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Edited on Fri Jul-11-08 05:25 PM by percussivemadness
There was a major violence problem in the UK in the 80s that reflected general dissatisfaction with living in the UK. Whilst it makes me laugh that 95% of Americans think England is tea and cucumber sandwiches, the reality of life in the UK couldn`t be even more different. A violent tribal society (each city has a football team, and each team has its supporters), movies like Lock Stock far more accurately portray life in England than Benny Hill and Mr Bean. As the hooligan problem threatened to become out of control, the Thatcher Govt started flooding the football terraces with MDMA or E (not the actual govt obviously, but there was a "blind eye" turned against it). Football violence disappeared overnight and the terraces became like huge raves.
Whilst the positive side was the eradication of any football violence, the downside (from a slave worker mentality that all govts want) was the E-Culture became part and parcel of British youth culture between 1989 - 1993. Whilst the Govt hated the tune in-drop out culture that dominated the UK in those years, a more powerful lobby was pissed, the alcohol industry. A report on Leisure Futures, published in 1993 by influential market analysts the Henley Centre for Forecasting, revealed that between 1987 and 1992, pub attendance in the UK fell by 11%, with a projected 20% decrease by 1997.Estimates used in the report suggested the percentage of 16-24s taking any illegal drug doubled to nearly 30 per cent between 1989 and 1992. Using a rather conservative estimate suggesting one million people attend licensed raves each week, the Henley Centre estimated UK ravers were spending £1.8 billion a year on entrance fees, cigarettes and illegal drugs. The report concludes: "This of course poses a significant threat to spending for such sectors as licensed drinks retailers and drink companies. Firstly some young people are turning away from alcohol to stimulants; secondly raves are extremely time consuming and displace much of the time and energy which might have been expended on other leisure activities like pubs or drinking at home."
In 1990, Graham Bright introduced the first legislative victory for the alcohol industry in its battle for market control, came in the form of the Entertainment (Increased Penalties) Act in 1990. This successful private member's bill was introduced by Conservative MP Graham Bright, who referred to it as "the acid house party bill". The new law placed fines of up to £20,000 on the organizers of unlicensed raves and had a highly detrimental affect on an exploding new culture with its impromptu venues. In a nutshell, it made a group of 2 or more people listening to music with repetitive beats illegal, giving the police powers to seize equipment and pose fines up to 20,000 or 10 years in prison to anyone falling within these broad categories.
The Joe Biden sponsored RAVE Act achieved the same thing in America in 2003.
As E-culture has become disenfranchised in the UK, due to ever increasing legislative penalties for dealers and the introduction of coke, heroin, Ketamine and speed being cut into the drugs, Britain has over the last 7 years returned to exactly where the alcohol industry wants them, as a nation of drunken louts fighting each other. The problem has become so endemic in the UK that many respectable parts of the UK are no longer safe at night and youth violence has been discussed in Parliament as one of the greatest issues afflicting British society today. Naturally violence has also returned to the terraces.
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