with non or occasional drinkers.
"And whether or not alcohol is linked to skin cancers, it's still a good idea to limit the amount you drink. Alcohol is linked to seven different types of cancer, and cutting down can cut the risk."
Officials estimate that 1.3% of sales - 200m litres - will become more expensive and this will lead to an overall drop in consumption of 0.04%.
Official figures suggest the scheme will cost business £4m to implement and the Treasury will lose £5m. But they also project savings of £5m for the NHS and almost £4m because of fewer crimes.
Ministers say that setting a pricing floor will target "pre-loading" in which people consume heavily discounted supermarket drink before going out to pubs and clubs. One small research project found that two-thirds of young people arrested for alcohol-related disorder in one city had pre-loaded with cheap alcohol.
Crime Prevention Minister Norman Baker said: "The coalition government is determined to tackle alcohol-fuelled crime, which costs England and Wales around £11bn a year.
"Banning the sale of alcohol below duty plus VAT will stop the worst examples of very cheap and harmful drink."
She agrees the widespread impression of the alcoholic as a vagrant or street-drinker prevents higher-functioning people with drink problems from seeking help. But she says the best way to tackle this is to correct false stereotypes, not downplay the situation faced by such individuals - many of whom are already in denial.
"People normalise heavy drinking," she says. "They tend to overestimate what everyone else drinks. They say, 'I don't drink as much as my friends so it's OK.'"
Dr Jarvis says it is a shame the words"hazardous" or "harmful" drinker aren't used more widely.
The issue with the use of the word "alcoholic" is that it is narrow. "You are either one or you are not," Leighton says. "This is why some people prefer the term 'alcohol dependence'. You can be an alcoholic without drinking too much - it is all about dependence, about losing control."
Historically
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-25712005
For hundreds of years alcohol claimed a prize place among the pills, potions and healing herbs of British pharmaceutical history.
A drop of gin was once advised to ward off the plague, a glug of wine to "defend the body from corruption" and a sip of absinthe to cure the body of roundworms.
According to the translation (published in 1683) Bacon suggests wine could: "Preserve the stomach, strengthen the natural heat, help digestion, defend the body from corruption, concoct the food till it be turned into very blood."
But he also recognises the dangers of consuming ethanol in excess: "If it be over-much guzzles, it will on the contrary do a great deal of harm: For it will darken the understanding, ill-affect the brain... beget shaking of the limbs and bleareyedness."
Absinthe, for example, distilled from herbs such as wormwood, has been documented for use against roundworms and other intestinal parasites for many years.
But according to Dr James Nicholls, of Alcohol Research UK, by the 18th Century spirits such as gin were considered by a growing number of people to be a major cause of drunkenness, poverty and crime.
Yet one of the most modern pieces to feature in the exhibition is a bottle of Atkinson's Infants Preservative, a remedy for teething babies, dated between 1919-1941.
The packaging reassures parents it can be given "with the utmost confidence" as it had no narcotic content. It does however contain 50% alcohol among its ingredients.
"But it wasn't until 1941 that legislation in Great Britain forced pharmaceutical manufacturers to list all the ingredients in their medicines."
Over the years the Royal College of Physicians has had a long history of raising awareness of the health damage caused by alcohol.
The college is currently calling for a range of measures, including a fifty pence minimum price per unit of alcohol in the UK and tighter restrictions on marketing and advertising, particularly where children may be exposed to it.
The college says: "Alcohol is a factor in more than forty serious medical conditions, including liver disease and cancer, and one of the major preventable causes of death in the UK."
Links to articles related to teen and student binge drinking:
Alcohol statistics:
http://www.alcoholconcern.org.uk/campaign/statistics-on-alcohol
http://alcoholeducationtrust.org/Pages/factfig.html
'alcohol, solvents and tobacco (all unclassified drugs) are rated more dangerous than ecstasy, 4-MTA and LSD (all class A drugs). If the current ABC system is retained, alcohol would be rated a class A drug and tobacco class B.':
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/horizon/broadband/tx/drugs/
Underestimated consumption of alcohol:
http://www.nhs.uk/news/2013/02February/Pages/Binge-drinking-rates-could-be-higher-than-thought.aspx
Things to do instead of drinking:
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/drinkawares
'I can honestly not remember one time in my life where I had a few drinks and relaxed. I can only remember times when I had a few drinks, then had a few more drinks, then had a few more drinks and then everyone else was unable to relax.'
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/why-i-quit-drinking
THE NORM: it seems normal for starbucks to start selling it from 4pm. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-26676655
Alcoholism: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25639406
Minimum prices on alcohol:
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/what-would-change-if-they-introduced-a-minimum-price-for-alcohol
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26040550
'Excessive drinking paired with art has always been deeply entrenched in any city’s culture. Berlin's best proof is the cinematographic document Berlin Drinking Battle by Rolf S. Wolkenstein and Wolfgang Hogekamp. The film was made in 1989, just one night before the fall of the Berlin wall. Obviously, they managed to somehow document their benders on video':
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/when-drinking-becomes-art-and-art-becomes-an-excuse-to-drink
Club scene:
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/ten-ways-to-improve-clubbing-in-2014
Sexual harrassment in clubs: Good examples which could be made into comic strip style:
http://www.theguardian.com/education/2013/nov/05/sexual-harassment-clubs-students
Pictures of drunk girls: http://acidcow.com/girls/11169-drunk-girls-119-pics.html
Lad culture:
http://www.theguardian.com/education/2014/feb/21/nus-summit--lad-culture-live-blog
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/a-big-night-out-withbritains-biggest-lads
'Depending on your perspective, you could level the blame at anything from the international financial crisis to the legacy of Jackass. It might be the bleak employment prospects young people are facing, it might be Grand Theft Auto, it might be Uni Lad culture, it might be British society's lack of respect for alcohol, it might be parents, it might be the lack of religious education in schools. '
'As Cormac McCarthy said in No Country For Old Men, "the point is there is no point". Some men just want to watch their own hair burn. ' - The youth feel the pressure of so much in a far more intense way than those generations before; the internet such as facebook and twitter provide a constant awaiting audience to laugh with you or at you, to kick you when your down or celebrate when you succeed; there is far more involvement of people, that aren't in your intimate circle, in your life. There is much more pressure to be the fraction of people who beat the odds and do well in this time of recession... to be the one friend in the group that can afford to be living away from their parents homes at 25.
'As Cormac McCarthy said in No Country For Old Men, "the point is there is no point". Some men just want to watch their own hair burn. ' - The youth feel the pressure of so much in a far more intense way than those generations before; the internet such as facebook and twitter provide a constant awaiting audience to laugh with you or at you, to kick you when your down or celebrate when you succeed; there is far more involvement of people, that aren't in your intimate circle, in your life. There is much more pressure to be the fraction of people who beat the odds and do well in this time of recession... to be the one friend in the group that can afford to be living away from their parents homes at 25.
'So maybe this is an unconscious attempt to reclaim the generation gap. I mean, your dad might be able to download the same Joy Orbison track on the same day as you, but he's unlikely to drink a gallon of vodka and urine, right?' - binge drinking is something that, in our culture, we can get away with while we are young, we are very aware that it is not socially acceptable once you grow out of this period.
' NekNominations, the cinnamon challenge, et al really are the closest thing we have to punk in 2014. Society has created a dirty pint of neglect, debt, unemployment and substance abuse, and now it has to down it. In one.'
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/neknominations-are-the-last-subculture
Neknominations:
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/neknominate-is-a-fun-new-social-media-game-for-perpetually-drunk-australians
NekNom Deaths:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/10649164/NekNominate-alcohol-deaths-rise-fuelled-by-online-drinking-games.html
Students compared to young hippies: returning to a child like state such as reckless behaviour to prolong time away from entering the adult world which includes little job and house prospects - recession:
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/big-night-out/the-drunken-student-disco
Is alcohol a chemical solution:
http://thefinchandpea.com/2012/12/01/science-caturday-is-alcohol-the-solution/
Alcohol related deaths:
http://www.nhs.uk/news/2012/02February/Pages/uk-alcohol-deaths-predicted.aspx
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-25930184
Alcohol related deaths in young women rise:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-23371340
Anti binge drinking: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25652991
Alcohol misuse in the baby boomers: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-26353044
VIDEOS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5WjqoLfQjo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHNO58RgnxQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NV13MDIvbHg
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=binge%20drinking%20documentary&sm=3
