NO ONE should be crying in to their beers over Queensland’s new liquor laws.

Australia’s obsession with alcohol and getting plastered should be a national disgrace.

Instead it’s a cause for celebration.

We shake our heads at America with their right to bear arms, but they’re not the only ones going out loaded.

In some circles, drunkenness isn’t only encouraged, it’s compulsory.

Picture drinking Italians and what do you see?

A large family gathering sitting around a table eating bread and pasta, laughing and sipping on red wine?

How about Aussies? Sunburnt blokes in singlets trying to make beer snakes with piles of empty plastic cups at the cricket or footy?

Chicks stumbling home from the races with their makeup running and shoes slung over their shoulders? Drunks punching on in the streets outside a nightclub?

media_camera In some circles, drunkenness isn’t only encouraged, it’s compulsory. (That’s me with beer in hand)

The move by the State government to call last drinks at nightclubs by 3am has sparked howls of protest from the Opposition and the liquor industry, which obviously has the most to lose.

But for the rest of us, the government has done us a favour.

You know those drunks who stumble out of nightclubs at 5 in the morning?

I’m one of them.

After living on the Gold Coast my whole life I have had more big nights in Surfers Paradise nightclubs than I care to remember.

More than I actually CAN remember.

None of them even come close to being the best night of my life.

I’ve given lip to the bouncers who kicked me out of clubs because I deserved to be sent home, but if you’re still stumbling around inside a nightclub at quarter to five in the morning clutching a drink, it hasn’t been a great night.

It’s been a shocker.

It’s a world of drugged out techno dancers and desperados still trying to jag a one-night stand even though they can barely stand up.

It’s not a place most people want to be.

media_camera Your correspondent (with beer in hand) and friends out on the town on the Gold Coast.

Emerging bleary-eyed from a nightclub in to the early morning light is like a slap in the face.

For the money you poured down your throat and the hangover that is going to ruin the next 24 hours.

The industry is concerned about loss of trade and fair enough, but it’s all relative.

media_camera Is there a pattern here? Ahem ... cheers

If people need to get in to the clubs earlier then some of that business can be recouped.

Critics say it’s going to affect tourism.

But if you’re the kind of tourist who bases their destinations on whether you can still grab a drink at 4am then you might not be the kind of tourist we’re after.

And if this decision can in any way reduce the number of senseless deaths from alcohol-fuelled violence then it will be worth it.

I’ll drink to that.

Jeremy Pierce is the tourism reporter for the The Courier-Mail’s Gold Coast bureau.