We present information directly addressing causes of the worsening youth alcohol culture, backed by university research. This document includes just one of hundreds of pages which show how advertising penetrates the thinking of youth, in this case Maori.

The Ministerial review of the regulatory framework around alcohol advertising and sponsorship is in response to our Group Against Liquor Advertising’s petition. This letter is being sent to all MPs.

A complete rethink on alcohol and youth culture is needed.

It is important that all MPs and interested parties recognise the increasingly serious situation and
changes that justify this re-thinking, especially since Martin Gallagher’s bill has failed. (That suggested raising the drinking age, and had inadequate suggestions about advertising and sponsorship.)

Serious: Statistics for New Zealand show an alarming increase in:

• youth binge drinking (number of drinks per occasion has doubled in past 10 years)
• young women’s alcohol consumption
• hospital admissions for intoxicated 11 – 17 year olds
• teenage drinking: $140 million worth of alcohol per year.

Most major newspapers and respectable periodicals (NZ Herald, NZ Listener, North and South) have featured major articles of concern. Social and youth workers, police, Maori wardens, and hospital intensivist doctors have said the same. Monday newspapers regularly feature alcohol violence from all around the country.

Changes:

• Alcohol advertising and sponsorship techniques are increasingly sophisticated, and internationally planned as never before. The young are prime targets. Alcohol advertising is not purely factual (prices, product description, availability) but relies strongly on association with sport and social success.

• New products like spirits-based ready-mixed drinks are aimed specifically at the youth market. Consumption of these has increased five-fold since 1997. Scottish research shows the industry even knows the preferences of 11 – 14 and 15 – 17 year old groups.

Vast advertising expenditure promotes and increases a youth alcohol culture through an emphasis on the sporty, humorous, wacky, and sexy. This undermining any good intent contained in the industry’s voluntary code, which prohibits promoting the view that alcohol will give social or sexual success. That association of alcohol with sexuality is agreed, by many Western countries, to be an unfair spin because young people cannot resist it. Sexual enthusiasm and limited judgment are normal for the young.

The code is continually broken by the industry, showing it is hypocritical and unfit for selfregulation. “Her butt just walked into my hand- Yeah right!” This really means:“If you’re one of our guys and drink lots of our beer you’ll be cool, sexy, have mates, and girls, and be a man.”

Increasingly, university research papers show evidence of this influence on youth. Many are on our website, (Prof. Snyder, Connecticut University , and Massey University research. )

Both the World Health Organization and the American Medical Association are calling for more determined action on alcohol advertising.

Self-regulation is a sham; specious reasons are given for turning down complaints. TV advertising time was recently brought forward from 9 pm to 8.30 in spite of the above statistics.

Unless we influence earliest beliefs of teenagers about the role of alcohol, we will not win this battle. The best slogan to prevent alcohol harm would therefore be :

“It’s not just the drinking,
it’s the way we THINK.”

We are naïve if we do not recognize the huge continual financial input into keeping and enhancing that youth culture.                       <Next>