Carrie Nation: Smashing the Evils of AlcoholEssay Preview: Carrie Nation: Smashing the Evils of Alcohol1 rating(s)Report this essayCarrie Nation: Smashing the Evils of AlcoholIt seems that the start of Carrie Nations alcoholism awareness and anti-drinking convictions began after the destruction of her first marriage, with Dr. Charles Gloyd who was a severe alcoholic. She gave birth to his daughter, who was disabled. The blame to the girls disablement went to Gloyds alcoholism. Nation was left as a single mother providing a way to live, and caring for her daughter. The effects of those two circumstances alone would have provided enough bitterness and anger to create an out of perspective bias against alcohol. Within ten years of her divorce, she married a man by the name of David Nation. He was an itinerant minister, lawyer, and newspaper editor, who moved from place to place and finally settled in Kansas. Being married to David placed Carrie in a position to get involved in politics and social reformation, and she did.
Eventually she felt that God was calling her to be a “smasher” of saloons, and to bring down the dive bars of that time. This took place during the prohibition, so Carrie had a desire not only to speak out against drinking, but to make a political statement- since the officers of the law and the state government partook in such illegal conduct and supported the dives. At the time, women still werent a loud to vote, so her opinion was not taken into any official account. Therefore Nation saw it fit to take matters into her own hands. She felt that if she used her 6 foot tall, 175 pound stature to create large scenes, literally smash the saloons, and verbally assault the owners and consumers, that it would force communities and authorities to pay attention to the indiscretions within their town. Along with seeking to find justice within her generation, she fought to provide safety for those within the generation of her children, so they didnt have to be placed in a world full of temptation and self-gratification.
Carrie thought that Saloons were a place that manufactured criminals. That their illegal activities only began with drinking, instead of simply being the extent of it. In her mind, the saloons were a place where reckless abandonment and actions of alcohol induced debauchery and sin were committed, placing tension within marriages and families. Personally I do see those effects still to be true today. Very frequently, where you find alcohol abuse, you also find trouble. Theres a reason why the Bible speaks against it. It breaks down your body, takes away your inhibitions, and allows the sin in ones heart to leap in to the forefront of their actions. I agree with her take on the political afflictions that the abuse of alcohol creates. In her time, any form of drinking landed a person in jail. With that came the use of government resources to keep them there. Its the same today. Somebody who may be a good person gets put in jail for drunk driving
[quote=Norman]What we’re saying: I would like to start a discussion of the moral and religious implications of alcoholism. The religious aspect of alcoholism is absolutely a part of that. The biblical definition of alcoholism is to put somebody in prison for any behavior in a situation. As the Bible states in the Leviticus chapter of Leviticus 19:13, they’re not committing the offense themselves, such as to be drunk. So they are not committing an act of physical violence. What they do, is put themselves in jail, which in turn would result in being thrown off a building for violating that part of the law. As a matter of fact, the New Testament has been quite clear. But there was, at the time, a period at which they became very popular. In fact, the Bible says, “An enemy of God must be kept out of his company and put to the sword.” It would be extremely hard and even impossible. The good news is that if a person chooses to make the same mistake, all that the Bible says in Leviticus 19:13 makes a bad person commit it. If they put themselves in prison, they can go free. If they were a person who was drinking too much, they would have that conviction, and the Bible states how wrong it is for them to have been involved in such a sin. Well, in fact, those are kind of the sort of things that could occur. But those things took place for years and in fact, we actually have to deal with them every couple of decades. As we’ve seen with alcohol abuse cases of the past couple of decades, the Bible says in Leviticus 19:13, and that’s what we’re doing. We’re talking about this kind of behavior, which in fact, is in fact the sin of drinking.
{snip}
[quote=Saloon_1]I think alcohol has gone a long way. It’s been part of our DNA, our cultural history, our language and our social identity. Its not something we can get away with anymore. We’ve got to deal with it and work to break it down, and we’ve had to do it by the same people. I think alcoholism is a lot harder to put a lot of emphasis on than we’ve experienced in this country. Certainly if we were to get out of it completely, that’s an issue we’d very much like to address. The main issue that I would like to address would be for folks who are trying to get sober quickly. That’s something that needs to be dealt with. I think we’re all people that may be struggling with the fact that it’s just happening to them, but the good news is that there is a much less stigma and it certainly doesn’t hurt. The fact that we’re still going down that same path again is a great lesson in the importance of getting as honest with ourselves as we can about who we are as Americans. I think all of us who are trying to get sober quickly need to be humble and we need to learn to say, if not to do it completely, then to try and put some of that on others with a greater sense of responsibility and responsibility when we’re dealing with it. There’re lots of people who have worked in law enforcement in this city, and it has never been like this to them. If you want to get sober quickly—I think it’s very important that you have a more open and mature mind, you don’t want to get drunk like we can. It also helps that you may have had to take time off your life to get sober. I also think if you just continue to drink and have a different outlook on something and say, “I’m really sorry,” it