Look, will you drink fascists, please, just fuck off?

Earier today, the poor, little Greek boy looked at the definitions of binge-drinking; by this definition I can think of only one person I know who is not a binge drinker (and he gets so intense at parties that everyone wishes that he was). Therefore it is with some irritation that I find, via Timmy, that the fuckers are at it again. This time, it is Preston police who have found the secret of the eeeeeevil binge-drinking.

Police in Preston, Lancashire, think it is not as simple as that. Vertical drinking, they believe, is one of the country’s main causes of public disorder and would like to see it banned in the city’s pubs.

Vertical drinking is a new term for what used to be called standing at the bar, long regarded as the natural refuelling posture. Sixteen pints of lager slip into the tanks much more easily when the gullet is erect rather than kinked by the body being squeezed into a chair like a half-shut penknife. Drinking while standing in a like-minded group, police argue, is a contributor to booze-fuelled violence.

Oh, in the name of fuck, now we aren't even allowed to enjoy our drinking any more?

Backed by the local NHS primary care trust, Preston police want a “no standing” drinking rule imposed on the city by the autumn; they want customers to be served only if they have a seat.

Oh, that'll be really popular, eh? And really enforceable too. Fucking hellski.

And, of course, since pubs will then either have to buy more seats or let fewer people into the pub, one can imagine that drink prices will go up quite substantially. And will the landlord be able to displace the quiet couple who will sit for a couple of hours with one small glass of wine each in order to accommodate and large number of gentlemen who have got a thirst on? Will we start to hear about the phenomenon of "table-blockers"?

Why don't the fucking police concentrate on enforcing the laws that we pay them to, rather than further curtailing our freedoms and then—in an extraordinarily cowardly way—get the landlords to enforce them. The police really are not doing themselves any favours, the stupid cunts.

Police in Preston already have an alcohol harm reduction and prevention team. Sergeant Andy Hobson, the team’s alcohol project manager, said: “If people are sat down there is less potential for flashpoints than with vertical drinking. This is not designed so much to affect the amount they drink; it is the proximity of other people when you are stood up, which is where the problems can start.

“People go into these places and crowd round the bars, then the next you know somebody gets a push, the pint goes over and that’s it.”

Ah yes, so the best way is to punish the innocent so that the police can stay in the station, drinking tea and eating biscuits; after all, they wouldn't want to actually wander about looking for crimes to arrest people for, eh?

Publicans have dismissed the scheme as impractical. Ryan Wood, manager of Yates’s pub, said: “They have completely missed the point. If anything it is going to cause more friction because people are not going to like being told to sit down every five minutes. It’s almost impossible to enforce.”

Well, quite.

I really wish that these doctors and bastard policemen would shut the fuck up and go back to actually doing their jobs...