381–390 of 1001 posts
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Calming your nerves lowers your heart rate. Lower heart rate leads to less heart problems. Less heart problems leads to longer life. A glass of wine calms your nerves.
Alcohol increases your heart rate.
Separately, consider that your assertion would likely be more persuasive to doubters if you'd included a link defending it.
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All drugs should be decriminalized. Shooting people in drug raids is far worse for those people than are the drugs. Likewise, locking people in cages with other misfits, criminals, malcontents, and addicts isn’t smart (especially considering that drugs are in the prisons too). If the goal is truly harm reduction, people need to simply work to convince drug users to not use drugs (whether those are opioids, alcohol, t…
Slippery slope. What happens when a drug addict looking his next fix attacks someone? This is why we have drug laws to start with, was to protect people. There are no simple answers here.
Everything is a balance though, isn't it? If a little alcohol reduces one's stress and increases socialization, then they may be better off with the alcohol on net.
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Agreed, although a single shot of moonshine is a equivalent to a little over a pint of beer. You can drink that and be well within alcohol consumption guidelines in US. Even most alcohol-naïve people would only be minimally intoxicated from a single shot of moonshine.
The guidelines are probably wrong. All recent scientific data I see shows that, like most poisons, the best amount to intake is zero. Here’s one for brain health. https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.05.10.21256931v...
I'm sure drinking has some effect on you, but I'm not sure one non-peer reviewed which by their own papers shows <18 drinks / week shows baseline within the uncertainty band is evidence of any noticeable mental decline. In fact several of the graphs, it shows an increase in matter volume for low non-zero amounts vs zero.
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My friend and family groups have been making a consistent effort to stop romanticizing alcohol and have gatherings without it. There's no denying alcohol is a social lubricant that can be very enjoyable.
I think it's important to normalize having alcohol-free excursions, especially when younger people are around. Demonstrate that self control is valued. And I say that as someone with a drinking problem who sweats about going more than half a day without one.
If you are turning down attending events because they are dry ... you have a problem.
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Counterpoint: alcohol is one of the best drugs on the planet for anyone on the spectrum of introversion to crippling social anxiety. In all my (many) years, I have found no better path to becoming socially acceptable (even likable) to neurotypicals/extroverts than 3-4 shots of vodka. This is an unfortunate, but very real fact for many of us. I've heard good things about Phenibut, but (1) it's very difficult to obtain…
Oh-ho, no, not in my experience. I used to be devastatingly introverted. Alcohol helped, but it’s nothing compared to GHB or MDMA. Ecstasy will give you the gift of gab like you can’t believe. minor edit: I should say I am ignoring the context of where it’s acceptable to do such things. You probably shouldn’t do G at Christmas with the in-laws. (Though our quarantine Christmas this year with friends…) I’m just making…
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> Then at some point people, as adults, feel like they have to drink to enjoy themselves? I wonder what happened. It feels like this question is disingenuous. You don't need fire starter to start a fire either, but wouldn't it be silly to conclude fire starter doesn't make starting a fire easier? Moderate alcohol consumption in an intimate environment is a lot of fun. Put differently, if alcohol didn't present such s…
I don’t understand your comparison with a fire. Your claim that moderate alcohol consumption makes things more fun is part of the point of my post. Is this actually true, or just a rationalization of people who already drink? No judgement for those who do drink, by the way.
Alcohol is one of the worst "drugs" on a personal/societal harm scale - if we're going to tolerate this at large, we should probably consider legalizing everything else that's less harmful to at least be consistent. While we're at it, let's de-stigmatize the abuse of substances and treat it like a real mental health issue.
Legalize medicinal meth.
Back in the 90's I worked on a concrete crew for a summer. Building big box store type buildings. They pour the floor, then pour the walls on top of the floor, then tip the walls up and weld them together with metal flanges embedded in the concrete.
Nearly everyone on the crew did meth (except like 2 guys, I was one). Often work would start like 3:00 AM to prevent rapid drying. No lunch to speak of. Expected to literally run on the job site from one task to another. I suppose there may have been potential labor complaints but they never happened or weren't investigated.
It wasn't unusual for people to burn out and just not show up. That was part of the calculus I think by management. One guy fell asleep in his truck and could not be woken up (after presumably being up for a few days).
I quit after a few months but later saw my (low level) supervisor at a restaurant. He was alone and didn't look good. He told me how his life had gotten increasingly out of control and he had tried to kill himself (before finding Jesus per his words).
Company didn't care. They were making money. They turned a blind eye to what was going on. The human wreckage generated was awful however.
You think if meth is legal over the counter this won't be more prevalent? I'm pretty sure it will. Meth kills, and not just the body.
Although I live in a place where weed is legal, I don’t use it. I enjoy the occasional glass of a nice scotch, though, and I love a good stout or porter beer. This is where it gets a little strange for me: by every metric I can think of, I’d be better off replacing alcohol with weed. There seem to be fewer negative effects, it’s not a source of empty calories, and looks like a better recreational drug in every way. A…
- Flavor
- Fills the stomach (can be a disadvantage too, but is advantageous in some situations, e.g. while waiting for dinner to be served at a party)
- Doesn't consume itself (i.e you can set down a drink and come back to it 30 minutes later)
- Easy to consume a small amount without substantially altering your mental state.
- No fire/burn risk
- Doesn't generate smoke/odor, which is unpleasant for other people and gets in your clothes/furniture
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We have already (as a society) decided we will no longer forcibly help people, so what do you do with someone that hurts others to feed their addiction? Put them all in jail for every little offense? Fine them? (they have no money) Force them into rehab? (another form of jail) Let the roam the streets attacking people? (recycle through jail or rehab) No, it's not simple.
Assault is not a "little offense". Anyone convicted of criminal assault should spend a significant amount of time in prison (regardless of whether they're a drug addict or not) in order to protect the rest of society.