Ryanair has been met with controversy following a recent Twitter post on Wednesday encouraging binge drinking that was targeted at students going on summer holidays.
The post has since been removed, but featured an image of someone passed out on a beach with the caption, “To all Leaving Cert and A-Level students: plan your dream summer holiday now so you have something to look forward to.”
“Book on Ryanair.com in between ‘studying’ tonight. This could be you,” the post went on to say.
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Ryanair disregarded the severity of their post by saying it was only posted by members of staff who were remembering their summer holidays and the things they would get up to then. Twitter users, though, felt differently about the post, calling it “irresponsible” and generally distasteful.
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“Our social media team were merely reminiscing about their own first lads/girls trip away, and recalling all the wonderful sightseeing, singsongs and cultural activities they enjoyed as teenagers,” one Ryanair spokesperson stated. The post has been largely received as a company-sponsored recommendation of drunken behavior, so many see it as intolerable.
The ironic point of this blunder is that Ryanair recently came out in support of stricter measures at British airports to stop excessive drinking. They are requesting for limits to alcohol sales at UK airports through a suggested two-drink limit per passenger and a rule stating no alcohol sales before 10 am.
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Eunan McKinney from Alcohol Action Ireland was also incensed at Ryanair’s comments. He noted that the company should remember the “tragic incidences, both at home and abroad, in which some young people do engage in excessive alcohol consumption in and around exam times, and pay a very high price for such risky behaviour, including with their lives.”
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