Photo and Feature Photo: jophie!
Alcohol-fueled bashings are all the rage in Melbourne, but this is one trend you don’t want to get yourself into.
Melbourne is taking a beating in the local papers lately, with numerous stories of stabbings, bashings, beatings, and brawls. The Herald Sun has a long running series on the issue called “Streets of Fear,” a bit of a marketing ploy, but it reflects the views of many Melburnians. It just isn’t safe to walk the streets of the CBD (Central Business District) late at night anymore.
Photo: Brylan
It’s not new. There has always been the odd news story of street violence, but the coverage has grown exponentially in the past several months, seeming to peak last weekend when one of the victims of a bashing was a police sergeant.
The community is rightly outraged, calling for mandatory jail sentences for assaults on cops, tougher prison terms, a closing of the bars, the banning of glass, and more police on the streets.
Below is a (very) small sample of front page stories regularly found after a weekend of revelry:
12 April Street brawl and vicious “king-hit” in broad daylight captured on video. Watch here.
8 June Man pushed into an elevator and stabbed with a broken beer bottle.
20 June Two hospitalized after 15 person stabbing brawl in Melbourne suburb. 17 year old boy stabbed in the CBD.
20 July 23 year old man kicked repeatedly in the head by two men and hospitalized.
9 August 33 year old Queensland tourist beaten by five youths in a random attack.
23 August Former Aussie Rules Football star jumped at Crown Casino by a gang of thugs. Unprovoked.
What are the Officials Saying?
Photo: jophie!
Predictably, officials are grasping at the lowest hanging fruit: alcohol. Victorian Premier John Brumby says booze is too cheap. The police place a large portion of the blame on nightclubs for not doing enough to stem the problem.
Attention is being turned to the way alcohol is marketed to young people, “alcopops” (sweet, high-acohol content drinks) being the main culprit.
Tried and Failed
For three months last year, a 2 AM lockout rule was enforced in Melbourne as a trial. This meant anyone leaving a bar after 2 AM was not allowed back inside — the intent was to stop bar-hopping as much of the violence occurred between venues.
The result? Ineffective. Reports actually indicate violent crimes went up during the lockout. The government has decided not to pursue this tactic.
Harsher Sentences
With the violence so highly profiled right now, judges are under extreme pressure to hand down harsher sentences. Two recent cases:
Nicholas Keon, who had just polished off an entire bottle of Southern Comfort before moving on to vodka, was sentenced to six years in prison for bashing David Mitchell, a promising football player who can never play contact sports again after suffering brain damage.
Aspiring v8 Supercar driver, Michael Tancredi, was sent to the sin bin for four years after putting his victim in a coma.
With more cases before the courts right now, will judges continue with the tough sentences? Will they get even tougher? More importantly, will they work?
Photo: s2art
Alcohol is not the Problem
My twenties were spent binge drinking on weekends. Same with my older brothers. Our parents’ generation did it too, as well as their parents, and so on. Binge drinking is not new.
What has changed is the availability of alcohol and its targeted marketing to young people. Alcohol is not the cause of the violence, though.
There is something more deeply embedded in these trouble-makers that alcohol enhances. Alcohol is not the root of the problem, but is the great disinhibitor that leads to the violence.
Australia’s Violent Culture
Leading criminologist, Rob White, claims that Australia has a culture of violence. “It’s everywhere. Turn on the TV, it’s there. We go to work and school and confront bullies. And then there’s Parliament and sport. In fact, we love the biff* – and we’re not really that surprised by it,” he says.
He goes on to talk about solutions:
What I am talking about here is mass cultural change: an education program to teach us collectively to engage in non-aggressive resolution of problems. But I don’t think we are that serious about it – we treat the symptoms not the causes.
He also says that, even though violence has been part of Australian culture for so long, the rules of engagement have changed. Where one-on-one fair fights used to be the norm, you now have swarms of men — maybe gathered by text message — beating up on a single person. Knife-weilding attackers are also more likely to target defenceless victims.
And even when the person is down, it doesn’t stop there. Recent deaths and serious injuries have been caused when the victims were stomped on while they lay helpless on the ground. There is no respect.
Are the Kids Alright?
Police Association assistant secretary Bruce McKenzie doesn’t think so:
The baby boomers have over-indulged their kids to the extent where they think they can do whatever they like.
Criminologist Rob White sees it differently though:
If you want to deal with street violence and alcohol, deal with it holistically, and deploy the tactical use of force where appropriate. I think to blame youth is a cop-out. It abrogates responsibility from those who should have it.
A better way? / Photo: rhymeswithsausage
A Balanced Approach
The Australian Institute of Criminology recently held a round table to discuss how to tackle the problem. They identified seven key areas that need to be addressed.
Among them are: business regulation (licenses and staff education), law enforcement (increased numbers at problem spots), education (school programs), technology and media (the role of the media and communications), and community and culture (encouraging local communities to be more involved).
With all the hype surrounding alcohol, it’s promising to see that other causes are also being looked into. As in most cases, it’s a relatively small minority that cause the all the problems and ruin it for everyone else.
It would be a welcome change if those who are able to drink responsibly don’t have their party spoiled too.
*Biff is Australian slang for a fight.
Bash does not have the same connotation in Australia as it does in the U.S. It means a violent attack, but not necessarily fueled by bigotry (e.g. gay-bashing).
Community Connection
Interested in protesting violence? Look for events in support of International Non-violence Day on October 2nd, or start your own.
Do you think replacing alcohol with marijuana would be a viable solution to the problem of alcohol related violence? If so, be sure to check out Juli Huang’s article on how to help the economy by legalizing pot.
Have you ever been in a drunk fight? Or been attacked by drunk hooligans?
What do you think will solve the problem?
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10 Comments... join the discussion!
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You’re right Tim. Most of the violence does occur in the wee hours of the morning. However, I have seen the odd fight well before midnight.
To clarify, Melbourne is a very safe city. I’ve never personally felt threatened, but then again, I’m not much into the late-night life anymore. If you’re going to party like it’s 1999 just be extra careful, keep your wits about you, and don’t stir yourself up any trouble. The worst part of it is sometimes they are random attacks, just a bunch of thugs out to hurt people, which would be hard to avoid if in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Just remember, we’re not invincible.
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Interesting…I agree I don’t think alcohol is the problem, but rather just something that eggs on an existing issue. Alcohol has always been a big part of the Australian culture (and Irish culture, German…the list goes on). And I’ve certainly heard and seen at least the macho, if not violent, mentality of some Aussie men.
My question is, why is this amount of intense violence seem to be happening just in Melbourne? It doesn’t seem like Sydney or other cities throughout AU are having quite as much of an issue.
Funny, when I was in Melbourne, I thought it was a pretty chill city, while Sydney was go go go. But I wasn’t out at 3 in the morning, so that might have had something to do with it…
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Not sure why it seems to be isolated to Melbourne. I do hear about random violence in Sydney or Brisbane too but not nearly on this level. Could also be that I’m here so obviously this is much closer to home. But I know that Melbourne’s problem is also reported around the country so it is especially bad here. Will be interesting to see how this is tackled.
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I don’t know that I would say that Australia has a violent culture any more than America or England. You say you turn on the tv and see violence, but most of those shows are American. Sport is violent no matter where you go, AFL is probably one of my the more tame sports and the penalties for engaging in fighting (both on and off the field) are huge. Unfortunately I think one of the big problems lies with the print media who go out of their way to print every single act of violence in Melbourne to the point where one would be convinced that we do indeed live in a violent city. In fact Australia falls behind the US, UK, New Zealand and Canada in terms of assault rates per capita. This constant hyping and sensationalising leads to a reinforcement of violence being the norm in Australia, and especially associated with masculine figures in the media such as footballers and rugby league players. The media should realise that just because they are saying that what a person has done is wrong doesn’t mean that they are not reinforcing the masculine norm. I don’t deny that violence is a problem and that it should be given it’s appropriate place in the media spotlight, I just worry about what all this moral panic is doing for our tourism industry when everyone seems to think that you can’t walk down a Melbourne street without being stabbed.
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One thing I can attest to having lived in Australia (Melbourne) for the past (almost) two years is that there is definitely more “bloke-ism” here than in NA, as Chris so eloquently put it below “men’s men”. This becomes dangerous in stand-off situations where neither party will back off for fear of being seen as a pussy and this is what will quickly escalate a situation.
But you are right in that violence on TV and in sport (hello? ice hockey?), is the same here as it is anywhere else. I think the question is how it combines with other factors that might be unique in Australia that leads to the problems, such as the availability of booze (eg the number of licensed establishments, the opening hours) and how it’s being targeted to younger and younger people. I remember reading an article in the paper about some alcohol issue (can’t recall what it was exactly) but then there was an ad right beside it for a sale on booze. Mixed messages.
I completely hear what you’re saying about media sensationalism – I dislike it myself and am always skeptical of the mainstream media. I’ve also used it as arguments in other discussions (if you don’t believe me, see my comments in the piece on Abroad “Should People of Color go to Russia?”). At the same time though, it really does help to bring the issue to the forefront and really put pressure on the officials to actually do something about it, because it is an issue.
And I think it if it does affect tourism then that will put even more pressure on the gov’t to tackle the problem (because it really is a problem when it’s as regular an occurrence as it is here).
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Interesting. When I was in New Zealand a year and a half ago, I heard reports of the same thing happening in Christchurch: groups of young men randomly beating people late at night.
Fucking hell.
While there is plenty of violence in American, much of it is gang-related, a sort of internecine warfare. We don’t see as much random attacks as happen in the UK, NZ, and Oz…. at least I was never aware. There is a real culture of booze violence in these places. I definitely felt it in NZ – a certain tension in some of the pubs, the feeling that I needed to watch what I said and watch my back. I’ve felt it in the UK as well. Maybe it’s because I’m a Yank and my accent automatically attracts attention, but I generally feel much safer drinking at a bar in America than one in the UK or New Zealand (and though I’ve never been, I’ll add Australia as well…).
Australia is such a masculine country, in image at least. Aussie men pride themselves in being “men’s men” – drinking fucking and fighting – so it’s no surprise that they’re running into problems. The amount of Aussie men I’ve met abroad who are homophobic and openly racist astounds me, and I know some real redneck motherfuckers back in the U.S. of A. No offense, but i think y’all got us beat.
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Here’s an article about the types of drinks on offer out there…they call them “booze bombs”.
One of the drinks you can get at a restaurant is an oversized marguerita with…wait for it…THIRTEEN shots of alcohol in it!
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Hello…I don’t know that I would say that Australia has a violent culture any more than America or England. You say you turn on the tv and see violence, but most of those shows are American. Sport is violent no matter where you go, AFL is probably one of my the more tame sports and the penalties for engaging in fighting (both on and off the field) are huge
onlineuniversalwork
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hi i lived and worked in melbourne in 1975 [i know centuries ago]/ lived in the st kilda area then moved to ormond. anyway being a bricklayer i loved to have a drink. i drank in the bell at the village area and the greyhound on the brighton rd being glasgow/irish i soon fell in line with my aussie mates and many a good drink was had by one and all. never saw any violence to talk about except for the odd punch up but that heppens any city worldwide lived in sydney the year before but liked melbourne better. hard work and a good drink should go hand in hand, any person after having a drink who wants to be really agressive shouid go to the nearest cop shop where they can act the big man. life’s too short enjoy it before you get too old[just like me] but i never was in prison. cheers my friends.
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