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Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

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Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#141

Post by gonehome »

yellowapple wrote: post #140
gonehome wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US has a wild variety of drink laws that vary by state. Many states have government run stores, some states allow beer and wine at grocery stores, but liquor must be sold in a separate store. Some states have laws that ban sales after 8pm, some 2am. Utah is the worst because they limit the alcohol percentage in beer (Mormons don't drink and pushed for these laws) so the companies have to make special shittier Uta…

> California may have a lot of signs warning you that everything causes cancer, but their alcohol laws are pretty permissive. Bars still close at 2am, though, which is lame.

Yeah true - they've tried to pass a 4am law a couple of times I think, but it's failed.

The Svalbard link reminds me of these stories about the volunteer bar in the research base in antarctica:

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/07/on...

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/aug/10/experie...

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#142

Post by anonu »

gonehome wrote: post #139
giantg2 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pennsylvania has monopoly state stores for liquor too. When weddings used to last for days, the mine bosses here would go to the beer and liquor stores and tell them to stop selling to that group of people. Then when the drinks ran out, the wedding would end and the miners would go back to work.

The US has a wild variety of drink laws that vary by state. Many states have government run stores, some states allow beer and wine at grocery stores, but liquor must be sold in a separate store. Some states have laws that ban sales after 8pm, some 2am. Utah is the worst because they limit the alcohol percentage in beer (Mormons don't drink and pushed for these laws) so the companies have to make special shittier Uta…

In south Carolina, right after prohibition up until a few decades ago, you were not allowed to advertise any signs (taller than 3 inches) on a liquor store that indicated you were a liquor store. So they marked themselves with big red circular dots instead (starting around 1940s). The laws have since relaxed but many liquor store still use the red dot and are often referred to as "red dot stores"

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#143

Post by TecoAndJix »

chrissnell wrote: post #130
giantg2 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pennsylvania has monopoly state stores for liquor too. When weddings used to last for days, the mine bosses here would go to the beer and liquor stores and tell them to stop selling to that group of people. Then when the drinks ran out, the wedding would end and the miners would go back to work.

More recently, the PA state-run liquor stores shut down for weeks during the covid scare and when they did open up, they only took a very limited number of orders online and over the phone. It was basically impossible to buy hard alcohol here for over a month. People were driving to other states to get it.

[PA Resident] You could (and still can) order liquor from PA distillers and have it shipped to your home! I remember not having to sign for anything and thinking sub-21 year old me would have loved this information. A nice workaround during the shutdowns

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#144

Post by Rule35 »

byproxy wrote: post #120
AdrianB1 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brain needs challenges and stimulation to develop; when people are taken care of, average IQ of society decreased over time. If you check the numbers there are several metrics where we regressed in the past hundreds of years, including reaction time, testosterones production, fertility etc. Good times create mediocre people and the times were better and better in the past centuries, while people got more and more med…

What’s wrong with being mediocre?

Not mediocre compared to some hyper-competitive person, but mediocre compared to your potential. It seems pretty obvious that fully self-actualized people are happier. They get more of what they want, and feel fulfilled for doing so.

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#145

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

abujazar wrote: post #47

Norwegian here. The reason for the quotas is historical and were put in place to limit miners' consumption of beer and liquor. Interestingly there's practically no quota on wine, presumably because miners didn't care much for that. You can't buy wine and liquor at local stores in Norway Svalbard, but there is a great selection in the state run monopoly stores (Vinmonopolet). In Longyearbyen there's one called Nordpol…

Random, but Longyearbyen should be on the "List of things that are surprisingly named after people." (e.g. German Chocolate Cake isn't from Germany, it's named after Samuel German).

I always thought it was named because staying at in such an isolated place, with month-long days and nights, for even a short period would feel like a "long year", but found on the Wikipedia page that it's actually named after John Munro Longyear.

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#146

Post by curryst »

Rule35 wrote: post #144
byproxy wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s wrong with being mediocre?

Not mediocre compared to some hyper-competitive person, but mediocre compared to your potential. It seems pretty obvious that fully self-actualized people are happier. They get more of what they want, and feel fulfilled for doing so.

Your potential is an utterly subjective objective. I'm not arguing for or against, but feeling "fully self-actualized" is equally accomplished by achieving your goals or lowering your goals until they're easily achievable. It's more a function of self-esteem than it is any kind of objective challenge. Those with healthy self-esteem feel self-actualized, those with poor self-esteem will feel as though they're never at their best.

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#147

Post by rendall »

hollerith wrote: post #102
jonsen wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh they are: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordic_countries

Oops, my bad. (Finns are not considered Scandinavians , and I conflated Scandinavians with Nordics.) Thanks for correcting my mistake.

That Scandinavian thing isn't so cut and dried. Culturally Finns pretty much are Scandinavian. The only thing different really is the language. It's probably best to refer to Finland as Nordic, but calling it Scandinavian isn't such a terrible error, either

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#148

Post by timc3 »

dean177 wrote: post #49
k__ wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it really so common to drink alcohol every day?

It’s not in the UK at any rate, the average varies between 12 and 17 units of alcohol per week depending on age with most of that falling on Fridays and Saturdays. 2 cans of beer per day works out at 28 units, so is certainly substantially more than average. I would guess there is a bubble affect though, most of my friends drink only on special occasions line parties, and regular drinking at home would be perceived a…

Well either its has changed since I lived there or your friends are not big drinkers. Regular drinking was not seen as anything out of the ordinary in the west country and London.

Editing to add - it is a good thing if it has changed.

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#149

Post by AdrianB1 »

the_only_law wrote: post #134
AdrianB1 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are mostly right, it is to prevent alcoholism like other attempts are still made in different countries to limit or ban soda and sweet drinks, cigarettes, some drugs, some or all guns. It is in general good for public health and bad for average IQ.

Yes, I’m sure increased, abusive consumption of a neurotoxin is sure to raise average IQ.

Nobody said that, you just put words in my mouth. Decreasing alcohol consumption is a positive thing, no doubts. Governments nanny-sitting people makes them dumb.

Re: Svalbard's Alcohol Quotas

#150

Post by ilaksh »

murrayhenson wrote: post #5
fouc wrote: post #2

What's interesting about this?

Maybe that the quotas are very low, or that there are quotas at all. Mainland Norway definitely doesn't have quotas like this; rather alcohol is simply made to be quite expensive. When I read this my first thought was something like, "I bet that those who don't drink are making a bit of profit on the side by selling their allowances." However, I'm guessing that for Svalbard's dedicated drinkers ...they're finding a w…

How is that a low quota? 24 cans of beer is a six pack every week. Plus four bottles of wine? And two bottles of liquor?

So a bottle of wine, a six pack, five shots, every week.

Gives me a headache just thinking about it.

I believe that there are studies that show that amount of alcohol significantly reduces life expectancy.

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