Mothers Against Drinking

Mothers Against Drunk Driving, or MADD, is out of control. Think they're only out there to stop drunk drivers? Not at all. Want to know MADD's official position on taxes?

MADD supports a prevention component to health care reform and supports a substantial increase in taxation on alcoholic beverages as a means of covering the cost to society caused by misuse of alcohol and as a means of supporting prevention programs including countermeasures to alcohol-impaired driving.

Okay, so they're tax & spend types, but other than that, they're OK, right? Hardly. Did you realize that MADD is lobbying for states to make Happy Hour illegal? Earlier closing hours in bars? How about some of their proposed rules for alcohol advertisements, which state no advertising shall:

• Feature actors, models or other talent or characters under the age of 30
• Be broadcast to audiences with less than 90% adult aged 21 and older viewership
• Feature on-camera consumption
• Use celebrities, music stars, athletes, animals, cartoon characters, or other language or images that appeal to youth
• Depict sports, rock concerts, or other events with strong appeal to youth
• Depict revelry or hint at the possibility of inebriation
• Portray drinking in association with sexual passion, promiscuity, or any other amorous activity as a consequence of or in association with alcohol consumption
• Disproportionately target ethnic minority communities

So just to be clear, the worst possible thing in the world to MADD would be a television ad showing a black music star having a good time with a beer in his hand, while talking to his girlfriend. If it were up to MADD, all alcohol advertisements would be black text on a white screen, stating simply: Please buy our product, just don't drink it.

MADD has become a Neo-Prohibitionist organization. Even the founder of MADD is on the record as stating "It has become far more neo-prohibitionist than I had ever wanted or envisioned." Learn more at Neoprohibition.com, and try reading their excellent study on MADD. (PDF)

So what brings this rant on? The Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission is sending undercover officers into bars to look for drunk patrons, and issuing citations and making arrests. That's right, arresting people for being drunk in a bar! MADD is fully supportive of this campaign, with a spokesman saying "Can you imagine if TABC had not stopped those people from leaving the bar, how many more drunk drivers we might have had on the road?"

Earth to MADD -- the officers weren't stopping anyone from leaving the bar, they were stopping them in the bar. Some of those drunks may have been planning to call a cab, or had a designated driver. But MADD isn't about stopping drunk driving -- they're about stopping drinking.

For the record, Fairfax county tried this about a year ago. It was covered in the Washington Post as well as in the Neo-prohibition study linked above. Enforcement died after a Washington Post article about a designated driver (!) who was told she had to "prove" she was sober while in the bar. The article stirred up enough controversy to stop police from arresting folks in bars, at least temporarily.

Labels: alcohol, nanny state, personal freedoms

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Church Says It Won't Break Laws, But Condemns Those Who Follow Them

Westboro Baptist Church likes to protest at funerals. Pretty disgusting, huh? And what are they protesting? They're protesting against homosexuality. So you'd think they're protesting at the funerals of gay men who've died from AIDS, right? Pretty insensitive, right? No, Westboro Baptist, a small church in Kansas, travels around the country to protest at the funerals of American servicemembers killed in combat.

At least they're going to the funerals of gay servicemembers, right? No! This church is hijacking the funerals of proud servicemembers in order to promote their anti-gay agenda. Specifically, they're praising God for killing servicemembers for defending a country that allows homosexuality. Because you can legally have sex with another man, these people think God is killing our soldiers with IEDs as punishment.

I could talk about how it's not actually illegal to be gay in most countries, and how tenuous the relationship between a bomb placed in Iraq is to God's feelings on two men in San Francisco, but I won't insult anyone's intelligence by pointing out the obvious. Nor will I point out that the United Stated Armed Forces have got to be one of the most homosexual-intolerant institutions in the country.

Instead, I'll just point out a simple piece of advice. If the fact that people are free to live how they want bothers you, move out of our country. Many fine countries have far fewer freedoms and more governmental controls on personal behavior. May I recommend Saudi Arabia or Iran?

Labels: church, homosexuality, iraq

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