This morning, despite staying up way to late, I still managed to get up and make it to the 8:45 am church service. At 10 am I went to a very interesting Sunday School class on "Making Ethical Decisions in an Unethical World" where we discussed behaviorism. At 11am I was doing some grocery shopping at Super Target. At 11:50am I was in the checkout line with my $95 worth of groceries when I was told I could not buy the six pack of Yuengling for 10 more minutes. What?!?
I wasn't really surprised that such an asinine law exists but I was surprised when I was denied my beer. Had I know this before unloading all my groceries I would have browsed the DVDs for 10 more minutes. Instead I went without (I still have a few left over from my Samuel Adams Summer Sampler case).
Why does such a law even exist though? Why does it matter when I buy my beer? From the best I can tell, laws like these, called blue laws, were written to impose good Christan morals on us. Forget about Jews, Muslims or any other religions and their holy days. Also forget about us good Christians who are just doing some grocery shopping after the early service. In North Carolina the hours you can buy alcohol is outlined in § 18B‑1004. It says that alcohol can not be purchased between 2am and 7am on any day and until 12 pm on Sundays.
That is just stupid.
My other least favorite law lately is the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act of 2005 which requires me to show ID so I can be tracked when I need some Sudafed (ephedrine, pseudoephedrine, or phenylpropanolamine) for a cold or allergies. Unlike showing ID to simply prove my age when buying beer, showing ID to buy some cold medicine gets me logged for 2 years. If I were in bad enough shape or if I bought some for my wife or kid for instance, I might get arrested. Read the post on Protectionism and My Stuffy Nose!
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2 comments:
Hey, you think that's stupid. In New York people with concealed weapons permits from other states can be (and are) prosecuted when they voluntarily give their guns to the NY police. I don't agree with the argument that there is a constitutional or other right to bear fire arms. But I don't agree that people who obviously don't intend to violate the law should be prosecuted for felonies.
According to a Snapple lid, it's illegal to sing off key in NC... and here I live.
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