Promotion of alcohol might be part of Colorado’s drinking problem
Re: ” Alcohol deaths soar 60% in just 4 years,” “State alcohol taxes low, deaths high,” ” Alcohol access grows,” “People struggle to get the help they need for alcohol addiction,” Denver Post special report, Jan. 7-10
I read your story this morning on how supposedly low taxes on alcohol are the cause of drinking deaths. I’m from north of Chicago and have been a Colorado resident for 10 years. I’ve received The Denver Post every day since I moved here. Back home, I read the Chicago Tribune.
The one thing that stuck out to me compared to Chicago was how alcohol-centric your paper and Denver mainstream media are. I also watch the 6 o’clock and 10 o’clock news. Just read through the Life & Culture section of your paper. You constantly have articles glorifying drinking. There are articles on brewpubs, distilleries, cocktails, and restaurants serving beer and spirits. There are even articles about which beer brewers are going out of business. Denver has Denver Beer Week. Denver is touted as “America’s #1 beer city.” Then there’s the Great American Beer Festival.
I like to have a drink once in a while, and I’m not blaming The Denver Post, but it seems that the city’s preoccupation with alcohol is the problem, not taxes.
Charles Kopelson, Littleton
Imagine if your drug of choice was legally sold at six different locations easily within walking distance of your home — and at several others within a short drive.
My name is Craig; I’m an alcoholic.
Alcoholics drink for many reasons: To blur the realities of existence, out of boredom, it feels good, to quit and go through withdrawals would be unbearable, everyone else does, and its constant glamorization in films, television commercials, music, and just about everywhere you can think of.
There are good excuses around every corner. COVID-19 and the quarantine didn’t help. What has followed hasn’t either. The country has never been more divided. Americans are frustrated, exasperated, and angry.
Why? Because of politics and politicians, race, and the border. Friends of mine avoid the news. People have begun to isolate. What comes next? A drink.
Taxing the dickens out of alcohol won’t keep anyone from drinking who is determined to drink. Prohibition didn’t stop the flow or consumption of alcohol in the U.S.
I do recommend one governance: Eliminate airport bars and alcohol altogether on airplanes. The article stated: “Although treatment is available in Colorado, information about how to access it hasn’t always reached families searching for help.”
That’s not true.
Anyone with a cellphone (that’s everyone except me) or a computer simply has to do an “alcohol treatment” search and countless pages will appear. We’re everywhere. Ask a recovering alcoholic.
The truth, however, is this: There will always — always — be an alcohol problem in this country to go along with a homeless problem, and numerous other inevitabilities in life.
Craig Marshall Smith, Highlands Ranch
Any student of economics will be able to tell you that if the price of something goes up, the consumption will go down. Proof of this concept has been demonstrated when the price of cigarettes was raised. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that, between 2000 and 2020, consumption fell 49%.
But because of the influence of the “alcohol lobby” in Colorado, our legislators refuse to apply this same principle to liquor taxes, which are among some of the lowest in the country.
Curiously, perhaps because the cannabis industry is so young, our legislators have no such inhibitions on taxing “weed.” Colorado’s liquor excise tax brings in about $50 million to $60 million a year. Cannabis excise taxes — $220 million to $250 million a year.
This is odd since alcohol kills, both directly and indirectly via traffic fatalities, many multiples of the number of people who are killed by cannabis. If our legislators have any interest in protecting Coloradans, they will institute a rapid increase in the taxes that the state levies on liquor. Or they can sell their souls for a cheap drink.
Guy Wroble, Denver
Re: “Marijuana legalization is taking a toll” Jan. 7 letter to the editor
The letter writer hits the nail on the head about strong and powerful cannabis but fails to mention that the drug should be regulated and therefore controlled due to extreme levels of THC. Ironically, in Sunday’s Denver Post, the big topic reported was alcohol and alcohol deaths. As marijuana has ruined many lives due to lack of regulation, the same has been true for nearly 100 years when prohibition ended on Dec. 5, 1933. There are far more deaths due to alcohol misuse than marijuana, and alcohol is by far a bigger “legalized” problem. We cannot go back to the days of prohibition for both marijuana and alcohol, but we need to do more education and awareness programs in schools and on television to make everyone more aware of their dangerous uses.
Curtis Urban, Pueblo
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