Ogre’s Politics and Views

By now I’m sure you have heard the story about Natasha Farnham, the 12-year old drunk who had liver failure by age 14. And you can see her in the pictures at the link, sitting with her mum. But did you real the sub-text in that story? Way at the start it’s got this:

Her descent into a life of ruined health and petty crime again illustrates the perils of cheap alcohol and the culture of binge-drinking that grips Britain.

Do it’s the fault of cheap alcohol and the culture. She skipped school a lot at age 12. No one noticed. She says that she didn’t know it was wrong to steal or to drink. She stole from her mum, and she didn’t notice. Her mum says Natasha started drinking “around the same time that alcopops were being advertised” — so it was the advertisers fault. Oh, and don’t forget, “The main thing that needs to be done is for supermarkets to stop offering alcohol at pocket-money prices.” It’s alcohol’s fault.

Notice who never once took any blame at all? Neither the girl or her mum. Supposedly she’s in rehab, but this must be the new-age rehab where nothing is your fault. It used to be one of the first steps of rehab was to admit the problem. Apparently no longer. And nowhere in the article does it say where mum was during all these times. Oh sure, it claims Natasha told her mum she was at a friend’s house, but that’s pretty darn lame.

But even more significantly, I wonder, did you, my good reader and guest, notice what was missing in this story of woe and horror? There is something huge that’s missing. There is one thing missing here that would likely completely and totally mitigate this entire story. In fact, were that one thing in place, I don’t think this would be a story at all. It may be that were that one thing included, poor Natasha might never have taken a single drink. But alas, there was not one mention of it in this entire story. Can you guess what it is?

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