“It’s not just Tom Waes who sets an example, we all do,” writes Bieke Verlinden after a week full of commentary, analysis and interpretation of the TV presenter’s accident.
When an exemplary figure like Tom Waes crosses social boundaries through excessive alcohol consumption, this rightly sparks a broad debate. A debate with so many voices, inputs and proposals that ultimately threatens to drown out the essence. And the essence is simple: we live in an alcohol society, in which the use of alcohol has been so normalized that we no longer seem able to conduct the debate in a sober manner.
When I watched the video yesterday in which Waes was clearly tipsy, just before the terrible accident, I was surprised by an advertising message. Advertising for a subscription to a newspaper, and on top of that subscription a free selection of six exclusive wines for the end of the year.
So… I want to watch a video about alcohol abuse and I immediately get a commercial promoting alcohol. How wrong can it be?
And yet almost no one seems outraged by this. It is that same alcohol that caused the accident and is the cause of so much evil and suffering. If alcohol were a person, society would have long ago decided to lock him up for life. There would be calls to reintroduce the death penalty for that serial killer. The process would take infinite years, because the victims of Alcohol are countless.
Would victims of this murderer, a frequent perpetrator of acts of aggression and domestic violence, tolerate it when the evil that destroyed their lives is everywhere and is promoted at every opportunity? Do we still think it is normal that children in the supermarket are first chased through aisles with racks full of bottles with high percentages of alcohol? Children are constantly exposed to images and messages that alcohol is the most normal thing in the world. That alcohol is part of every happy or difficult moment in life. That alcohol increases pleasure, soothes sadness, takes away pain, makes them belong to the group (‘men know why’).
We are often complicit on our social media. The weekend starts with a photo and a beer, congratulations on a birthday are expressed with an emoji of clinking champagne glasses. A championship should be celebrated with squirting champagne, and around the youth football field you will find advertising for alcohol. Student life revolves around cantuses. Duvels for 1 euro or an order of 1 meter of beer at bargain prices. Drinking games at parties or your uncle demonstrating how to drink ad fundum at a family party…
The automatic habit of drinking something is so ingrained and woven into our daily lives and language that we need to be more aware of the fact that we ourselves are a promotional machine for an inadvisable use. Our language is full of one-liners such as “one is not one” or “may we like them for a long time”. These innocent statements do not emphasize sporadic conviviality, but the permanent presence of alcohol as the most obvious choice in our daily lives.
Those who do not drink alcohol are often looked at as if something is wrong. What woman hasn’t experienced the insinuation that she’s probably pregnant because she turns down a drink? Such a culture means that you prefer to drink along to avoid being noticed.
So let’s be critical ourselves. If we want our children not to become victims of alcohol, we must reduce our use or keep in mind what is responsible drinking and what is not. Not only Tom Waes has an exemplary role, we all have that. We must be aware of what messages we convey, amplify or spread on social media. A culture in which alcohol is seen as the holy grail and in which every debate about cutting back is immediately seen as banning or taking away the pint of the Flemish who can easily decide for themselves what is good or not, that is no longer possible.
Normalizing and, consciously and unconsciously, promoting alcohol only increases consumption. That combination of bad example and constant encouragement to drink is a dangerous cocktail. It makes drinking an acquired culture.
Seeing drinking makes you drink. Minimizing alcohol consumption will not help prevent drivers from getting into the car while tipsy. We will all have to be more conscious about the consumption and promotion of alcohol. We have to be much stricter with friends and those around us when they drink too much. We need to promote a culture of caring and addressing each other, instead of one of alcohol as a symbol of fun and success.
Bieke Verlinden is an alderman in Leuven and sits for Vooruit in the Flemish parliament.
