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America has a drinking problem

theatlantic.com

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Re: America has a drinking problem

#161

Post by mumblemumble »

graeme wrote: post #73
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)

If available, sparkling water with lemon. Another commenter mentioned bitters, I plan to add that. They’re fine as long as the incredibly tiny alcohol amount won’t cause any issues. If that isn’t available, some sort of soda or tea or coffee. Or, just water. No one really cares, though to be polite to the bar you’re at it’s good to try to buy something.

I've also discovered that my favorite gin and tonic doesn't actually contain any gin. Tonic water and lime suits me just fine.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#163

Post by clomond »

blhack wrote: post #116

Some of my most cherished memories are those where I was out drinking wine and having really good food with my wife and friends. When people were telling stories about Jesus, the central figure of their religion, one of the miracles they told of was him turning water into wine. This is held up as one of the most important stories in their entire moral system. When the pyramids were being built, the builders were paid…

The history of human's connection to alcohol extends even further.

One of the anthropological theories is that it was a core reason for humans to take up agriculture in the first place and to domesticate certain grains.

And, the genetic mutation that allows us to process it in the first place (an enzyme in the liver to break it down much more easily than before) that we received in our lineage millions of years ago allowed us to descend from the trees to the ground. It was a key enabler to our expansion where rotting, fermented fruit sitting on the ground became an enabling calorie source!

Re: America has a drinking problem

#164

Post by silviogutierrez »

phkahler wrote: post #118
1980phipsi wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I lost five pounds or so switching from Coke to Diet Coke.

There is more weight loss to be had switching from Diet Coke to water. It's obviously not the calorie content, but the insulin response from sweet tasting things that will occur even with artificial sweeteners.

Do you have a link to a reputable source? I've heard this a lot, and have a company in the nutrition space, but I haven't seen anything conclusive

Re: America has a drinking problem

#165

Post by Dah00n »

qeternity wrote: post #146

As an American who’s spent most of their adult life working outside the US (Europe and Asia) I find this pretty hilarious. I mean, it may be true…drinking damage is absolute, not relative. But if America has a drinking problem, a huge chunk of the rest of the world are outright alcoholics. Of course I think all of this is alarmist. Alcohol is one of those great traditions that has transcended centuries and generation…

I think this is missing the point a bit. In my experience, while some countries in Europe have a higher intake of alcohol on average, I have never met anyone who drink to cope with stress, work, etc. outside full-blown alcoholics. Americans do this a lot. In my opinion those are two different discussions: one about the effect of too much alcohol on your system and one of the tendency to drink in ways that is normally only seen in alcoholics (but in smaller quantities). While they might sound similar one is overconsumption (bad) and the other is normalisation of alcohol abuse (very risky, likely bad).

Edit: I didn't down vote your comment btw.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#166

Post by theandrewbailey »

tjs8rj wrote: post #108
offtop5 wrote: post #96

Why not let everyone do what they want? I hate these moralizing articles, if we have a drunk driving problem then write an article about that. But if people want to drink in their own homes let them be.

Are you saying there aren't downsides inherent with drinking itself? I'm onboard with letting people do what they want, but if what they want to do has negative effects the least we should do is make them aware of that.

Doesn't society already tell everyone that alcohol abuse is bad?

Re: America has a drinking problem

#167

Post by lhorie »

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…

> to enhance meals

Can you clarify what you mean here? I was under the impression european habits of alcohol pairing takes much more space under this umbrella than, say, whether an american associates junk foods (pizza, wings) with beer.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#168

Post by vdnkh »

fantod wrote: post #149
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…

Noticed this when I was in Germany/Austria as well. In America, if you go out drinking then that's the primary activity. It's what you're doing. But in central Europe socializing and seeing friends is the activity and you just happen to drink because that's what you do when you see your friends.

This makes no sense. Do you think that Americans go out drinking to get drunk arounds friends, but not to socialize with them?

Re: America has a drinking problem

#169

Post by teachingassist »

ckosidows wrote: post #137
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…

Curious about your age? Does this get easier as you get older? I stopped drinking for 6 months and then a friend got a new job and my birthday rolled around. I felt like the situations called for celebratory drinking or that it was expected. I really enjoyed my period of non-drinking and I feel exactly the same as you in regards to sleep, anxiety and well-being. But being in my late 20s I feel like people around my a…

In my experience: some people may take it as a personal reflection on them, if you stop drinking, and will react negatively.

(I don't recommend keeping those people in your life.)

Re: America has a drinking problem

#170

Post by Jetrel »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #28
r00fus wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who doesn't drink more than 2-3 per week and have in the past been in the 2-3 per day category, perhaps it's related to age and/or kids. When kids were tots, I couldn't afford the time to socialize, and now I'm older, consumption has dietary/sleep impacts and I can't afford that too much. Also weirdly I simply don't enjoy the buzz as much.

I also drink about this much per week. I like a beer or wine or whiskey every now and again, but I've never really seen the point in getting buzzed or drunk (or high for that matter). When I do drink, I only have 1 or 2 at a time, not out of an express desire to stay sober, but because I'm usually pretty naturally satisfied by that amount. For whatever reason, I like sobriety. It's strange to me that people should th…

One reason some folks gravitate to mild-altering substances is "transcendent understanding"; drugs put the mind in enough of a different mode of operation that very frequently, it can enable you to understand things you can't understand, sober. And I don't just mean "fuzzy unprovable emotional things", I also mean concrete, empirical stuff like science, math, and programming. Some of this comes from "disinhibition"; some drugs like alcohol can remove various "writer's block" types of things where the mind (under normal, sober conditions) obstinately refuses to consider what, in retrospect, end up being painfully obvious solutions to a problem.

Some of it, though, genuinely comes from causing the mind to operate in a rather different mode and make connections and "leaps of understanding" that it just can't do under normal circumstances. It essentially forces a sort of "educational learning-difference" on you, and if you manage to muscle through and learn how to solve a problem in that state (and get the empirically correct answer), you've essentially allowed your mind to come up with a totally different approach to a problem it would never normally take.

Having previously been one of those programmers chasing the "Ballmer Peak", it definitely was more than just an XKCD joke; the joke worked because it was documenting a real phenomenon that's been known for ages. Several recreational drugs, like alcohol, marijuana, can also be used as "performance-enhancing" drugs in the same way things like Adderall can; it's down to careful dosing and discipline - you have to carefully stay in the "eye of the storm" and not get too inebriated, and you also need to exercise a careful awareness of how the drug's effects can "lead you astray" (i.e. something like Adderall can give you a rush of manic hyperfocus, but it's easy to waste this on irrelevant details, instead of focusing on something productive. There have been plenty of comedic stories of people taking Adderall and … instead of doing their homework, doing something daffy like carefully organizing all the books on their shelves … by color.) So you have to be aware of the drug's "biasing" effects and carefully wrangle your behavior during it.

All that said, I definitely recommend against long-term use of alcohol in particular, just due to the chronic toxicity of it. For a while it's great, but over time, it really starts to wear you down, and do more harm than good. Eventually you're so damn tired all the time, that any productivity gains from mental breakthroughs are wiped out. If it was used on rare occasions for breakthroughs/inspiration, it might be viable, but using it as an anti-adhd/procrastination drug (for which, anecdotally, it was very effective) just isn't sustainable, long-term.

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