After reading an opinion piece in The Times today by Melanie Reid I was left in two minds as to whether or not I agree with what she was saying. She was discussing the recent pictures that were printed in the national newspapers of a drunk 19 year old student urinating on a war memorial.
Melanie Reid explains how this student came to be in this awful position, he had been on a pub crawl called Carnage, which if you're a student reading this, I'm sure you've head of and many have probably been on! In some respects, I feel sorry for the student as many people in Britain have been in the position where they've consumed far too much alcohol and have done 'silly' things but in the same respect I think it is an absolutely disgusting act.
She goes on to blame the drinks industry and with her last line asks the question "Why weren't Carnage in the dock? That they weren't says it all." This is a reference to the fact that the student who urinated on the war memorial has been in court and could possibly face a jail sentence. I think that blaming the drinks industry is a cop out when it comes to people facing responsibility. Yes these bar crawls promote drinking and many people get extremely drunk when on them but surely that is the choice of the person? They are not forced to go on these crawls and many people I know who have been on them have always had an excellent time. The act of urinating on a war memorial is perhaps a result of going on the bar crawl organised by Carnage but he himself got into the state he was in and he himself urinated on the war memorial.
I see that this student has been made an example of and is in someways a scapegoat for the binge culture that is often plastered across the tabloids but in the same way I think after such a disgraceful act it was just, a war memorial is a place of remembrance and place that deserves so much better.
You can see the picture here: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1220579/Carnage-Shame-drunken-student-caught-urinating-war-memorial-mass-pub-crawl.html
Thursday, November 5, 2009
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Alexa ranking 4.3 - see messageboard. Just quickly reading blogs today, not leaving comments and But please blog each week on each issue of WINOL - keep it positive! - that will really help you write your critical review of how it all went (it should essentially be a matter of stringing all your blog entries into a coherent piece of writing and handing that in).
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