Nulato residents argue over liquor store. Step aside, I'm gonna lecture angrily and set yer shit straight.
Top of the morning gents,
A few years back 2 North Slope villages tried going
totally wet.
The result was disasterous, and both villages quickly
returned to dry status thus allowing me to
disintegrate Logan's Run and WeBeDrugs Airline routes
plethora.
Ya see, the excessive and chronically abusive drinking
that we see all over bush Alaska has nothing to do
with the relative status or availability of alcohol.
The disasters are due solely to the composite liver
chemistry of the citizens in each of these villages.
Yup, I'm talking about ethnicity, race and organ
structure and function. Allow me my habitually
digressive preamble...
A hunnert years ago Dr. Jan Shackles was my graveyard
guard duty conversationalist and Florence Nightengale
whilst watching over badly injured arrestees at MMC,
Kotzebue's infection connection analogous to the
Anchorage Native "Anus" Hospital (ANS).
She and I chatted about all sorts of things, but her
depth and authority lay in the EXACT reason why I was
hired to watch drunken and broken Inu-monkeys that
would be in prison had they not been wrapped around
axles or worse, inserted into storm porches like May
Marlene Thomas, God rest her soul.
I may be more immature and naive than all of ye
graying gunslingers and uniformed felons, but I'm
older than almost all of ye.
It may also be the case that I arguably have a better
memory than you lads because I broker (steal) huge
sections of your brains (me bun's too) as temp. data
storage using my hyper sonic mother board and
processor speed as a means of retrieval from all YOUR
giant hard drives.
I'll say it again. All of you likely have higher IQ's
than I, but were denied the ability to learn. Strike 2
for Team Alaska public schools.
The thrust of Dr. Shackles theoretical assertions were
a simple fact: the Mongolian Spot on all our Eskimo
brethren. This 'spot' is easy to detect and indicates
missing liver chemicals and uniquely native liver
function when soaked with ethanol alcohol.
All Asian descendants from the Siberian Mongol-Asian
Steppe have both 'spots' on generationally mutating
male DNA and non-mutating mitochondrial female DNA,
hence no gender specificity with regards to poor
alcohol breakdown, digestion, secretion and excretion.
Still with me?
ALL our Eskimo folks are of Asian descent, thus the
vile hatred of gooks, slopes and dinks due to the
irritating similarity seen in the mirror and
differring treatment with us Northern European
swinging dicks.
Alas, I digress, but not too far from the fray. But to
back these ideas I attached a Masters Thesis
Submission assigned by the good Dr. Porter.
It's a quick read and may surprise you how the medical
world is catching up to notions only understood by all
you village coppers, state troopers and a contract
narc that will remain persistently annoying and
anonymous.
Despite our fond memories of Northern European holiday
drinking with our blessed gramps, grams, mums and
poppas, ANY drinking here on the resevation with our
aboriginal inlaws spells only disaster. Come on,
they're Eskimos, not Vikings nor Celts for fucksake.
You are merely humble servants in the million year war
protecting the innocent from evil and we have
thousands of dearly departed Inupiaq angels covering
our 6 and backing our plays.
God be with you chaps. You are the chosen few.
Karluk.
---
Nulato's choice
Out of money, village may bank on liquor store sales
Published: May 10, 2006
Without question, alcohol abuse has ravaged much of
Bush Alaska, wrecking families and futures, condemning
thousands of Alaskans from the unborn to the aged to
troubled lives, violent deaths or both.
So why is the Yukon River village of Nulato going to
vote on owning its own liquor store?
The village needs the money.
Right now, the village sees a lot of money going to
the Last Chance liquor store -- owned by a member of
the city council -- 15 miles out of town. Rather than
let liquor sales enrich one person, the idea is to get
into the business, control the flow and tap the
profits for city services.
Councilman Howard Esmailka said revenue from the store
could pay for a city police officer who would sleep in
the back of the liquor store.
At best, the village would be doing more to make
drinkers pay the social costs many of them impose on
the community. At worst, the village would be
administering its own poison.
It's a practical choice laced with local politics. If
Nulato is going to live with the consequences of
liquor sales, it might as well make the benefits
public rather than private. Practical or not, it's a
choice Nulato shouldn't have to make.
Like much of the rest of rural Alaska, Nulato has been
on the ropes financially with the end of state revenue
sharing in 2003. The village hasn't been left utterly
adrift: In fiscal year 2006 there was $44,791 in
temporary state energy assistance and a federal
payment of $37,605. The Legislature's just-passed
budget includes one-time payments to local governments
aimed at helping with higher fuel costs; Nulato will
receive $40,000.
But none of this is money Nulato or any other local
government in Alaska can count on in the future.
"It's kind of a hit and miss with the state," says
Bill Rolfzen, who specializes in municipal assistance
with the Department of Commerce, Community and
Economic Development. Mr. Rolfzen noted that the last
state revenue sharing payments in 2003 capped a decade
of steady decline.
So Jack Daniels may be a more sustainable revenue
source than the state of Alaska. But as Alaska State
Troopers investigator Michael Duxbury says, where
there's alcohol, there's crime.
Nulato and the rest of Alaska communities need
sustained revenue sharing. Alaska's small local
governments don't have the wherewithal to be entirely
self-sustaining.
A small slice of the state's Permanent Fund earnings
would put revenue sharing on a permanent basis, and
put money in the hands of local governments, which are
generally more in tune with local needs and wants.
We'd give up a few dollars of our dividends but still
have our autumn checks -- and maybe some property tax
relief in Anchorage, or a police officer in Nulato.
At present Nulato residents make all of their liquor
purchases just upriver in Galena, the region's sole
outlet for beer, wine and hard liquor. With such a
huge sum of money being spent at Galena's liquor
store, a Nulato municipal liquor store would mean much
more money would stay in community: hence Nulato would
have better choices to make.
BOTTOM LINE: Nulato shouldn't have to turn to liquor
sales when the state has the means to restore lost
funding from revenue sharing. A local sales tax,
property tax or income tax would serve the community's
financial needs without filling their graveyard to
capacity.
---
Article Last Updated: 05/09/2006
Nulato residents argue over liquor store
Associated Press
Residents in the Yukon River village of Nulato are
debating a proposal to create a city-owned liquor
store and use the proceeds to pay for police and other
city services.
But it's a tough choice to make in a community with a
history of drinking problems. Supporters say a store
will also discourage residents from traveling in
dangerous weather to buy from a liquor store about 15
miles upriver.
Opponents say crime and alcohol consumption will rise
as more locals drink in town and residents from
surrounding villages arrive to binge drink.
About 100 Bush villages have banned alcohol sales or
possession. Only four villages of more than 200
villages in Alaska have created city-run liquor
stores.
---
ALCOHOL: ETHNIC, RACIAL AND CULTURAL EPIDEMIOLOGY
Probably as a kind of spillover from the rational fear of racism, there is an irrational cultural phobia against recognizing hereditary differences of any kind. Nevertheless, the composite of evidence fully supports the fact that there is a genetic gradient of susceptibility to alcoholism. As discussed earlier, the hypothesis that best fits all of the data is that alcoholism results from not one but several genetic factors with an interacting effect on the various phenomena of alcohol attraction or aversion, adaptation, dependence, and deterioration, McBroom (1966) and Moody (1967). This view is fully compatible with the science of genetics as applied to a large number of other similar hereditary phenomena, as explained by Dobzhansky (1962) and Vale (1973).
Alcohol has many complex effects and there are many individual differences in the initial biochemical response to alcohol as a stimulant, a source of energy, and a sedative drug. Since there are such obvious physical attractions, it is as instructive to ask why some people drink less as to ask why some drink more. Wolff (1972) found marked differences in reactions to small amounts of alcohol in a comparison of Caucasoid subjects with a Mongoloid group comprised of Japanese, Taiwanese, and Korean subjects. As a control of cultural and postnatal dietary factors, infants were also studied. After drinking even less than an amount that had no noticeable effect on ninety-five percent of the Caucasoids, over eighty percent of the Mongoloids responded with pronounced facial flushing, increased pulse pressure, and symptoms of mild to moderate intoxication. Amplitude of response correlated directly with blood alcohol levels, and could not be attributed to differences in absorption or metabolism of alcohol. Unpleasant reactions, such as "a pounding sensation in their heads," were reported by some of the adult Mongoloids at peak measured response amplitudes. Thus the lower incidence of alcoholism among at least some groups of Mongoloids appears to be related to an inborn aversion to even small amounts of alcohol. The author concludes, "The assumption that ethnic group differences in autonomic regulation have a genetic basis is compatible with other reports of racial differences in autonomic responses to selected pharmacological agents."
It is estimated that some ten percent of all drinkers in the United States are alcoholics. However, the differential rates among ethnic groups are enormously varied, from a negligible rate below one percent for Jews, to something like eighty percent estimated for Indian and Eskimo groups. These differential rates appear to be stable in spite of cultural variations in corresponding reports from different parts of the world, Malzberg (1960).
If you examine my matrix chart (below) showing the inverse correlation between the length of time some illustrative ethnic groups have been exposed to alcohol and their rates of alcoholism. The time exposed to alcohol refers to the time in each group that alcohol is estimated to have been available in sufficient quantity that significant numbers of the population susceptible to alcoholism could progress in their drinking and deterioration. Thus the universal principle of natural selection could begin to eliminate the susceptible genetic strains at that point, Moody (1967), and Alland (1969). This process of elimination can be seen dramatically in the groups just starting their exposure to the toxic effects of alcohol ingestion. In a study of fifty alcoholic Indian and Eskimo patients at the Cedar Hills Alcoholism Treatment Center, we found that they had reproduced at a rate averaging less than one offspring per patient. Their nonalcoholic and nondrinking parents of origin had averaged seven children per family. (Undoubtedly the "skip phenomenon" described below accounted for some of the difference in reproduction rates from one generation to the next, but a true attrition must also be assumed from the general drinking patterns in these ethnic groups.) The reason for this relatively rapid attrition is the very low resistance (high susceptibility) and the correspondingly early age of onset of alcoholism that characterizes these early exposure groups, Dubos (1965), and Young (1970). Most of the fifty patients in the study had shown alcoholic deterioration in their teens and twenties sufficient to disqualify them from normal socioeconomic development and mating behavior.
There are reports of certain American Indian tribes who have had access to alcohol in small quantities for many centuries. They are said to have used alcohol only in occasional tribal rites, when the whole tribe went on a ceremonial drunk. At all other times drinking has been taboo) and the prohibition strictly enforced. This kind of drinking pattern tells nothing about the rate of susceptibility to alcoholism, and could not materially effect any change in the gene pool no matter how long the practice continued. Alcohol must be freely available on a continuing or frequent basis in order for the more susceptible individuals to succumb to the illness of alcoholism, and for tribal adaptation to occur.
In contrast to the Indian and Eskimo groups, the average North European alcoholic develops comparably advanced symptoms in his thirties and forties, after having mated and produced children in numbers more typical of his nonalcoholic group of origin. Thus the attrition rate decelerates with group adaptation over a period of centuries.
A "skip phenomenon" has been recognized as a common mechanism in family strains with relatively high rates of alcoholism, common among Irish and Scandinavian families. Members of a given generation may drink and be destroyed by alcoholism. The shock of this tragedy may cause the survivors and members of the next generation to totally abstain from drinking. Members of a succedent generation, not as directly affected by the earlier alcoholism in the family, may see no good reason for abstinence and take up social drinking, thus innocently precipitating another devastating wave of alcoholism. Of course the skip phenomenon is still prevalent because of the general cultural ignorance of the genetic basis of alcoholism. Alternate generations walk blindly into the trap, convinced by the prevailing cultural belief that sensible, moderate children of normal parents are not at all likely to become alcoholics.
Perhaps because of the dearth of any better evidence in support of the mental health belief about alcoholism, it seems to have become an obligatory ritual among mental health apologists to cite the old foster home study by Roe (1945) as evidence against the genetic factors in alcoholism. In any event, no one seems to have noticed that Roe's study completely failed to engage the issue. She studied sixty-one children placed in foster homes before the age of ten, rather late to rule out environmental influences and the skip phenomenon. Twenty-five were from nonalcoholic parents) while thirty-six had had at least one alcoholic parent. The children were followed only until they became early adults, by which time only three of the thirty-six children of alcoholic parents had begun to use alcohol, Since alcoholism most often requires at least a few years to reach diagnosable stages, nothing much can be said of the alcoholic tendencies of this little trio of novice drinkers who could scarcely be considered an adequate sample in any case. And since alcoholism can be manifested only as a response to alcohol, nothing whatever can be said of the alcoholic susceptibilities of the other thirty-three children of alcoholic parents who had not begun to use alcohol at all. Thus the study fell short of providing any relevant evidence one way or the other.
Jellinek (1945, 1960) was forced to acknowledge genetic factors in alcoholism in spite of the fact that the original data that he surveyed had been contaminated by mistaking the secondary psychological symptoms of alcoholism for evidence of functional psychiatric illness. Bleuler's (1955) and other psychiatric studies have been weakened by the same contamination, which only makes it the more impressive that they, too, have found evidence of genetic factors in their data. A number of less contaminated studies have found much more pronounced evidence of genetic relationships in alcoholism; family tree studies by Shadel (1948) and Lemere (1956), and a twin study by McBroom (1966). This whole area is another example of suppression and minimizing of evidence in alcoholism, but the truth will out. At the annual meeting of the National Council on Alcoholism in April of 1972, Dr. Frank Seixas summarized that another recent comparison of identical and fraternal twins, members of each pair raised separately, provides the strongest proof yet that genetic factors are involved in alcoholism. The genetic linkage was over four times as strong between identical pairs, compared to the fraternals.
Along another important line of genetic research, it has been found that infants born of drinking alcoholic mothers go through an alcoholism withdrawal reaction in the postpartum period, Courville, Montague (1959), Sandberg (1961), Sax (1966), and Dubos (1965). It could be expected that in the event these infants were to drink later in life (a relapse), that they would have an extraordinary susceptibility to alcoholism both because of the genetic factor and because the hereditary tendency was advanced by prenatal participation in the mother's alcoholism.
In animal research, genetic susceptibility to addiction through succedent generations of mice have been reported by Mirone (1952) and Blignant (1965).
Again, what is needed is not so much more data and information, but the willingness and ability to bring all of this vital knowledge together into a comprehensive alcoholism rationale.
Referring to my matrix chart again, the Jews and Italians after more than fifteen thousand years of exposure have very low susceptibilities and rates of alcoholism, and rates of attrition are also, of course correspondingly low, Gloor 1952), Moody, and Dubos (1965). Contrary to the belief that mental illness causes or predisposes to alcoholism, it is of considerable interest that the Jews rank lowest among ethnic groups in the United States in alcoholism, while ranking highest in schizophrenia. In a different type of comparison, it is also revealing that the Italians have been exposed to alcohol in quantity for more than ten times as long as the French, and that they have only one-fortieth as many alcoholics per capita as the French. These findings are all the more impressive in view of the fact that the Italians drink more alcohol per capita than the French. Which of the two ethnic groups drink more irresponsibly is not proven by this data, but the logic of the situation strongly indicates the Italians.
The deterioration of orthodoxy among Jews, and the concomitant crossbreeding with other ethnic groups, have been observed to be accelerating phenomena in recent decades. Genetic mixing with individuals who have higher tendencies toward alcoholism produces progeny with higher rates of alcoholism than the Jewish parents. Thus the increasing mixed marriages, or other mixed sexual unions, have led to an increase in the overall alcoholism rate among Jewish groups.
However, note that even with a doubling of the alcoholism rate of this ethnic group they would still be at about one percent. Some observers have mistakenly assumed that the increasing alcoholism rate stems directly from the breakdown of orthodoxy itself in the form of more tolerant attitudes toward heavy drinking. However, Gloor (1956) has shown that even when Jews become participating members in groups that engage in heavy drinking, as they have done for many years, they continue to drink within their tolerance limits and do not become alcoholics. This is not at all surprising when alcoholism is viewed as a biological response to alcohol. A person may thoroughly enjoy eating an apple, but cloy at the offer of a second. There is no reason to credit him with special cultural restraint or willpower for declining to eat the second apple.
The industrialization of northern Italy has led to ethnic migrations and to an increase in genetic mixing, and the Italians are also experiencing an increase in their alcoholism rate for the same basic reason as the Jews.
Of course, alcoholic drinking involves interactions with the environment, but to the degree that these interactions are distinguishable from those of nonalcoholic drinking they represent the influences of physical adaptation, dependence, and deterioration, and the augmentation of normal motives and relationships.
Historically in the political and economic conflicts that have occurred among migratory ethnic groups, those with high rates of alcoholism have suffered a competitive disadvantage, while those with the greater immunity have been quick to see and to capitalize on their fortunate relative position. The obvious socioeconomic advantage of natural immunity was expanded and strengthened by the allegation that a high rate of alcoholism is a symptom of cultural inferiority, rather than the expected constitutional reaction whenever any toxin is first introduced to any species or group. Furthermore, the perpetration of this belief helped to insure that the newcomers to alcohol use would continue to try to drink in spite of their prohibitively high casualty rate. As a protective counterreaction to the cultural insult, the majority among the newcomers who discovered that they could handle alcohol successfully were quick to disown as characterological inferiors the minority among them whose alcoholism threatened to confirm the cultural inferiority of the entire group. Thus every alcoholic is familiar with the inexorable dilemma-to drink the poison and die, or to abstain in humiliation and contempt, by admitting to the shameful fact of alcoholism.
Probably the most notorious example of this mechanism of ethnic abuse is within the more general devastation of the American Indians by the white intruders. The expedient of giving "fire water" to the Indians and then slaughtering them in their aggressive but helpless stupefaction was only an extreme manifestation of the general exploitation of their high susceptibility to the harmful effects of alcohol. It undoubtedly helped to ease the conscience of the exploiter to suppose that the Indians ran amok because of some mysterious psychic need to destroy themselves-that their berserk behavior was a revelation of their true cultural inadequacy which was merely released and magnified by the alcohol. The common spectacle of the withdrawal-crazed individual willing to betray his tribe for a drink must have seemed like confirmation of the cultural inferiority. And the frontier goad that one is not a real man if he can't hold his liquor is only the cruder form of the still prevailing belief that alcoholism is a symptom of an underlying psychosocial inadequacy.
Plate 2 also provides a clue to the origins of the "Drys" who engineered prohibition and the "Wets" who clamored for its repeal. The Drys come preponderantly from the North European groups still experiencing prohibitively high rates of alcoholism. Since the psychological view of alcoholism hasn't provided any reliable clues as to who will or will not drink alcoholicly, their only sensible conclusion is that nobody ought to drink. The risk is too great. The Wets are led by those ethnic groups that have reached low rates of alcoholism, along with the more immune strains among the north Europeans. They naturally suppose that alcohol is a harmless beverage, if only everyone would "learn" to react to alcohol as they do. Their allegation that the Dry position is merely an expression of the Puritan ethic against worldly pleasure is only plausible in the context of the larger cultural indignity that alcoholism is caused by psychosocial inferiorities. As stated earlier in this paper, once the false belief is accepted there is no limit to the number of specific derivatives that can serve as grist for the mills of research or be served up whole kernel to the public as information about alcoholism. Because of this cultural diversion neither the Wets nor the Drys have spoken sensibly to the issue of alcoholism. Nobody seems to have noticed that the Wets and the Drys share a common error, the totally irrational belief that all people react to alcohol the same. The Drys assert that alcohol is a poisonous drug for everyone and that nobody should drink. On the other side of the same error, the Wets insist that alcohol is a harmless beverage for everyone and that everyone should be able to learn to drink safely. Both groups are guilty of denying or minimizing the many profound individual and racial differences in biological reactions to alcohol.
It is inaccurate to say that society has been unconcerned about the problem of alcoholism. National prohibition represented a monumental level of concern and effort to control the problem. The reason for the seeming apathy is the fact that the public has not had access to unbiased information about the nature of alcoholism and how to cope with it. Given only the two equally stupid alternatives, provided by the Wets and the Drys, intelligent action has not been possible and society has been paralyzed.
Since the repeal of prohibition mental health professionals have again enjoyed a supportive social climate and freedom to promote the age-old philosophy that alcohol would be harmless for everyone if used in moderation, and that alcoholism is but a symptom of social, cultural, and psychological dysfunction. However, the basic error of this philosophy, and that of the Drys, has been fully exposed by scientific and clinical knowledge. The time has come for the public to be informed that sufficient knowledge and understanding is readily available to mount a successful community attack, not against the irrelevant wet or dry positions, but against alcoholism. As the new rationale and reform movement gain momentum, hopefully a growing number of established professionals will capitulate and become an enlightened part of the solution instead of continuing to be such a major part of the problem.
A few years back 2 North Slope villages tried going
totally wet.
The result was disasterous, and both villages quickly
returned to dry status thus allowing me to
disintegrate Logan's Run and WeBeDrugs Airline routes
plethora.
Ya see, the excessive and chronically abusive drinking
that we see all over bush Alaska has nothing to do
with the relative status or availability of alcohol.
The disasters are due solely to the composite liver
chemistry of the citizens in each of these villages.
Yup, I'm talking about ethnicity, race and organ
structure and function. Allow me my habitually
digressive preamble...
A hunnert years ago Dr. Jan Shackles was my graveyard
guard duty conversationalist and Florence Nightengale
whilst watching over badly injured arrestees at MMC,
Kotzebue's infection connection analogous to the
Anchorage Native "Anus" Hospital (ANS).
She and I chatted about all sorts of things, but her
depth and authority lay in the EXACT reason why I was
hired to watch drunken and broken Inu-monkeys that
would be in prison had they not been wrapped around
axles or worse, inserted into storm porches like May
Marlene Thomas, God rest her soul.
I may be more immature and naive than all of ye
graying gunslingers and uniformed felons, but I'm
older than almost all of ye.
It may also be the case that I arguably have a better
memory than you lads because I broker (steal) huge
sections of your brains (me bun's too) as temp. data
storage using my hyper sonic mother board and
processor speed as a means of retrieval from all YOUR
giant hard drives.
I'll say it again. All of you likely have higher IQ's
than I, but were denied the ability to learn. Strike 2
for Team Alaska public schools.
The thrust of Dr. Shackles theoretical assertions were
a simple fact: the Mongolian Spot on all our Eskimo
brethren. This 'spot' is easy to detect and indicates
missing liver chemicals and uniquely native liver
function when soaked with ethanol alcohol.
All Asian descendants from the Siberian Mongol-Asian
Steppe have both 'spots' on generationally mutating
male DNA and non-mutating mitochondrial female DNA,
hence no gender specificity with regards to poor
alcohol breakdown, digestion, secretion and excretion.
Still with me?
ALL our Eskimo folks are of Asian descent, thus the
vile hatred of gooks, slopes and dinks due to the
irritating similarity seen in the mirror and
differring treatment with us Northern European
swinging dicks.
Alas, I digress, but not too far from the fray. But to
back these ideas I attached a Masters Thesis
Submission assigned by the good Dr. Porter.
It's a quick read and may surprise you how the medical
world is catching up to notions only understood by all
you village coppers, state troopers and a contract
narc that will remain persistently annoying and
anonymous.
Despite our fond memories of Northern European holiday
drinking with our blessed gramps, grams, mums and
poppas, ANY drinking here on the resevation with our
aboriginal inlaws spells only disaster. Come on,
they're Eskimos, not Vikings nor Celts for fucksake.
You are merely humble servants in the million year war
protecting the innocent from evil and we have
thousands of dearly departed Inupiaq angels covering
our 6 and backing our plays.
God be with you chaps. You are the chosen few.
Karluk.
---
Nulato's choice
Out of money, village may bank on liquor store sales
Published: May 10, 2006
Without question, alcohol abuse has ravaged much of
Bush Alaska, wrecking families and futures, condemning
thousands of Alaskans from the unborn to the aged to
troubled lives, violent deaths or both.
So why is the Yukon River village of Nulato going to
vote on owning its own liquor store?
The village needs the money.
Right now, the village sees a lot of money going to
the Last Chance liquor store -- owned by a member of
the city council -- 15 miles out of town. Rather than
let liquor sales enrich one person, the idea is to get
into the business, control the flow and tap the
profits for city services.
Councilman Howard Esmailka said revenue from the store
could pay for a city police officer who would sleep in
the back of the liquor store.
At best, the village would be doing more to make
drinkers pay the social costs many of them impose on
the community. At worst, the village would be
administering its own poison.
It's a practical choice laced with local politics. If
Nulato is going to live with the consequences of
liquor sales, it might as well make the benefits
public rather than private. Practical or not, it's a
choice Nulato shouldn't have to make.
Like much of the rest of rural Alaska, Nulato has been
on the ropes financially with the end of state revenue
sharing in 2003. The village hasn't been left utterly
adrift: In fiscal year 2006 there was $44,791 in
temporary state energy assistance and a federal
payment of $37,605. The Legislature's just-passed
budget includes one-time payments to local governments
aimed at helping with higher fuel costs; Nulato will
receive $40,000.
But none of this is money Nulato or any other local
government in Alaska can count on in the future.
"It's kind of a hit and miss with the state," says
Bill Rolfzen, who specializes in municipal assistance
with the Department of Commerce, Community and
Economic Development. Mr. Rolfzen noted that the last
state revenue sharing payments in 2003 capped a decade
of steady decline.
So Jack Daniels may be a more sustainable revenue
source than the state of Alaska. But as Alaska State
Troopers investigator Michael Duxbury says, where
there's alcohol, there's crime.
Nulato and the rest of Alaska communities need
sustained revenue sharing. Alaska's small local
governments don't have the wherewithal to be entirely
self-sustaining.
A small slice of the state's Permanent Fund earnings
would put revenue sharing on a permanent basis, and
put money in the hands of local governments, which are
generally more in tune with local needs and wants.
We'd give up a few dollars of our dividends but still
have our autumn checks -- and maybe some property tax
relief in Anchorage, or a police officer in Nulato.
At present Nulato residents make all of their liquor
purchases just upriver in Galena, the region's sole
outlet for beer, wine and hard liquor. With such a
huge sum of money being spent at Galena's liquor
store, a Nulato municipal liquor store would mean much
more money would stay in community: hence Nulato would
have better choices to make.
BOTTOM LINE: Nulato shouldn't have to turn to liquor
sales when the state has the means to restore lost
funding from revenue sharing. A local sales tax,
property tax or income tax would serve the community's
financial needs without filling their graveyard to
capacity.
---
Article Last Updated: 05/09/2006
Nulato residents argue over liquor store
Associated Press
Residents in the Yukon River village of Nulato are
debating a proposal to create a city-owned liquor
store and use the proceeds to pay for police and other
city services.
But it's a tough choice to make in a community with a
history of drinking problems. Supporters say a store
will also discourage residents from traveling in
dangerous weather to buy from a liquor store about 15
miles upriver.
Opponents say crime and alcohol consumption will rise
as more locals drink in town and residents from
surrounding villages arrive to binge drink.
About 100 Bush villages have banned alcohol sales or
possession. Only four villages of more than 200
villages in Alaska have created city-run liquor
stores.
---
ALCOHOL: ETHNIC, RACIAL AND CULTURAL EPIDEMIOLOGY
Probably as a kind of spillover from the rational fear of racism, there is an irrational cultural phobia against recognizing hereditary differences of any kind. Nevertheless, the composite of evidence fully supports the fact that there is a genetic gradient of susceptibility to alcoholism. As discussed earlier, the hypothesis that best fits all of the data is that alcoholism results from not one but several genetic factors with an interacting effect on the various phenomena of alcohol attraction or aversion, adaptation, dependence, and deterioration, McBroom (1966) and Moody (1967). This view is fully compatible with the science of genetics as applied to a large number of other similar hereditary phenomena, as explained by Dobzhansky (1962) and Vale (1973).
Alcohol has many complex effects and there are many individual differences in the initial biochemical response to alcohol as a stimulant, a source of energy, and a sedative drug. Since there are such obvious physical attractions, it is as instructive to ask why some people drink less as to ask why some drink more. Wolff (1972) found marked differences in reactions to small amounts of alcohol in a comparison of Caucasoid subjects with a Mongoloid group comprised of Japanese, Taiwanese, and Korean subjects. As a control of cultural and postnatal dietary factors, infants were also studied. After drinking even less than an amount that had no noticeable effect on ninety-five percent of the Caucasoids, over eighty percent of the Mongoloids responded with pronounced facial flushing, increased pulse pressure, and symptoms of mild to moderate intoxication. Amplitude of response correlated directly with blood alcohol levels, and could not be attributed to differences in absorption or metabolism of alcohol. Unpleasant reactions, such as "a pounding sensation in their heads," were reported by some of the adult Mongoloids at peak measured response amplitudes. Thus the lower incidence of alcoholism among at least some groups of Mongoloids appears to be related to an inborn aversion to even small amounts of alcohol. The author concludes, "The assumption that ethnic group differences in autonomic regulation have a genetic basis is compatible with other reports of racial differences in autonomic responses to selected pharmacological agents."
It is estimated that some ten percent of all drinkers in the United States are alcoholics. However, the differential rates among ethnic groups are enormously varied, from a negligible rate below one percent for Jews, to something like eighty percent estimated for Indian and Eskimo groups. These differential rates appear to be stable in spite of cultural variations in corresponding reports from different parts of the world, Malzberg (1960).
If you examine my matrix chart (below) showing the inverse correlation between the length of time some illustrative ethnic groups have been exposed to alcohol and their rates of alcoholism. The time exposed to alcohol refers to the time in each group that alcohol is estimated to have been available in sufficient quantity that significant numbers of the population susceptible to alcoholism could progress in their drinking and deterioration. Thus the universal principle of natural selection could begin to eliminate the susceptible genetic strains at that point, Moody (1967), and Alland (1969). This process of elimination can be seen dramatically in the groups just starting their exposure to the toxic effects of alcohol ingestion. In a study of fifty alcoholic Indian and Eskimo patients at the Cedar Hills Alcoholism Treatment Center, we found that they had reproduced at a rate averaging less than one offspring per patient. Their nonalcoholic and nondrinking parents of origin had averaged seven children per family. (Undoubtedly the "skip phenomenon" described below accounted for some of the difference in reproduction rates from one generation to the next, but a true attrition must also be assumed from the general drinking patterns in these ethnic groups.) The reason for this relatively rapid attrition is the very low resistance (high susceptibility) and the correspondingly early age of onset of alcoholism that characterizes these early exposure groups, Dubos (1965), and Young (1970). Most of the fifty patients in the study had shown alcoholic deterioration in their teens and twenties sufficient to disqualify them from normal socioeconomic development and mating behavior.
There are reports of certain American Indian tribes who have had access to alcohol in small quantities for many centuries. They are said to have used alcohol only in occasional tribal rites, when the whole tribe went on a ceremonial drunk. At all other times drinking has been taboo) and the prohibition strictly enforced. This kind of drinking pattern tells nothing about the rate of susceptibility to alcoholism, and could not materially effect any change in the gene pool no matter how long the practice continued. Alcohol must be freely available on a continuing or frequent basis in order for the more susceptible individuals to succumb to the illness of alcoholism, and for tribal adaptation to occur.
In contrast to the Indian and Eskimo groups, the average North European alcoholic develops comparably advanced symptoms in his thirties and forties, after having mated and produced children in numbers more typical of his nonalcoholic group of origin. Thus the attrition rate decelerates with group adaptation over a period of centuries.
A "skip phenomenon" has been recognized as a common mechanism in family strains with relatively high rates of alcoholism, common among Irish and Scandinavian families. Members of a given generation may drink and be destroyed by alcoholism. The shock of this tragedy may cause the survivors and members of the next generation to totally abstain from drinking. Members of a succedent generation, not as directly affected by the earlier alcoholism in the family, may see no good reason for abstinence and take up social drinking, thus innocently precipitating another devastating wave of alcoholism. Of course the skip phenomenon is still prevalent because of the general cultural ignorance of the genetic basis of alcoholism. Alternate generations walk blindly into the trap, convinced by the prevailing cultural belief that sensible, moderate children of normal parents are not at all likely to become alcoholics.
Perhaps because of the dearth of any better evidence in support of the mental health belief about alcoholism, it seems to have become an obligatory ritual among mental health apologists to cite the old foster home study by Roe (1945) as evidence against the genetic factors in alcoholism. In any event, no one seems to have noticed that Roe's study completely failed to engage the issue. She studied sixty-one children placed in foster homes before the age of ten, rather late to rule out environmental influences and the skip phenomenon. Twenty-five were from nonalcoholic parents) while thirty-six had had at least one alcoholic parent. The children were followed only until they became early adults, by which time only three of the thirty-six children of alcoholic parents had begun to use alcohol, Since alcoholism most often requires at least a few years to reach diagnosable stages, nothing much can be said of the alcoholic tendencies of this little trio of novice drinkers who could scarcely be considered an adequate sample in any case. And since alcoholism can be manifested only as a response to alcohol, nothing whatever can be said of the alcoholic susceptibilities of the other thirty-three children of alcoholic parents who had not begun to use alcohol at all. Thus the study fell short of providing any relevant evidence one way or the other.
Jellinek (1945, 1960) was forced to acknowledge genetic factors in alcoholism in spite of the fact that the original data that he surveyed had been contaminated by mistaking the secondary psychological symptoms of alcoholism for evidence of functional psychiatric illness. Bleuler's (1955) and other psychiatric studies have been weakened by the same contamination, which only makes it the more impressive that they, too, have found evidence of genetic factors in their data. A number of less contaminated studies have found much more pronounced evidence of genetic relationships in alcoholism; family tree studies by Shadel (1948) and Lemere (1956), and a twin study by McBroom (1966). This whole area is another example of suppression and minimizing of evidence in alcoholism, but the truth will out. At the annual meeting of the National Council on Alcoholism in April of 1972, Dr. Frank Seixas summarized that another recent comparison of identical and fraternal twins, members of each pair raised separately, provides the strongest proof yet that genetic factors are involved in alcoholism. The genetic linkage was over four times as strong between identical pairs, compared to the fraternals.
Along another important line of genetic research, it has been found that infants born of drinking alcoholic mothers go through an alcoholism withdrawal reaction in the postpartum period, Courville, Montague (1959), Sandberg (1961), Sax (1966), and Dubos (1965). It could be expected that in the event these infants were to drink later in life (a relapse), that they would have an extraordinary susceptibility to alcoholism both because of the genetic factor and because the hereditary tendency was advanced by prenatal participation in the mother's alcoholism.
In animal research, genetic susceptibility to addiction through succedent generations of mice have been reported by Mirone (1952) and Blignant (1965).
Again, what is needed is not so much more data and information, but the willingness and ability to bring all of this vital knowledge together into a comprehensive alcoholism rationale.
Referring to my matrix chart again, the Jews and Italians after more than fifteen thousand years of exposure have very low susceptibilities and rates of alcoholism, and rates of attrition are also, of course correspondingly low, Gloor 1952), Moody, and Dubos (1965). Contrary to the belief that mental illness causes or predisposes to alcoholism, it is of considerable interest that the Jews rank lowest among ethnic groups in the United States in alcoholism, while ranking highest in schizophrenia. In a different type of comparison, it is also revealing that the Italians have been exposed to alcohol in quantity for more than ten times as long as the French, and that they have only one-fortieth as many alcoholics per capita as the French. These findings are all the more impressive in view of the fact that the Italians drink more alcohol per capita than the French. Which of the two ethnic groups drink more irresponsibly is not proven by this data, but the logic of the situation strongly indicates the Italians.
The deterioration of orthodoxy among Jews, and the concomitant crossbreeding with other ethnic groups, have been observed to be accelerating phenomena in recent decades. Genetic mixing with individuals who have higher tendencies toward alcoholism produces progeny with higher rates of alcoholism than the Jewish parents. Thus the increasing mixed marriages, or other mixed sexual unions, have led to an increase in the overall alcoholism rate among Jewish groups.
However, note that even with a doubling of the alcoholism rate of this ethnic group they would still be at about one percent. Some observers have mistakenly assumed that the increasing alcoholism rate stems directly from the breakdown of orthodoxy itself in the form of more tolerant attitudes toward heavy drinking. However, Gloor (1956) has shown that even when Jews become participating members in groups that engage in heavy drinking, as they have done for many years, they continue to drink within their tolerance limits and do not become alcoholics. This is not at all surprising when alcoholism is viewed as a biological response to alcohol. A person may thoroughly enjoy eating an apple, but cloy at the offer of a second. There is no reason to credit him with special cultural restraint or willpower for declining to eat the second apple.
The industrialization of northern Italy has led to ethnic migrations and to an increase in genetic mixing, and the Italians are also experiencing an increase in their alcoholism rate for the same basic reason as the Jews.
Of course, alcoholic drinking involves interactions with the environment, but to the degree that these interactions are distinguishable from those of nonalcoholic drinking they represent the influences of physical adaptation, dependence, and deterioration, and the augmentation of normal motives and relationships.
Historically in the political and economic conflicts that have occurred among migratory ethnic groups, those with high rates of alcoholism have suffered a competitive disadvantage, while those with the greater immunity have been quick to see and to capitalize on their fortunate relative position. The obvious socioeconomic advantage of natural immunity was expanded and strengthened by the allegation that a high rate of alcoholism is a symptom of cultural inferiority, rather than the expected constitutional reaction whenever any toxin is first introduced to any species or group. Furthermore, the perpetration of this belief helped to insure that the newcomers to alcohol use would continue to try to drink in spite of their prohibitively high casualty rate. As a protective counterreaction to the cultural insult, the majority among the newcomers who discovered that they could handle alcohol successfully were quick to disown as characterological inferiors the minority among them whose alcoholism threatened to confirm the cultural inferiority of the entire group. Thus every alcoholic is familiar with the inexorable dilemma-to drink the poison and die, or to abstain in humiliation and contempt, by admitting to the shameful fact of alcoholism.
Probably the most notorious example of this mechanism of ethnic abuse is within the more general devastation of the American Indians by the white intruders. The expedient of giving "fire water" to the Indians and then slaughtering them in their aggressive but helpless stupefaction was only an extreme manifestation of the general exploitation of their high susceptibility to the harmful effects of alcohol. It undoubtedly helped to ease the conscience of the exploiter to suppose that the Indians ran amok because of some mysterious psychic need to destroy themselves-that their berserk behavior was a revelation of their true cultural inadequacy which was merely released and magnified by the alcohol. The common spectacle of the withdrawal-crazed individual willing to betray his tribe for a drink must have seemed like confirmation of the cultural inferiority. And the frontier goad that one is not a real man if he can't hold his liquor is only the cruder form of the still prevailing belief that alcoholism is a symptom of an underlying psychosocial inadequacy.
Plate 2 also provides a clue to the origins of the "Drys" who engineered prohibition and the "Wets" who clamored for its repeal. The Drys come preponderantly from the North European groups still experiencing prohibitively high rates of alcoholism. Since the psychological view of alcoholism hasn't provided any reliable clues as to who will or will not drink alcoholicly, their only sensible conclusion is that nobody ought to drink. The risk is too great. The Wets are led by those ethnic groups that have reached low rates of alcoholism, along with the more immune strains among the north Europeans. They naturally suppose that alcohol is a harmless beverage, if only everyone would "learn" to react to alcohol as they do. Their allegation that the Dry position is merely an expression of the Puritan ethic against worldly pleasure is only plausible in the context of the larger cultural indignity that alcoholism is caused by psychosocial inferiorities. As stated earlier in this paper, once the false belief is accepted there is no limit to the number of specific derivatives that can serve as grist for the mills of research or be served up whole kernel to the public as information about alcoholism. Because of this cultural diversion neither the Wets nor the Drys have spoken sensibly to the issue of alcoholism. Nobody seems to have noticed that the Wets and the Drys share a common error, the totally irrational belief that all people react to alcohol the same. The Drys assert that alcohol is a poisonous drug for everyone and that nobody should drink. On the other side of the same error, the Wets insist that alcohol is a harmless beverage for everyone and that everyone should be able to learn to drink safely. Both groups are guilty of denying or minimizing the many profound individual and racial differences in biological reactions to alcohol.
It is inaccurate to say that society has been unconcerned about the problem of alcoholism. National prohibition represented a monumental level of concern and effort to control the problem. The reason for the seeming apathy is the fact that the public has not had access to unbiased information about the nature of alcoholism and how to cope with it. Given only the two equally stupid alternatives, provided by the Wets and the Drys, intelligent action has not been possible and society has been paralyzed.
Since the repeal of prohibition mental health professionals have again enjoyed a supportive social climate and freedom to promote the age-old philosophy that alcohol would be harmless for everyone if used in moderation, and that alcoholism is but a symptom of social, cultural, and psychological dysfunction. However, the basic error of this philosophy, and that of the Drys, has been fully exposed by scientific and clinical knowledge. The time has come for the public to be informed that sufficient knowledge and understanding is readily available to mount a successful community attack, not against the irrelevant wet or dry positions, but against alcoholism. As the new rationale and reform movement gain momentum, hopefully a growing number of established professionals will capitulate and become an enlightened part of the solution instead of continuing to be such a major part of the problem.
posted by Alaska: Local And State News. at 1:14 PM
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