It's all fun and games until <b>you</b> find yourself on the wrong side of their ever-expanding victimless crime laws.
Oh yeah, victimless. Alcohol is the worst, ask any family counselor, pastor, etc. Horrendous damage is done by the stuff including drunk driving. Those cops are just drawing the line between the drunks and the people that are interested in having a reasonable life.
Yes, alcohol is dangerous. Guns are too. Should the government take those away for our own good as well? How about other sharp objects, like scissors? Maybe they should just lock us all up in nice, safe padded rooms under 24 hour supervision? Then we'll be protected from all the dangerous things in life! I think you're having some trouble grasping the proper role of government.
the issue is one with the legislators they are the ones who passed drunk in public laws. do i think that it is absurd that it is illegal to be drunk in a bar? or in public? yes. it is illegal in many states. but not in mine. actually, in my state, it is illegal for a drunk person to try to purchase alcohol or to try to enter a bar when drunk, but it is NOT illegal to be drunk in public go figger
What's the big deal? Obviously public intoxication is a big problem. I don't know what it's like in Texas, but in Australia, come Friday or Saturday night, there are hordes of rowdy, obscenely drunk men roaming the streets, or loitering on corners or outside clubs, hurling abuse (and worse) at innocents passers-by. (It's mostly Anglos doing the roaming, while the ethnics prefer to loiter, clustered in large groups.) It's just utterly unruly. I would welcome a public ordinance aimed at reducing this filth. No one's stopping them from drinking in moderation. No cop would book someone, even if ordered to, if he wasn't visibly "intoxicated" (a probably purposely vague term). Cops have been around long enough to know when someone's at that level. I completely support it.
Of course you do. If they decided to round up all the male homosexuals and put them in prison camps, you'd support that too.
Do you suppose the bars they are visiting are biker hangouts and blue collar taverns or suburban fern bars ? HA !! Why arrest potentially hostile perps who cant or wont pay the fines anyway when ya can milk the generally tame middle class out in the burbs ? Its just another shakedown for your average Mr. Ben Dover.
The funny thing is you probably really believe that, don't you? I just don't want to see them and their whole sordid culture celebrated and elevated to the equal of heterosexual norms, that's all. Sure, I'd prefer them to shut about their homosexuality, but that's an organic thing - if our culture didn't permit it, they'd get the gist and would shut up (as they still, except for in the media, pretty much do, mercifully). But that hardly means I'd lock them up and throw away the key. Don't you ever feel a certain dissonance between the rationalist ideals you espouse and the shoddy kind of thinking you sometimes do when your pet causes are challenged? What's so "anti-freedom" about what I've said about public intoxication? If people want to get wasted, they can still do it a home. In public, they just need to tone it down a little, that's all. If they can't - as most people can't - then don't go out in public, or just drink less when you do. Why should the streets at night be a no-go zone for normal, law abiding types? They would like to go out and enjoy the nightlife in the cities their efforts helped build just as much as the crazed, boozed-up (and probably coked and doped-up, too) youths that rule it today.
And what constitutes "public intoxication"? I just want to know if there is some standard applied to this preemptive action in the bars. If the police want to set up a check point outside of this bar with a mandatory breathalyzer test, it would be more palatable than a police officers decision on who is drunk and should be subject to arrest.
Spect8or, it's illegal here to roam the streets while drunk, or even take a single sip of alcohol in any non-designated public location. The ruling regime has already gotten me used to this fact, and the law has been this way since as long as I can remember. HOWEVER, bars have always been a safe haven where adults are free to drink and smoke, as long as they refrain from driving home intoxicated. Now bar owners no longer have the privilege of allowing cigarette smoking <b>on their own property</b>, and the government has found a brand new way to capture more innocent political prisoners. Drinking is the <b>entire purpose</b> of going out to a bar- and the fucking government is going to secretly watch drinkers to selectively oppress those who are drinking 'too much' for their liking? Somehow you can sit back and cheer such blatant civil rights violations? They're going to come for you too eventually, don't forget that.