Stoptober

I'm no friend to the public health industry. I'm also sceptical about most charities, especially health ones. MacMillan on the other hand is, as far as I know, very good. It provides nurses to help care for people with cancer. That's a great thing to do and I applaud them for it.

I am very annoyed with them now because of their latest temperance campaign. TV commercials, media coverage, all asking people to give up drink for October. 

Having a month off the sauce is no doubt a very wise course of action for everybody, maybe even as often as once a year, but since when was it MacMillan's job to add its voice to the throng of puritanical guilt trippery coming from the largely publicly funded public health "lobby"? 

Furthermore, do you remember the fuel protests of the early 21st century? Some people tried to organise a protest whereby nobody bought any petrol on one certain day of the week. The point being that the supply chain wouldn't be able to cope and the oil companies would have to slash prices on that day or face overflowing storage tanks. Same goes for the drinks industry. Nobody's saying you have to get pissed every day. It's good for people to have some time off the sauce. But all at the same time? That could push quite a few businesses, social amenities and livelihoods over the edge.

There are already plenty of preachers in the health charity sector without MacMillan adding its hitherto sensible voice to the din. If you are involved in or value the beer and pub industry you might like to think about suspending any future support for MacMillan until next October when you'll find out whether they intend to continue their assault on your living. Unlike MacMillan however, I'm not going to tell you what to do.