Xueyang Lin (Edward)
Ms. Fuentes
ENG 101-90E
04/24/2013
Alcohol and Media
Human beings began to drink alcohol in 10000 B.C. and there are hundreds of kinds of
alcohol in the world. A lot of people drink and even some monkeys like to eat fermenting fruit that
tastes like alcohol. It seems like drinking is very natural but a lot of people have different ideas.
They claim that the media has serious negative influences on our culture. One of the most
important is the media is always telling us alcohol is great. It brings us happiness; it makes us
more attractive and leads to good relationship, and there is no negative consequence. But
actually, alcohol causes a lot of problems and the alcohol is wrongly portrayed by the media.
Some people say the alcohol advertisement should be modified so they would be more sociably
responsible. And they even think alcohol advertisement should be banned from primetime
television so less people have access to that kind of content. Whereas, a lot of people also think
the rights would be hurt if restrict the advertisement. We should ban drunk driving, but it is not a
fault if people drink. Alcohol causes problems, but it is not the fault of the media. It is better to not
ban the alcohol advertisement.
The media always tells us drinking is great. And we influence a lot by the media. From the
documentary Spin the Bottle, it says “Culture is the place and space where a society tells
stories about itself, about what is right and wrong, good and bad, acceptable and unacceptable.
These stories shape our values and ideas, and they shape the way we behave. The media has
become our culture’s main storyteller: the stories the media tells about alcohol are important”.
Drinking is a kind of culture in many countries since hundreds of years ago. We have a bunch of
beautiful stories about drinking. These stories only tell us the positive things but usually they do
not mention the negative parts. As a Chinese person, we also have a lot of these kinds of stories.
One of the most famous poets in Chinese history was Li Bai. It is said that he would have a lot of
inspiration after drinking and then he would write great poems. Even the death of him was
considered to be a romantic story by Chinese, because he was drunk and drowned in the river.
And the heroes in Chinese historical stories are always like to drink. These stories shape our
value, and led to a lot of people who are alcoholics in China. Actually, a lot of alcoholics have no
job and cause family violence. The American media always tell the alcohol is important, and it is
dangerous for these alcohol advertisements become part of American culture.
Alcohol advertisements target young people. It would increase alcoholics and heavy
drinking. The advertisements of alcohol are everywhere, and young people are easy to notice
them. From Spin the Bottle, it mentioned “If a person starts drinking before the age of 15,
they’re 4 times more likely to develop an alcohol-related problem”. The alcohol advertisements
are everywhere. And they not only target adults, but also the teenagers. The promotions of
alcohol would let young people feel it is common to drink. The earlier people begin to drink, the
easier to become an alcoholic. Alcohol is a kind of thing that people would addict to drink. It is
dangerous to rely on the alcohol every day.
Alcohol also leads to other social problems. A lot of car accidents are caused by people
who drive after drinking. From Alcohol Advertising Contributes to Teen Alcohol Abuse, it is
said that, “More than 40 percent of teenage deaths are caused by motor vehicle crashes. More
than half of those are alcohol related”. And “alcohol use is also a factor in many of the problems
such as teenage pregnancy, date rape, suicide, assault, and vandalism”. There are too many
problems caused by alcohol. So some people came up with the idea of making some restriction
or banning the alcohol advertisements.
Heavy drinking is not good for health and cause a lot of social problems. But the alcohol
companies want more alcoholics then they can have profits. From the article Alcohol
Advertising Contributes to Teen Alcohol Abuse, Jean Kilbourne said, “Ten percent of the
drinking age population consumes over 60 percent of the alcohol”. It means not many people are
alcoholics, but they are the most important customers of alcohol. If there are more alcoholics, the
alcohol companies would make more profits. If these 10 percent of people who are alcoholics
stop drinking heavily, the alcohol market would be much smaller. These companies care about
the profits much more than the alcoholic problem. Actually, they do not want them to quit drinking.
The Alcohol companies would keep on promote heavy drinking if we do stop them.
There are also a lot of people who think it is better to not restrict or ban the alcohol
advertisements. Because if we control it, the problems cause by the alcohol would still exist.
Long time ago, people also drank when there was no alcohol advertisement but there also have
a lot of problems related to alcohol. However, it is not the problem from the alcohol itself or the
media, but the culture. It is what the advertisements do to promote people to consume the
alcohol. Drinking alcohol is common, but it is the culture that promotes heavy drinking, from
“Spin the Bottle”, it is said that people want to have sex after drinking and if women drink like
men, they’ll share some of men’s power. This is the culture and nothing to do with the
advertisements. Instead of shaping the culture or the value, media is an indicator of the culture.
Like a lot of people in China know the Chinese media is controlled by the government and
always lies. People may cheat by the media for a while, but more and more people are waking up
and trying to think rationally. The media may have influence for a while, but finally people would
have rational ideas as time goes by. Control the media is not a way to solve problem, but a way
to make the problem worse.
The media is not always promoting the advertisement and heavy drinking. We can also
find bad news that related to alcohol like car accidents, crime and other problems after drinking.
People would notice the problems from the media and try to solve them. Even the government in
the U.S. is afraid of the media, this is an important way to restrict the power of the government be
abused. It is a kind of precious rights to have free media and the media indicates the problems in
our society. If something is really harm to the society, it is better the ban itself than to ban the
advertisement. And the advertisement of it would disappear automatically if something is
prohibited by the government. But stop the alcohol advertisement is not our aim, what we need to
do is solving the problems related to alcohol.
It is better to use the law or other ways to manage the society than ban the advertisement.
There is a good example at managing alcoholic problems, and there is nothing to do about ban
the advertisement. Chinese always drinking heavily when they talk about business and this is the
Chinese culture. But successful businessmen always drive luxury cars when they go out for
dinner and drive home after drinking. It always causes terrible accidents. This problem was
solved in China because of strict law enforcement. Even some celebrities were sent to the jail for
6 six months when they were caught driving after drinking. So there must be some better ways to
reduce problems caused by alcohol than ban the advertisement. Ban the alcohol advertisement
only shows the government is not able to deal with the problems.
Everything has its value so it exists. Heavy drinking is not good, but alcohol is a good
thing if drinking in moderation. It helps circulation and prevents people from cardiovascular
diseases. Even drugs can be used to let patients have less pain. And everything could be
harmful even water. Drink enough water is good for the health but drink too much water also can
kill people. So it is not the problem the alcohol itself but the culture. It is better for us to change
our culture and habit about drinking.
There are a lot of problems are related to the alcohol, but I think most of them have no
connection to the alcohol advertisements. The free media cause problems in United States, but I
think it makes more contributions to the society. The media controls the expansion of power and
indicates the problems in the society. It is useless for solving the alcohol problems if we restrict
the alcohol advertisements. And it is not good for the society to let the media close their mouth. It
is better for us to focus on the alcohol problem itself. Let’s think about how to prevent driving after
drinking, how to teach girls how to protect themselves after drinking and how to prevent people
from being alcoholic. These are the real problems the media told us and we need to face up to
them.