The bigger question is why isn't sobriety viewed as the default position rather than the exception? I mean, nobody would ask why young people are saying "no" to crack cocaine.
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Reasons young people are choosing sobriety
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Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety
#72I suspect that most young people in the developed world are introduced to alcohol by megacorps who just want to sell you as much fun as you can walk away from. That is quite different from being introduced to alcohol at an early age as something that is an intricate part of your culture and diet. Personally, I find fermentation fascinating and a walk through human history: kefir, kvass, berries, barley... On a person…
I don't really see the megacorp connection. Maybe you're thinking of stuff like Heineken and other corps doing their advertisements?
But I think the real place young people meet alcohol is every festival, club or pub, not in a purely commercial arena.
Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can only drink so many pops/sodas two or three before you hit a sugar limit. With beer you could easily hit higher limits.
Does anyone still drink sugared sodas when going out? Most people are very conscious of this and only drink zero.. Edit: by Zero I mean coke zero or other 'diet' drinks. I was talking about the sugared versions only that have become really unpopular here in Spain.
>Does anyone still drink sugared sodas when going out?
Is this a real question? You don't ever see soda being served at a restaurant? I see it all the time and it's obvious people are still drinking it since it's on the menu at literally every restaurant.
Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety
#74Well everyone vapes at my school so maybe there's your answer.
Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety
#75Question: Why has smoking all but been extinguished and is now viewed as gross and trashy (as it should), while alcohol has retained its glamour? Do governments need to start mandating pictures of people with alcohol poisoning on every bottle and can? Do restaurants need to start banning alcohol from their venues?
Smoking makes you smell terrible even when you aren't holding a cigarette. Young people in America never picked up the habit in the first place because of anti-tobacco education, and not being desensitized to the smell, started gagging around people who still smoke. The smell, and the second-hand smoke issue, both make smoking viscerally offensive to most of those who don't.
> Do restaurants need to start banning alcohol from their venues?
Restaurants make more money selling booze than they ever made selling tobacco, so there is a lot of political pressure for this to not happen. Not just money from selling the booze itself, but from all the other irresponsible purchases drunk people make. Who's going to spend $25 for a ham and cheese sandwich if they're not drunk?
Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sounds like you drink more often than once or twice a quarter.
Oh yeah, I am a regular consumer, but the nature of hangovers seems entirely divorced to the frequency of drinking to me.
As mentioned in my original post. I used to regularly drink. Often with food and hydrating.
You have alcohol tolerance and I no longer have that. Your experience with hangovers is entirely based on tolerance.
Hydration and food are an important aspect of not getting a terrible hangover for me still but it does not stop them entirely.
Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety
#77When I was in my 20s, I drank socially from time to time and even occasionally by myself. As I've grown older, I pretty much stopped: - I've found that the pressures of "adult" responsibilities (kids, real career, etc) leave little time for it - I want to model good behavior for my kids, and in particular, I don't want my kids to see me drinking or drunk - I'm in the back half of my 30s now - I've realized that the t…
>Spending that time with dulled senses
What exactly is the fear of dulled senses? What are you gaining by being a bit sharper on Friday night that drinkers are losing? Is anything actually lost?
I'm genuinely curious because most of the time the dulled senses bit is brought up it seems like there's almost always some kind of guilt on behalf of the speaker that causes them to feel uncomfortable with intoxication in a way that others simply don't experience.
I would guess the average casual drinker dismisses the person that is worried about "staying sharp" as being uptight or unnecessarily rigid, because as you said, life is short and who really gives a damn about being 100% cognitive all the time?
Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety
#78The bigger question is why isn't sobriety viewed as the default position rather than the exception? I mean, nobody would ask why young people are saying "no" to crack cocaine.
There was news recently of the Japanese Government heavily promoting drinking to young people, because their alcohol industry is suffering.
> because their alcohol industry is suffering
Or rather, because their tax revenue is suffering: "Taxes on alcohol accounted for 1.7% of Japan’s tax revenue in 2020, down from 3% in 2011 and 5% in 1980." [0]
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/17/japan-governme...
Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety
#79The bigger question is why isn't sobriety viewed as the default position rather than the exception? I mean, nobody would ask why young people are saying "no" to crack cocaine.
To be literal about it, it's because drinking is the default position, in the UK. The average person drinks. I'm an American and no stranger to drinking, but even for me, living there (in the late 2000s) there seemed to be a greater assumption amongst the people around me (with the huge exception of the many Muslim people) that everyone drank.
Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety
#80Once you stop drinking the hangovers get worse and worse. The pandemic removed the pressure to drink (for some) and now it’s really hard to lose an entire day to feeling like garbage in exchange for a couple hours of partying. I still drink one or two socially but anymore and my next day is a mess.
Agreed, it's got to be the hangovers. Being drunk is fun enough, but not if it means your next 1-2 days is ruined. People were shown another way by the shutdown of bars, combined with the proliferation of cannabis as a (mostly) hangover-free alternative.
Being drunk is fun enough? having had to deal with an OD'ing colleague, passing out, getting cold and blue, having to call the ER... After that I restricted my intake to only very few small drinks.