Alcohol Advertising: A Youth Worker speaks of the harm being done / Carly Laughton

It’s about 3pm on a Thursday afternoon and I’ve been at Auckland central courthouse since 9.30am advocating for a young man who the courts seem to be determined to imprison. He’s a kind and courageous person, and the charge is a small survival crime common among whānau we support in the city, taking food. The long wait is lengthened by the constant nagging feeling of powerlessness, and the frustration at the lack of empathy within the system, and at the way he is being treated. To remain a strong advocate for him I need to take a moment to gather my thoughts.  I take the escalator downstairs, head through security and out the front door. Finally outside, the air gives me room to take a deep breath and close my eyes. My thoughts take control. “Am I going to be able to help him” “Surely these Lawyers should be doing more” “I feel like I’m not enough in this situation”. As I open my eyes I’m faced with a giant bottle of whiskey on a billboard, across the road. “Ahhhhh that would be nice.”

A relatively regular, unharmful thought for somebody in a stressful situation, right?

Perhaps… however I’m an alcoholic who’s in recovery from a disease that has wreaked havoc on my entire life.

Alcohol swiftly took centre stage in my life as a small child, and as I got old enough to access my own, the consequences that it brought were rapid and vast. There was little transition to alcoholism as I was not drinking for taste, but for the effect. Drinking was the solution I poured over the ever-present fears and unworthiness that were rooted in my core beliefs. Feelings and thoughts that told me that I was not and would never be enough. I spent 20 years in and out ofinstitutions and prisons, had multiple suicide attempts and never saw any other way out.

Just over 3 years ago I chose recovery, and my life has completely changed. Transmuting my life knowledge, I’m now a youth support worker, on my way to becoming a qualified Drug and Alcohol counsellor. With further aims to develop programmes to treat alcoholism in young people, so that I may help others exit similar self-destructive cycles.

People who are recovering from alcohol addiction develop resilience over time, and do I expect to be wrapped in cotton wool for the rest of my life? No.

However, the statistics around violent and criminal offenses that take place while under the influence of alcohol in Tāmaki Makaurau are staggering, and it is a good question to ask how appropriate or even helpful is it for there to be a 10ft bottle of whiskey placed directly outside the exit to the largest courthouse we have in Aotearoa? How sad would it be for these young people to walk out of our courthouse and be triggered by an image that could lead them straight back to the substance that contributed the original crime in the first place. To start the cycle all over again.

 Too many people the image of a whisky bottle may promote ideas of fun and pleasure, to someone like myself and to the hundreds of young people who walk through those doors every year, they are not, they are triggers. What we know about visual triggers is that they are one of the strongest and most likely to push someone to pick up their drug of choice, especially Aotearoa’s strongest and most accessible drug, Alcohol.

Those who choose to leave behind a life of crime and confront the feelings of their past trauma without the buffer of substances are warriors, especially those who are young.

The lives they choose to build for themselves after they step away from alcohol and other drugs are so full and beautiful. There is no greater feeling as a youth worker than to walk alongside a young person who is in the arena with their trauma and feelings every day and still chooses to stay clean and sober. I have seen these same young people support their friends and family to make changes in their own lives. The roll-on effect of one person’s change has the potential to impact so many.

How brave and courageous are these rangatahi?!

Don’t they deserve to be protected from these giants of commerce? By no means am I proposing that all people require this kind of protection, however if you put the face of Big Alcohol next to the face of our most vulnerable, who do you think requires the korowai of our policies and procedures more?

The lawyers of “Big Alcohol” sit in the chambers of parliament with many of our leaders and speak to the community work that is achieved with the money they make from sales, but at what cost to our young people? At what cost to those who are brave enough to attempt change?

How nice would it be to know that they can walk along a street and not be triggered, to attend a school rugby game and not see images of branding that has caused them so much shame and guilt.

So, what is our solution? I’m under no illusion that this advertising will be stopped all together but perhaps looking at where these giant bottles of liquor are placed is a good place to start. Sports fields and low-income areas should be a safe place to choose a life without alcohol. Aotearoa’s drinking culture is well known and widely documented. Big alcohol does not need the billboards. The commerce of these giants is flourishing, especially during lockdown while there is not much else for people to do. How amazing would it be to see giant billboards advertising hope and the freedom to change generational trauma instead?

It brings me great hope to see the kōrero that is taking place amongst those who champion this mahi.

WE have a lot of work to do.

Carly Laughton is a Youth Peer Support specialist and Advocate working for the E Ara E service at Odyssey house supporting young people with mental health challenges into education and employment. Carly is working towards a qualification as an Alcohol and other Drug counsellor and once qualified hopes to develop programmes to support young people experiencing homelessness in Tamaki, with a focus on Alcohol and Synthetic cannabis. Carly is passionate about supporting young people as she grew up in and out services herself and hopes to use her lived experience to offer hope that recovery is possible. Carly lives in Tāmaki Makaurau and is the mother to a 14-year-old daughter and two fur babies.

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