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America has a drinking problem

theatlantic.com

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Re: America has a drinking problem

#151

Post by grumple »

trts wrote: post #29

I decided to give up alcohol for a year. That was three years ago and doubt I will ever go back. Aside from having better sleep than at any other point as an adult, I truly enjoy the activities I partake in just as much, if not more, than when I still paired them with alcohol. It took about 6 months to stop feeling like I was missing out, and now I feel like everyone else is. Anxiety in general is noticeably lower (t…

I went to a party the other night and didn't drink at all. Very unusual. I brought a bottle of tequila for the host and friends.

Strangely, I didn't feel anxious at all, despite having pretty high general anxiety. My energy levels were higher than usual, which I felt was connected to not drinking. I felt totally normal in my social interactions, didn't force anything, felt good. I kept my water bottle in hand and never felt out of place.

It was a good lesson that alcohol is not needed to have a good time.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#152

Post by qeternity »

Barrin92 wrote: post #135

Article mirrors my experience. For context I'm German, my wife's French and we've got family in Croatia who own a vineyard so I'm used to being around alcohol and people drinking. My first impression when I spent time was in the US was indeed how bipolar drinking is compared to Europe. We probably drink a hell of a lot more in raw terms than the average American does.Two glasses of wine for dinner, another one in the…

Where in Germany? I find this surprising. As an American expat who has spent a lot of time in Germany, I’d agree that the German relationship with alcohol is less taboo, but Germany/UK have pretty big binging cultures. The Mediterraneans definitely do it more responsibly though.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#153

Post by PragmaticPulp »

It's hard to reduce the US to a single culture. Alcohol consumption habits vary greatly from region to region, or even city to city depending on where you live.

I've noticed that heavy drinkers tend to cluster with other heavy drinkers. The more you see your friends and coworkers binge drinking regularly, the more you feel it's an acceptable and even common behavior. Likewise, non-drinkers tend to cluster with each other because it gets tiresome to have friends who want every event to revolve around alcohol.

Statistically, the median drinker in the US doesn't drink much alcohol at all. The vast majority of alcohol is consumed by the top 10% of drinkers. You may have simply ended up with a cluster of heavy drinkers that aren't representative of the median US alcohol consumer.

Statistic here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/09/25/think... Note that the median US alcohol drinker consumes less than 1 drink per week.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#154

Post by soperj »

Someone wrote: post #72
awrence wrote: post #33

“ In his 1979 history, The Alcoholic Republic, the historian W. J. Rorabaugh painstakingly calculated the stunning amount of alcohol early Americans drank on a daily basis. In 1830, when American liquor consumption hit its all-time high, the average adult was going through more than nine gallons of spirits each year.” I think I remember hearing a similar stat on the ken burns prohibition doc. I didn’t quite understan…

Wine isn’t a spirit (nor is beer). That number is about distilled alcohol. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquor : “Liquor or spirit (also distilled alcohol) is an alcoholic drink produced by distillation of grains, fruits, or vegetables that have already gone through alcoholic fermentation. […] Liquor generally has an alcohol concentration higher than 30%” ⇒ For a 10% alcohol wine, multiply that by a factor of (at le…

They already did that when they said 36 liters, which is 100 bottles of wine.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#155

Post by yojo »

philips wrote: post #95
leifg wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuine question: what do you drink instead? Do you stick to water or do you order any kind of soda/lemonade (or something I’m not thinking about)

Dry kombucha is a really nice alternative at 50 - 100 calories a can. My go to this summer https://www.lionheartkombucha.com/flavors/

I'm also a fan of kombucha (and make it at home), but it's not quite a non-alcoholic beverage.

Commercial kombucha is generally The yeast can work anaerobic, the bacteria need O2 to get the job done. Anything not pasteurized is likely going to increase in ABV some in the bottle, since the yeast are active and the bacteria aren't. This is also why I force carbonate my home-brew - when you build CO2 with a secondary ferment you're also building alcohol.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#156

Post by carlmr »

germinalphrase wrote: post #109
kevinmchugh wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Club soda (or flavored seltzer) + bitters. There's alcohol there still but less than half a percent ABV. Not enough that it tastes boozy or impairs my judgement. Drinking one relatively low ABV beer impairs my judgement enough that a second drink sounds like a good idea, the soda and bitters never does that for me.

This (or similar) is my go-to. In a rocks glass, it also looks enough like a cocktail that no one makes a point of asking (if that matters to you).

>no one makes a point of asking (if that matters to you).

Actually it does kind of annoy me when I just drink water that people will ask all the time. My go to has been seltzer + lime + wedge because I do like to have some taste, and it does look cocktail-ish.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#157

Post by nestorD »

paxys wrote: post #31

When we are no longer restricted by resource limits as a society, everything quickly becomes an addiction. Food, alcohol, cigarettes, caffeine, sex, drugs, gambling, shopping, TV, video games, social media. I'm sure people a lot more qualified than me will be able to talk about it in scientific terms, but I feel like a certain category of species (maybe all of them?) simply never ran into limiting excesses as part of…

On the subject of addiction I highly recommend this comic on the rat park experiment: http://utw10426.utweb.utexas.edu/quest/Q3/ratpark.html

It starts with the famous experiments where rats would prefer drugs to food and water but goes on to further study that lead to not so bleak conclusions.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#158

Post by heavyset_go »

trts wrote: post #29

I decided to give up alcohol for a year. That was three years ago and doubt I will ever go back. Aside from having better sleep than at any other point as an adult, I truly enjoy the activities I partake in just as much, if not more, than when I still paired them with alcohol. It took about 6 months to stop feeling like I was missing out, and now I feel like everyone else is. Anxiety in general is noticeably lower (t…

I stopped drinking because I wasn't going out due to the pandemic. I've come to a similar conclusion, and intend to make this a long-term decision.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#160

Post by simonsarris »

The sound rule in the matter would appear to be like many other sound rules—a paradox. Drink because you are happy, but never because you are miserable. Never drink when you are wretched without it, or you will be like the grey-faced gin-drinker in the slum; but drink when you would be happy without it, and you will be like the laughing peasant of Italy. Never drink because you need it, for this is rational drinking, and the way to death and hell. But drink because you do not need it, for this is irrational drinking, and the ancient health of the world.

G.K. Chesterton, from Heretics

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