How much should we ban?

I GET it, I understand that society has to have rules governing how our personal choices impact on others, but where does it end? Max Cruickshank (Letters, March 10) rightly points out that tobacco and alcohol cause more problems in Scotland than do illegal drugs and there is a wave of obesity-related problems just about to wash over the country; what do we do? Do we ban everything that can possibly be harmful? Are we to live in an Orwellian dystopia where everyone is forced to eat and drink the same governmentrecommended nourishment, take the same exercise, to be safety-obsessed clones?

Everyone knows that smoking is bad, that too much alcohol is bad for you, but as recent events on Scotland’s hills have shown, so can too much fresh air or simply driving to work. Is it more righteous that the NHS replaces a hip on someone who has overdone exercise rather than putting a gastric band on a fatty like me? We’ve all contributed financially to the service.

We are bombarded with advice on what is good for us and what we should do – drive less; well, how about making public transport free? Eat better food to avoid obesity: well, make it easier to find a cheap grocer in a council estate rather than a chippie and a bookie. It’s okay to encourage sparkly Prosecco parties in the west end, they even have them in Downing Street, but sitting at home getting hammered on cheap cider because it’s all you can afford and life sucks is morally wrong, apparently. People are imperfect and always will be. Society should not be judgmental or proscriptive but compassionate and understanding. If all the money and resources that are currently wasted on futile attempts to stop people doing things that some grand panjandrum has decided is bad for the common herd were redirected to mitigating the effects of abuse and overindulgence the world would be a better place.

David J Crawford,

Glasgow.