Definitely. Britain consumes alcohol in a much more irresponsible manner than the Europeans. The Europeans drink socially, but also with meals, public drunkenness is not socially acceptable in mainland Europe. In the UK the rise of binge drinking (drinking a lot of alcohol in short sittings) has lead to an increase in alcoholism.
Among the white British community there used to be a culture of drinking communally after work. Every other street used to have a corner on the pub, it's where the community would gather and socialise, with alcohol as a social lubricant. Then in recent years the licensing laws were relaxed, alcohol became cheaper to buy, more widely available to purchase in shops and supermarkets, meaning people visited pubs less often (as they had higher prices because of higher costs), which led to pubs shutting down. At the same time rise in nightclub culture has meant people tend to do a lot of their drinking on the weekends, at night, in the city centres.
So you look at the conditions that have changed;
- Communal drinking has reduced, ie when you are drinking there are less people around to monitor your state
- Drinking is less regulated, you can buy alcohol at cheap prices wherever you want
- it has become socially acceptable to be in a drunken state as people have less opportunity to drink and more people drink together in the city centres on weekends.
So alcoholism has risen. The British sikh community also have a problem of alcoholism, but the reasons are slightly different. They tend to drink hard liquor more than beers and lagers (which contain less alcohol), there is also a culture of bravado around how much they can drink, especially at weddings, and as with so many desi problems, there is the shame of admitting you have a problem.
Where a gora or his friends or family will seek help, the asian will try and hide the problem, don't let the community know, besti ho gi, that kind of thing.
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