I’m not even sure what I think of this.
MADD announces an exclusive license agreement with Hill Street Marketing Inc. to produce a line of alcohol-free beverages, MADD Virgin Drinks, which will provide American consumers with a delicious and socially responsible alternative to alcoholic beverages.
Part of me celebrates the option (I’m all for choice), assuming that MADD isn’t about eliminating choice. And they say…
MADD is not against responsible drinking by those 21 and older.
… although that doesn’t really match up with much of MADD’s normal rhetoric.
Hey, at least with the word MADD printed huge on each bottle, there’s little chance of picking the wrong one by accident.
MADD is no good. Now they are a self-perpetuating prohibitionist lobbying machine with no sense of restraint or balance. They are a fully functioning organ of the prison-industrial complex. As I recall, the woman who founded MADD eventually left the organization and repudiated its current methods and goals.
I think mothers against drunk driving (not the institution MADD but the actual mothers) should actively, aggressively
harasslobby their congressmen to increase the penalties for drunk driving. As it is now, people who are arrested for DUI are given the rhetorical ‘slap on the wrist,’ and nothing bothered me more than this story:http://cbs3.com/local/John.Lawless.Previously.2.1181374.html
The aptly-named Lawlesss had a recorded history of driving drunk and was driving on a suspended license (presumably it had been suspended from a previous DUI encounter) when he killed an innocent person, leaving the victim’s wife husbandless and daughter fatherless.
People drink and drive because 1. the mentality of a drunk is “I’m ok to drive, I’ll be careful,” then they wrap their car around a tree or sideswipe a barrier/other cars/etc or worse, kill someone. Then they KEEP THEIR JOB and pay a fine and take a class. BUT if you’re even caught (or planted with) ‘controlled’ substances, you’re locked away, minimum sentence, etc (because it’s a war on minorities not a war on (some) drugs; read tinyurl.com/1mn )
Thanks for finding this, Pete. Here’s my take: http://ssdp.org/blog/2009/09/attention-fellow-undergrads-i-am-sober.html
On a MADD page I found this statement, which is interesting:
http://www.maddorangecounty.org/designated.htm
“MADD opposes the consumption of alcohol by anyone under the legal drinking age of 21. Therefore, MADD makes it clear that if you are under 21 years of age, the Designated Driver concept is not for you, unless, your parents (after drinking) or the friends with you are of legal drinking age and having consumed alcohol, and you are asked, as a licensed driver, to be the Designated Driver. “
It’s my guess that’s what has prompted some places to make laws making the designated driver into a criminal should he transport those below 21 around. Related are also laws making it a crime to host a party, where alcohol is present, when attendees are younger than 21.
While logical from a law-and-order perspective it’s bound to ignore the fact that there ARE those below 21 drinking, and MADD doesn’t have the harm reduction backup plan ready for them. Hence the kds leave mom and dad’s house, drive to the beach, the former designated drivers decides “what’s the point, heck I’m gonna grab a beer” … and the rest is in the headlines.
Besides that it’s a kinda weird concept for MADD to now be selling drinks – it’s not like alcohol-free drinks aren’t available. Some thoughts on that here: http://www.duiattorney.com/news/view-by-tag/designated+driver/
The age 21 drinking laws are yet another damn intrusion in people’s lives. You can fight and die for your country at age 18, but you can’t drink.
The problem with organizations like MADD is that they never know when to stop. After achieving their original purpose, they’ve sought to maintain the ‘need’ for their ‘services’ like any bureaucracy does, to justify their continued existence.
it’s telling that the founder of MADD, Candy Lightner, left the organization in 1985, saying that it had become “far more neo-prohibitionist than I had ever wanted or envisioned… I didn’t start MADD to deal with alcohol. I started MADD to deal with the issue of drunk driving.”
When the person who starts the organization quits under such terms, well, what are we left to think?
Honestly FUCK MADD and their lame, ineffective methods of decreasing drunk driving. The prohibition of drinkers between the ages of 18-20 has caused the binge drinking deaths of more people than I care to count. However, if parents were allowed to serve a glass of whine or beer with dinner when their children were younger without fear of being dragged out of their homes by police maybe kids would be more acclimated with alcohol and would therefore not binge drink as much once they leave home for college. These drinks should be boycotted at the very least. I would gladly piss on MADD’s grave the day it disbands.
Interesting. You know, in many states you can get busted for carrying fake marijuana. I wonder if the justification for such laws would also demand that users of MADD’s fake booze be subject to arrest for drinking it while driving or for giving/selling it to minors . . .
But non-alcoholic beverages won’t make ugly people more attractive or fukkable… not that we want them reproducing mind you… at least not in my town. But, as I’ve said a zillion times before every dollar they spend on this type of add is one less dollar they have to depict us as defacto monkeys ready to rape their dog and murder their neighbors in the name of the ganga gods!
I wonder if MASD (Mothers Against Stoned Driving) will be selling very low to no THC Cannabis (AKA hemp) after marijuana is legalized.
“delicious and socially responsible alternative to alcoholic beverages”
It’s called Dr. Pepper.
I wonder if they will sell even one bottle of this crap. Who is “Hill Street Marketing Inc.”? I bet they are a wholly-owned subsidiary of MADD. Read that very carefully – Why would you enter into a license agreement with a marketing company to produce a line of beverages? One would assume MADD owns the rights to its own name, so it wouldn’t have to license the name MADD from anyone. It might contract with a beverage manufacturer to produce and bottle the actual beverages. But why would it “enter into a license agreement” with a marketing company? What are they licensing? Why is a marketing company “producing” the line of beverages?
Something fishy is going on here.