BBC NEWS | Magazine | Bad statistics and binge drinking
I love this article almost as much as I hate the abuse of statistics to grab headlines in the press or to grab soundbites in parliament. And all these reports, most often commisioned by a group with an agenda, never give you all the raw data that you’d need to make your own mind up.
As for the terrors of binge drinking, yes it is ill-advised to drink so much (and/or in bad combinations) that you do bad things to your health, your surroundings (I include people in this category, AKA collateral damage) and your self-respect. But unless you’re doing it all the time, it’s ridiculous. While I accept that my drinking last Saturday can only really be described as an (accidental) binge, enjoying a couple of glasses of wine with a meal is not a binge, even if you do so a couple of times a week, and go out to the pub with your friends once or twice.
And anyway, I’ve given up smoking, so I still need one vice to cling on to. But it’s certainly not going to be massaged statistics.
2 Responses to “Bad statistics and binge drinking”
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Yes statistics can lie. But lets face it – we all binge drink. We go out most weekends and get tipsy if not lathered. We drink so much at Aberrant games we end up consuming as much as three bottles of wine per person.
Yeeeeah.
Wrecked.
Like D.O says, you can prove anything with Stats.
It’s all rubbish and scaremongering.
If binging consists of drinking 3 pints a day- then think how many qualify.
It’s stupid.
Binge drinking is drinking enough to make a mess of yourself.
That’s what’s sad about it, that many (young) people today have to get steaming to have ‘a good time’.
Rubbish!
You can have a good time drinking a couple of drinks but with good company.
Binge drinking is a symptom of the Yob Culture we now live in- it isn’t necessarily the cause.
The furor and scaremongering we are now getting associated with the extended licensing due in November is pathetic.
Yes- unfortunately a fair number of (young) people will end up going stupid with the extended licence and so crime & accidents will increase- but it won’t last.
Other countries that have had longer hours for years (eg. the continent) don’t really have the problem- people do moderate their drinking- they chill, drinking is just part of the socialising.
it’s just that the UK has had the restriction for so long, that in circumstances abroad, we unfortunately go too far. Once we have it at home for a while, it will be taken for granted & people will not be in a rush to get tanked up to have a good time.
Our culture will change.
We’ve just got to put up with the transition in the meantime- but it is this that the media (& other bodies) are playing upon to stoke up our fears & our outrage.
Bah! I say.
Bah!