Some letters sent on behalf of the Council to the Western Mail

When a young man gets drunk before going to a party

Dear Sir,

When a young man gets drunk before going to a party he is, basically, arranging things so that he doesn’t have to be himself at that party. The pertinent question, therefore, as Rollo May the leading psychotherapist puts it, is not ‘why does he drink so much? Rather, it is why does he feel he has to flee from himself?’

The proposed measures put forward by the Holyrood government to help tackle alcohol misuse in Scotland whilst welcomed as minor pieces of social engineering do nothing to address this question. Neither do any proposed measures I’ve heard about from the Westminster, Cardiff Bay or Stormont governments. Churches and educationalists, likewise, shun answering this basic question which, I believe, is at the very root of the problem of alcohol misuse in our society today. So who knows the answer - because it’s obvious that the aforementioned do not?

Why not try asking the people who’ve “been there” and who are now, thankfully, recovered from this invidious condition: the recovered alcoholics? They will tell you that their condition had nothing to do with alcohol. It was to do with their inability to cope with the reality of their aloneness and sense of separateness from others. Now can you see why the question is not being addressed? To do so would be to confront the burden of being human. And no one wants to do that – unless, of course, you have to do it in order to stay sober.

Yours sincerely,
Wynford Ellis Owen
Chief Executive

1. When Society Becomes Addicted
2. Greed and alcohol misuse make for a lethal combination
3. Misuse of Alcohol
4. A confused listener
5. When a young man gets drunk before going to a party