By Ali Khimji

A new report from the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs has found alcohol to be more dangerous than illegal drugs. The organisation, led by David Nutt, scored the drugs on a scale of 1-100 based on mental and physical damage, addiction, crime and costs to the economy and communities.

Alcohol scored 72 points, heroin got 55 points, and crack came third with 54 points. The report also calls for a new classification system for illegal drugs.

The findings arrive alongside more concerns over the anti-social effects of alcohol in town centres. “Too many of our streets and town and city centres are plagued by shouting, vomiting, fights, urination and other rowdy behaviour,” said Matthew Bennett, chairman of Open All Hours campaign group.

Alcohol-related crime and disorder is thought to cost taxpayers £13bn per year. It is estimated to cost the NHS £3bn per year to treat alcohol-related sickness. Furthermore, alcohol is responsible for a total of 26,000 deaths in England and Wales.

As we enter the age of austerity and government spending cuts, it is hard to believe that the government spends £16bn on treating the effects of alcohol.

The combined Departmental Programme and Administration Budgets for Energy & Climate Change, the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, Transport, and International Development add up to £14bn in 2010-11.

If people were able to control their alcohol consumption, we would be able to double the amount of money that we spend on securing a sustainable future, improving our infrastructure, and supporting developmental aid programmes abroad.

These statistics really beg the question of asking ourselves if we have our priorities right. Alcohol spending reached £41bn last year. In the previous year, cash donations to charities in the UK reached £1.3bn. If people were able to decrease their alcohol consumption by 10%, we could boost the work of charities across the UK and the world.

What do you think? We want to hear your views on this >

>Check out the Government Spending Figures here<

Coming to the GPU this weekend? Well emel is delighted that Baba Ali will be our guest at the emel stand – E24.

Baba Ali’s GPU video is here

Looking forward to seeing you all there.

By Ali Khimji

Following a change of logo, Gap was faced with a mass online protest over its decision. More than 2,000 comments appeared on the company’s Facebook page, and 5,000 people became followers of an anti-Gap logo Twitter account. But those pale in comparison to the 14,000 parody logos that appeared on another website.

However, there is an air of ‘publicity stunt’ around this, as Gap didn’t bother updating any of its merchandise to reflect the change.

This isn’t the first time that a company has attempted to develop a new brand, and some were more successful than others. Apple dropped the multi-coloured apple for a silver one back in 1998, and Google even had an exclamation mark attached to its logo for a few months around the same time. More recently, Tropicana put a picture of a glass of orange juice on its cartons in the US which was quickly changed back.

There is one lesson to be learnt here; the people truly do have power. The fact that a multi-million dollar company had to back down to the outcry of several thousand people, can speak volumes to the hidden activist within.

There are further examples of the strength of consumer power. In 2007, Masterfoods announced that it would start using rennet in its products. But a campaign by the Vegetarian Society urged people to complain to the company, local media and MPs. More than 6,000 e-mails and calls were received by Masterfoods, and 40 MPs signed a petition.

Let’s also not forget the Anti-Apartheid Movement that started in 1959 with a consumer boycott of South African goods. This led to the exclusion of South Africa from the Olympics and further economic sanctions. Today, there are boycotts of Israeli goods known as the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign.

We want to hear your views on the matter. Do you think that consumers still have the power to change corporate decisions? Or are there any logos that you want companies to get rid of? (Just don’t make a protest of your answers!)

By Ali Khimji

Andrew Marr, presenter of his own BBC show, has labelled bloggers as “socially inadequate, pimpled, single, slightly seedy, bald, cauliflower-nosed young men sitting in their mother’s basements and ranting.”

As bloggers, we feel the need to respond to such hurtful comments. We’re definitely not socially inadequate, as you’re probably reading this through Facebook.

We’re not pimpled or slightly seedy. Not any type of seedy for that matter. Most of us are single, but we are still young (some at heart), and we all have full heads of hair. We don’t even know what cauliflower noses are, and we are not all young men in our mother’s basement. (Women outnumber men in our above-ground London offices)

But most importantly, we are not ranting. (This post isn’t a rant, it’s a response. There is a difference of six letters!)

Although many blogs out there may seem like verbal diarrhoea, everyone should be entitled to their own opinion and be free to express it.  Freedom of speech is a fundamental human right, and cannot be denied to anyone.

However, some people do need to recognise when their views are insulting and abusive and we, as society, cannot tolerate any offensive behaviour.

But at the same time, should we take everything to heart and feel insulted by the smallest of jokes? Perhaps if we take life too seriously, we’ll never get out alive?

We want to hear your views on the matter; should people be prevented from putting across any sort of offensive views? Or should we take everything with a pinch of salt and let people express their opinions?