Drinking Culture In NZ. Is It Really That Bad?

It’s common knowledge that New Zealand is a country with a supposed “heavy binge drinking culture” but is it really as bad as everyone seems to make it out to be? Sure New Zealanders are well known to enjoy a few cold ones after a hard days work or tend to get a bit crazy on the weekend after a long stressful week but does this really justify the “binge drinking” stigma which we have been labeled with?

New Zealand's drinking culture has stayed much the same for the past many decades, you just have to listen to what your own parents got up to in their youth to know that, so why is it suddenly now that our country is so quick to alert us all to how serious the problem has become? More then anything I think this is due to an increased amount of media attention on the subject rather then the problem actually getting any worse. A clear example of this was the media frenzy over the death of 16 year old school boy James Webster. While I am not denying that this was a sad and tragic death, it was not the first and will not be the last of its kind. Events like this happen around the world every year and it is unavoidable. People argue that part of the binge drinking problem is that the legal age is too low, but in this case the boy was already underage and acquired the alcohol without getting someone else to purchase it for him, therefore a higher drinking age would have been ineffective. I myself remember the backlash of this event, and the sudden ban on all public underage drinking events such as after balls (no matter how well organised or chaperoned they were). Seeing as how teenagers will find a way to drink no matter what, banning a safe and secure event at which their drinking could be monitored, most would instead opt for secret smaller scale events, at which they would most likely not be supervised and are more likely to binge drink at. The drinking age is not the problem, countries such as Germany and France have an even lower set legal age of 16 for spirits and even lower for beer and wine and yet neither of these countries have and over active binge drinking culture.

Binge drinking, according to international standards is counted as drinking that brings the blood alcohol levels to 0.08% or more, generally 5 or more drinks in a single occasion for men or 4 for women. I think this in itself is a bit of a harsh amount to set as "binge drinking". In a general drinking occasion it is very common for people to exceed this amount without getting so intoxicated as to bear the image of behaviour that most people would associate with this label. Most people would relate the term 'binge drinking' with extreme intoxication to the point of losing control of ones own basic functions, vomiting, passing out and all those other great joys that come of a big night out. But by the standards set, people who happily drink 5 beers, only one night of the week and who enjoy none of those such consequences would also be counted as binge drinkers, so yes if these people are also counted into national statistics then of course the numbers will be high. Before New Zealand states that our nation is in the beginnings of a binge drinking epidemic I think the terms should be adjusted and specified. Just because it makes sense on paper does not mean it is accurate to how things actually are in the real world.

Other countries also need to be taken into consideration with this issue. I think that it is a common misconception amongst New Zealanders that our country is supposedly one of the worst alcohol consuming nations in the world. Based on my research this is far from the truth. In fact most of the top drinking countries or based in Europe. And in terms of binge drinking the UK is one of the highest for this. In Britain the rise in binge drinking, especially among teenagers, has risen drastically, as has the rate of vandalism and crime, teenage pregnancy and the spread of sexually transmitted illnesses, all of which have been linked to excess alcohol consumption. When comparing the state of the UK to our own country (both of which have the same drinking age) it is apparent that our countries drinking culture is in no way as dangerous as many others in Europe.

Overall I think the hype surrounding drinking culture in NZ is a little bit over the top. There have not been very many stories of serious binge drinking death or injury and any that have been have are taken a little bit over the top with modern media attention. Looking at our country as a whole we aren't doing to badly with controlling binge and underage drinking, especially in comparison with other countries with the same drinking age and laws.