It’s Wednesday night. Corporation is on the cards. You’ve got your school disco attire just right. It’s going to be cheap and it’s going to be cheerful.
You’ve worked hard (so far) this week and it’s time for a reward. Perhaps you start with a bottle of wine or a few cans with your housemates, and then move on to Bar One for some cheap drinks.
You’ve got to prepare yourself for Corp’s finest quadruple vodka and Irn-Bru cocktails. All this will ultimately lead to a superb night of tasteful dance moves and tuneful sing-a-longs. Nothing wrong with that. Or is there?
According to Mature Students Councillor, Alexzander Swatton, alcohol is the source of a large portion of today’s social issues.
For Mr Swatton, students have little choice but to mix alcohol with socialising. The wallet-friendly brews, the hilarious drinking games, the two-for-one offers; all these selling points amount to an irresistible drinking culture.
Swatton concludes that by subscribing to this competitive market, the University of Sheffield’s Students’ Union has failed to prioritise the welfare of its students.
Here’s a taste of some of his proposals:
Ban ‘hedonistic or misguiding’ terms such as ‘Exam Slam’ and ‘Union Christmas Day’.
Restrict Union nights to weekends.
Stop promoting society events with alcohol incentives.
And limit weekday bar opening hours.
For the majority of people who don’t make use of the Union’s alcohol resources 24/7, these proposals would eliminate that mid-week reward that we treasure so greatly.
It would mean saying farewell to that post-exam pint, that football-watching tipple, and even having a comfortable Christmas get-together. Bah. Humbug.
Alcohol-related issues plague the UK, especially the student population. One would only have to open any tabloid paper to confirm these views.
But the source of the problem isn’t quad vods and £1 snakebites. The foundations of our alcohol-inspired culture date back to the Industrial Revolution, when factory workers would celebrate their days off by hitting the local brewery.
I am not justifying binge-drinking delinquency, but it is certainly not a new-found conundrum. It is also a very British trait.
In Italy, for example, at the tender age of 14 I was able to buy a bottle of Sambuca for the equivalent of £5 from our local Luigi’s.
Yet five years on when I visit my family, Italian students aren’t seen heaving on the sides of phone boxes or waddling bare-foot with stilettos in one hand and cheesy chips in the other.
Whatever their origins, these customs are woven into the fabric of British society.
Banning Union Christmas Day and banning alcohol promotions will do absolutely nothing to solve contemporary problems.
In 2008/9 the Union bars turned over almost £4.5million. Decapitating our greatest source of income would merely serve to cripple the Students’ Union as a whole.
Fundamentally, though, it would go against the most important pillars of democratic rhetoric: economic and social freedoms of choice.
If these proposals were taken seriously, you can forget the awards for Best Students’ Union. How does Swatton propose to fund more non-alcoholic-orientated events if he cuts the majority of the Union’s revenue?
In all fairness, the University of Sheffield already provides a sufficient variety of activities. From quiz nights to kick-boxing, Sheffield students have a wide choice.
As free-thinking individuals, however, we choose to incorporate alcohol when we socialise. Binge-drinking has been linked to anti-social behaviour, but as Swatton himself puts it, ‘being drunk is not an excuse’.
He is absolutely right. It takes a certain individual to abuse members of the public, to act violently towards others, to buy and drink excessive amounts of alcohol. But we shouldn’t all be punished for the actions of others.
When he put forward his proposals to the Students’ Union Council, Swatton admitted that he didn’t think they would be accepted. Ultimately, he was right.
Although there was some positive response towards his ideas raising awareness on the effects of alcohol, this was as far as it went.
Finance Officer Martin Bailey told Council that on average students who go to Population spend £2.20 a head. This means the majority of drinking happens before a night out on that £3 bottle of Pinot Grigio from the off-licence.
A select committee will now discuss how to provide further education on alcohol consumption.
But ultimately, as individual adults as well as students, we must take responsibility for our own actions. We create the demand for alcohol; the Union does not demand us to drink it.
If Swatton’s proposals materialised, we would only look elsewhere in Sheffield to celebrate the end of exams or birthdays. Our union thrives as a competitor to other universities and venues because it meets the wants and needs of its students.
If a student feels pressured into drinking because of the irresistible prices and availability of alcohol, maybe they have no self-control and should consider going to an AA meeting.