By: Megan White
The United States has Hollywood and pop music. China has cheap toys and trinkets. Russia has alcohol, and a lot of it.
For over a thousand years, the liquid vice of people around the world has comforted, entertained, and quenched the thirst of the Russian people, seeping into and saturating the national culture. But when it rains, it pours.
What Americans generally regard as the fuel for rip-roaring good times and poor life decisions, has sparked in Russia, in the words of President Dmitry Medvedev, a “national disaster.”
Although a legal drinking age of 18 has been on the law books for quite some time, the rule often goes ignored, and the number of Russian children aged 10 to 14 who regularly consume alcohol exceeds 10 million. By the age of 16, according to a 2011 report by the Word Health Organization, Russians drink the equivalent of roughly four gallons of pure alcohol per capita each year, almost twice the amount consumed by their American counterparts. And the repercussions are startling. Alcohol related crimes, accidents, and illnesses account for one in eight deaths annually.
Russian culture is killing Russians.
It all began with economics. As early as the mid-1500s, spirit production houses served as the primary source of revenue for towns across the country. By the 19th century, nearly one-third of the funds in the national treasury came from the production and consumption of alcohol. As money trickled in, traditions took root and drinking became a practice that was encouraged with little regard to its negative consequences.
For centuries, alcohol has played the role of a Black Widow killer, seducing and enticing Russians with national identity, status, and economic incentive before dealing her fatal blow with little to no warning.
In the United States, school curriculum commonly involves painting a picture of alcohol as a villain with the power to ruin lives. Alcoholism, cirrhosis, and moderation are all words in the average American student’s vocabulary. Although many of these average American students begin to drink as teenagers, the image of alcohol as a malevolent force remains in the back of their minds alongside the ever-present concept of “too much.”
In Russia, however, there is no such image and no such limitation. Heavy drinking is encouraged, whether the occasion be purchasing a new item or celebrating the weekend. The ability to drink large quantities without becoming drunk earns a level of respect, and a person is considered rude if he or she does not drink as much as the surrounding company. And the morning after, hangovers are cured by the practice of “opokhmelitsya,” or drinking even more. People are not equipped with a little voice to sit on one shoulder and whisper words of moderation. Heavy drinking is not taboo, and for that reason, neither is alcoholism.
As Russia’s population continues to decline ,and its rate of alcohol-related deaths continues to soar, it becomes painfully apparent that for the sake of the country’s future, something must be done. Solving the alcohol problem in Russia, however, requires much more than a government-sponsored slap on the wrist or the flick of a pen.
Mikhail Gorbachev tried in the 1980s to enact an anti-alcohol campaign that involved raising prices on vodka, wine, and beer, restricting sales, and banning drinking in public places. Though successful for a short period of time, the campaign took on an effect reminiscent of Prohibition in the United States, tragically backfiring. While the national economy tanked, the black market economy boomed, and alcoholism continued to ravage the country.
No matter how good their intentions, laws cannot change cultures. Excise taxes and cold-turkey bans will only fuel the fire, as people will always desire what they cannot have. Solving the alcoholic epidemic requires nothing less than a deep-seeded cultural revision. This change will involve long-term national recognition of the less-than-savory side of drinking. It will involve immersing children at an early age in the idea that alcohol can play the villain. It will involve a complete overhaul of the national perception of drinking.
It will also involve realizing that the problem will never completely disappear. As long as there are fermented fruits and vegetables, people will drink. Having an understanding of alcohol’s dangers planted deep within the mind, however, will go a long way in introducing a new traditional drinking practice – moderation. In order to save their culture, Russians first must change their culture.
