03-02-2018, 07:28 PM
(03-02-2018, 06:02 PM)chutten Wrote: So the Region should embrace and formalize the practice? Legalize, don't prohibit?
I like it.
One problem may be the lack of indoor venues in the area. Another might be the lack of cultural through-line that Berlin has with Oktoberfest. This is not an Irish celebration. It is a celebration of green and beer.
But neither of those should be deal-breakers. A more mercenary Council would already have leapt on this.
Didn’t they run sanctioned beer tents a year or two ago? That is sort of like starting down that path.
I was trying to think of objections, but I ended up with something like “St. Paddy’s day is well-known as an opportunity to get hammered, whereas Oktoberfest is understood to be a time of wine tasting alternated with poetry readings”. So I think I’m coming to the view that setting up a structure like that used for Oktobertfest could work. Am I right in believing that almost everybody views Oktoberfest as primarily a benefit or at worst a neutral for the Region? I’m sure some people get drunk and there are probably a few arrests for various related incidents, but I can’t recall it ever being a big problem or anybody concluding that we should cancel. The same approach might well work for St. Paddy’s. The worst offenders probably want a confrontation with the police anyway. If all the normal people who just want to have a good time (and yes, for many of them, get drunk, but not create havoc) are at proper venues the trouble makers probably won’t even show up.