It’s foolish and pointless. I’m talking about Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to ban alcohol sales after 9 pm. In response to the latest Israeli trend – that is, killing – the PM announced that he intends to advance legislation that will prevent kiosks and gas stations from selling alcohol at all, while limiting selling times at stores.
This is how Bibi will be fighting violence! Because he’s unwilling to tolerate domestic terror! Oh no! So he found an idea that looks good and sounds authoritative, conveys a sense of determination, but contributes nothing. Welcome to the “how to make a headline” class.
Let’s start with an allegory. The residents of a small village live by the river. Once in a while, one of them becomes fed up with life, jumps into the river, and dies. What do you think the village chief should do: Block any access to the river with some kind of netting, or train people that can identify despaired individuals on time and encourage them?
Ok, I think we got the message. No netting can stop a man from getting drunk. Bibi would do well to find other ways to fight violence in our society aside from messing with our drinks. The issue here is not what goes into one’s blood stream, but rather, into one’s consciousness. Education, public discourse, and the increasingly extinct values of respect, tolerance, and fear of the law are difficult to change. It’s much easier to lock the doors of the convenience store.
Israelis are light drinkers
In any case, professional drunks start drinking in the morning anyway, while thugs who look for a fight don’t wait for a beer from the neighborhood kiosk in order to get in trouble. The only people who will really suffer from the limits are those who at the end of the day want to get a drink or two en route to another evening where they can whine about how violent life here has become.
Israeli politicians tend to forget basic facts during times of crisis, for example, the fact that they’re not kings. One cannot just decide to limit our access to beer, just like one cannot decide to monitor our access to the Internet. It just doesn’t work that way.
Israelis are rather light drinkers and one cannot really attribute the violent events of August to these drinking habits. Even Bibi knows that. In the interview where he announced his plan, he admitted that “the
rate of drinking and violence here is significantly lower than it is in Western countries.” However, he insisted that “we’re seeing an increase, and that’s worrisome.”
Of course it’s worrisome. What’s worrisome here is Bibi’s ability to present foolish plans with a convincing tone; what’s worrisome here is his willingness to resort to populism. I’m also worried about the headache I suffered upon hearing him. You know what I’m talking about. It’s called a hangover.