turns out the article is mostly focused on US restaurants; but I agree, German street food is not complete without a Pislner.

> German street food is not complete without a Pilsner

German here. For lunch, no one I know ever drinks alcoholic beverages (except maybe when going to a nice restaurant with the whole family on the weekend). And I don't think people are eating street food for dinner all that much, except maybe Döner. But even at Döner places, I don't think I've ever seen people drinking beer. They mostly don't drink anything, and some drink Ayran.

Well for some cafe and restaurants Shisha.

There's always a way to make healthy profits without dealing in immoral and despicable practices.

I wouldn't say always - it becomes a lot harder if your competitors are willing to stoop and you don't have enough customers who care!

It's not immoral to sell someone a drink that they want to have with their meal.

It's been proven what the dangers of alcohol are. Practically the only benefits are monetary for the seller.

I don't drink much these days but I think that's taking it a little far. You could make the same argument about fatty foods and many other things.

There are non-drink culinary uses for it too. The wholesale banning of alcohol misses the point a lot of the time. I had a friend who taught cake decorating and it's common to mix high concentration alcohol with coloured dust to paint on sugar flowers because it's a great solvent, evaporates quickly, and doesn't soak into the sugar. No one eats this part of the cake. But in some countries with Islamic students they were so unwilling to be anywhere near alcohol they used water. Perhaps I'm mistaken but I thought the original intent of those commands was regarding intoxication (which I don't fully disagree with) so this seems odd to me.

Correct, it's mainly to avoid intoxication and the ramifications that come out of it. However, I agree with what those students did. They have principles and they stuck to them. The alcohol could have mixed with the food for instance, even though it wasn't meant to be consumed directly. Secondly, someone could unknowingly consume it thinking it was edible.

As to your first point, highly processed foods are definitely something to watch out for. However, the effects of alcohol are immediate, and can be seen in a single sitting. Countless instances of rape, drunk driving, and homicides that come out of it. You won't see someone consume a couple of meals at a fast food place then lose his decision making ability for instance.