Latest news with #Hobgoblin
Time of India
21-05-2025
- Business
- Time of India
British brews, desi cheers: Thanks to cheaper imports, it looks like a summer of cooler pints and wider choices
There's refreshing news for guzzlers in the midst of an unsparing summer. Following the India-UK Free Trade Agreement , the import duty on British beer has been slashed by 75% – down from a steep 150%. Which means, your favourite chilled pint from the UK might soon be easier on the wallet. Coupled with the rise of gastro pubs and microbreweries, Indian drinkers (except those in Karnataka*) have never had it so good. 'Slow sip, long conversations' For many, beer and summer go hand in hand. But its popularity isn't seasonal. Beer ranks just behind hard liquor as India's most-consumed alcohol. 'Beer suits India's tropical climate – it's refreshing, low in alcohol, and lends itself to long chats or loud parties,' says Pankil Shah, co-owner of a Colaba resto-pub. 'It's casual, easy, and more 'sessionable' than spirits.' Debayan Datta, manager at a nationwide pub chain, agrees, 'Beer fits into every social scene – from house parties to cricket screenings. ' Cheers to Brit beers: Premium UK labels like Boddingtons, Newcastle Brown Ale, Fuller's, Carling, Cobra, John Smith's and Hobgoblin may become more accessible. 'These are maltier, low on hop bitterness and are great for those new to craft beer,' Shah adds. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Giao dịch vàng CFDs với sàn môi giới tin cậy IC Markets Tìm hiểu thêm Undo 'We're seeing growing interest in styles like IPAs (Indian Pale Ales) and stouts (like Guinness).' But there needs to be more awareness, felt Gurpreet Singh, owner of an alcohol brand in Bengaluru. 'Consumers buy beers like Corona and Hoegaarden because of Hollywood, Budweiser does well because of its global name. For UK beers to do well, they have to be better known,' Singh said. Spoilt for choice: Homegrown microbreweries remain a strong draw, especially for younger drinkers. 'Craft beer's low preservatives and competitive pricing keep it popular,' says Sk Samim, GM of a resto-pub chain in the East and Northeast. Between premium imported brands and a blooming homegrown industry of microbreweries, we may be now spoilt for choice as a beer-loving nation. What's Trending Crisp lagers: great for hot weather Wheat beers: smooth with a fruity touch Flavoured brews: mango, chili, coffee Craft ales: bold, experimental sips What FnB consultants and pub managers have to say: The cut in import duty on UK beers will certainly widen the spectrum of choices for Indian consumers. This is also an opportunity for Indian craft and mainstream beers to get greater visibility in the UK, where there's increasing curiosity about world beers – Rini Chatterjee, F&B consultant and experience designer, Delhi Urban audiences are increasingly curious. Beer festivals and microbreweries have nurtured that curiosity – Debayan Datta, pub-chain manager (*The Karnataka conundrum: In its fourth liquor price hike in under two years, the Karnataka government has increased the additional excise duty (AED) on beer from 195% to 200%, while cheaper Indian Made Liquor (IML) brands are expected to rise by ₹15–₹20 per 180 ml quart) Check out our list of the latest Hindi , English , Tamil , Telugu , Malayalam , and Kannada movies . Don't miss our picks for the best Hindi movies , best Tamil movies, and best Telugu films .
Yahoo
28-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Lawmakers' obscenity purge focuses on wrong targets
Iowa lawmakers are trying to scrub obscenity from public libraries. (Stock photo by Daniel de) The Iowa Legislature wants to keep sexually explicit materials out of the hands of minors. That seems like a reasonable enough goal, but lawmakers are going about it wrong. A bill moving through the Iowa House, House File 274, wants to scrub any potential obscenity from public schools and libraries. As state law stands, public schools, libraries, and educational programs are allowed to use 'appropriate material for educational purposes' without being subject to obscenity penalties. This doesn't mean teachers can screen pornographic films or hand out smutty romance novels. It means health teachers can show diagrams of the human reproductive systems. It means English teachers use literature that deals with themes of the challenges of adolescence such as the onset of the menstrual cycle described in Judy Blume's classic 'Are You There, God? It's Me Margaret.' Lawmakers say this isn't their target. They want to get rid of stuff that panders to prurient interest, basically sexual material designed to arouse rather than inform. Reasonable people can agree that's a good idea. But for a Republican-controlled legislature, the targeting of schools and library is incredibly poor marksmanship. The idea that minor children are using schools and libraries as even a tertiary source for obscene material is laughable. I'm in my third year of teaching middle school English. This was the first year anyone asked me how to check out a book from the school library. I've had to stop more students from writing curse words and drawing crude depictions of male genitalia in books than I've ever had to ask a kid to stop reading books other than the required text. I had one student who tried to read manga comics instead of the required text. It pained me some to make the student put it away. I hid comic books between the covers of my social studies textbooks in Mrs. Mathis' class at Winterset Middle School. It looked like I was studying the difference between temperate and tropical forests, but I was really reading Spider-Man latest battle with the Hobgoblin. A thousand years ago, back in the 1980s, a kid had to work to get their hands on materials pandering to the prurient interest. You had to have a buddy whose dad wasn't careful with where he left the Playboy magazines or a friend whose mom got the Victoria's Secret catalog. Even then I didn't go to the library to find pictures of naked women. I went to the library to play 'Oregon Trail' game on the Apple IIe and check out books on the history of newspaper comics. Yeah, I was always this big of a nerd. Much has changed since the 1900s. Kids who want to see obscene materials don't go to school or library to get it. They just pull their internet-connect smartphone out of their pocket. Lawmakers move bills aimed at stopping minors' access to obscene materials, porn As much as one-fifth of internet searches on mobile devices are for adult content, according to a Columbia University study. And that data only related to adults ages 18-35. Common Sense Media reports as many as 60% of teenagers come across the adult material while using their smartphones without actively searching for it. Other students say as many as 20% of older adolescents deliberately access adult websites on their smartphones. I'd wager, at least as it comes to boys, about 79% of the rest are lying. The only thing HF 274 will do is make it easier for the most puritanical members of communities to tie up teachers and librarians in court procedures and potentially get them slapped with fines. Instead of picking on underfunded schools and libraries and underpaid teachers and librarians, the members of the Iowa General Assembly should think bigger. Go full China. Shut down the internet in Iowa. Replace it with a service that tells the people what a good job the government is doing protecting them from all the evils of the world. I am not what anyone who knows me would describe as an optimist, but I choose to believe that's not what lawmakers really want to do. The solution lies with families taking a more active — and if so desired — stricter approach to what media their kids consume, what they access on their technology, and how many hours a day they're on those devices. Lawmakers are considering a bill that would require age verification for websites that post pornographic and obscene materials. That might help, but our school has a robust system to block many websites. The students quickly master the way around them. Again, the burden falls less on government and more on families and caretakers to set standards and limit device time. This isn't a solution for government. One would think self-described small-government Republicans would be the first to recognize that. But it's my experience that politicians of any stripe don't truly want smaller government. They just want to use power of government to push around people who have different ideas than theirs. This column first appeared on Daniel P. Finney's blog, The Paragraph Stacker on Substack. It is republished here through the Iowa Writers' Collaborative. Editor's note: Please consider subscribing to the collaborative and its member writers to support their work.
