Binge drinking – Sayles' social study

The primary objective of my study was to assess the consequences of people being given access to copious amounts of cheap alcohol.

Armed with a notepad and recording device, I made my way down to the park in central Birmingham. Introducing myself to three young lads, (Steve, Dave and Alan) all of whom sitting on the grass drinking beer, I outlined the objectives of my research. They invited me to join them.

I began by asking why they had so much beer to hand. “Well we weren’t intending on drinking today” Steve replied. “We actually popped into the supermarket to get some doughnuts, but as we made our way toward the pastry section we found our way blocked by a wall of beer.”

“I’ve never seen anything like it” said Dave, “try as we might, we just couldn’t seem to find a way around it”.

“Buy one case, get four free!” said Steve. “Can you believe that? Eventually we said, “f*** the doughnuts, let’s just get pissed. Fancy a beer Bob?”

“Errr....well it’s a little early in the morning for me. I haven’t had breakfast yet.”

“Ah.. go on” said Alan, thrusting a Bud into my hand. “Don’t worry about breakfast, we’ll go and get some sandwiches in a bit.”

“Do you realise we’re actually saving money?” said Steve, opening his third bottle of the morning. “The doughnuts cost considerably more than the beer, can you believe that? Let’s be honest about it. If you were offered choice of doughnuts or beer, which would you choose? It’s a no brainer, isn’t it?”

“I suppose it is”, I replied, “but shouldn’t you be doing something else?”

“Like what?”

“Err...I don’t know, perhaps working?”

“Have you seen the state of the economy? There’s no hope of us getting a job at the moment so if we can’t work we might as well get **** faced. We come down to the park every day, meet loads of interesting people and have a great time. Another beer Bob?”

“Errr...thanks.”

At that point, another group of young people joined us. Alan motioned for them to take a beer. “Are you sure they’re eighteen?” I asked.

“Bob, this is a social thing. We don’t ask questions here. These are our friends. We can’t say no.” I said nothing but merely watched as the young lads took their beer bottles, joined the group and began drinking.

“I’m off to get some sandwiches” said Alan. As he made his way to the supermarket I asked the group what they thought about supermarkets offering cheap booze.

“It’s brilliant” replied one. “We’ve never got much money, but at these prices it doesn’t matter. A bottle of beer costs less than a bar of chocolate. We can afford to get legless whenever we want.”

“Aren’t you worried about exceeding your weekly unit allowance?” I asked. The blank faces indicated that they had no idea what I was talking about.

Soon after, Alan and another lad returned carrying another four cases of beer. “I’m sorry Bob; we tried to get your sandwich, we really did.”

“Another wall of beer?” I asked. “I’ve never seen anything like it” he replied. “We tried walking around it but it was just never ending; seemed to go on for miles.”

“Never mind” said Dave thrusting another beer into my hand, “we’ll have another go later”. By now more people were entering the park and within a relatively short space of time our ranks had swelled considerably.

“More doughnuts” said a blonde girl, adding another couple of cases of beer to our stockpile. Everyone laughed. It was obviously an in-house joke. By now I was famished. “Lunch?” I enquired hopefully. “Good idea, Bob” said Dave. “I’ll go and get some pizza.”

I decided to accompany him. Entering the supermarket we made our way to the pizza section. After making good progress our route soon became blocked by, yes you’ve guessed it, an eight foot high wall of beer.

“There has to be a way around this” I said. “There isn’t Bob, trust me. It’s insurmountable. We’ve tried. It’s like they’re forcing us to buy the stuff.”

After several attempts to negotiate the formidable barrier, we conceded defeat and gave up on the idea of pizza. Nevertheless we took consolation from the fact that the beer offer had been upgraded since Alan’s previous visit to ‘buy one get five free’. Making our way back to the park, we congratulated ourselves on how much money we’d saved.

“More doughnuts” I said, putting the beer down in front of the group. “You’re one of us now Bob” said Alan.

And of course he was right. I had, albeit unwittingly, allowed myself to evolve from detached observer to active participant. In short, I’d become a social drinker.

During the course of the day, a number of people came over to introduce themselves, lured it seems by the seemingly infinite amount of beer we had at our disposal. All were welcomed into the group with a cursory nod or wave and given a bottle of beer.

Eventually, as the beer stockpile began to run low, people began to drift away. Many appeared exceedingly drunk and I recall wondering what sort of mayhem some of them would cause before the evening was out and whether anyone would link it to events in the park. I suspect not. If a problem were to arise, some unfortunate publican would likely be singled out for blame.

So much easier to blame the little guy than hold the big boys accountable, isn’t it?