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America has a drinking problem

theatlantic.com

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Re: America has a drinking problem

#711

Post by watwut »

capableweb wrote: post #656
Wxc2jjJmST9XWWL wrote: post #636

Whenever I explain the "USA" to (Eastern) Europeans, I always simply state the notion: "diverse country of the extremes". Yes, widespread obesity, but health obsessions also run deep in that country, gym memberships, elite universities with sports programs full of money. How many weird diet fads start basically in the US? Self-help books, alternative gurus, etc. Bad education? Yes, pretty much. But also some of the b…

Neither of the things you've listed sounds like diversity, it sounds like inequality. Why is half the country without proper education while the other ones are in the best research institutions in the world? And what does the people are those institutions spend their time on, if it's not helping the other half reaching the same position as themselves? The social experiment seems to be about how extreme you can really…

> And what does the people are those institutions spend their time on, if it's not helping the other half reaching the same position as themselves?

Elite universities are supposed to advance elite science - stuff like math, physics, technology, sociology, history. They also train people for work that requires such training.

But, they dont create public education policy nor should they. They are not subject of public elections nor are they responsible for budget.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#712

Post by quotemstr »

gambiting wrote: post #708
hallway_monitor wrote: post #705

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Freedom creates inequality. The freedom to excel comes with the freedom to do poorly at the game. Why should everyone be in the same position? They didn't put in the same effort. We do give away a lot of welfare to people who are doing poorly. It might be more effective to stop giving people money and use it instead to create programs to provide better jobs and skill training.

>>Why should everyone be in the same position? They didn't put in the same effort. For a simple reason - because we know, empirically, through decades of studies(some of which were done by the very US of A!), that it produces better results for the entire society. I've learnt long ago that it doesn't matter how I feel about benefits system personally - yeah I hate that some people get money for doing nothing. But it'…

> For a simple reason - because we know, empirically, through decades of studies(some of which were done by the very US of A!), that it produces better results for the entire society

Is that why America's per capita GDP is higher than that of the EU? Why the US, not the EU, is the world's center of innovation and the strongest magnet for talent?

I don't think that trying to make everyone the same is good for society or conducive to high levels of human accomplishment. Striving for excellence will inevitably produce winners and losers, but if you don't do it, you just end up with mediocrity stew. I'm not going to cut off the right side of the distribution of human accomplishment on the say-so of people who have some weird ideological commitment to human sameness.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#713

Post by frankbreetz »

graphtrader wrote: post #676
capableweb wrote: post #656

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither of the things you've listed sounds like diversity, it sounds like inequality. Why is half the country without proper education while the other ones are in the best research institutions in the world? And what does the people are those institutions spend their time on, if it's not helping the other half reaching the same position as themselves? The social experiment seems to be about how extreme you can really…

I think you are just repeating things you have read about. People walking out of their jobs because wages are so low is obvious bullshit. The people I know in this situation are the hardest working people I have ever met and it is insulting to them to say such things.

Leaving one job for a better one doesn't make you less hard working.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#714

Post by konart »

TameAntelope wrote: post #332
Bostonian wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"we also have a very painful past and present" I don't see why that is more true of the U.S. than say Germany, Japan, Russia, China etc.

We've both refused to own our past national transgressions the way Japan and Germany have, we have more diversity than all of those countries, and have also not scrubbed all mention of said painful past from our national history like Russia and China.

> we have more diversity than all of those countries

I'm sorry, but this is just bullshit. At least when it comes to Russia.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#715

Post by yoz-y »

karlkloss wrote: post #678
yoz-y wrote: post #629

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I though the standard beer in Europe was always 500ml.

Nope. In most restaurants and bars, 300ml is the standard size, sometimes even 250ml. 500ml is considered a big beer. 300ml is also the standard size at festivities, concerts and sports games. In Colone, the standard size of the local beer (Kölsch) is 200ml, but 300ml is also common. In the south of Germany, especially bavaria, 500ml is the standard size in restaurants, and 1L at festivities and in bars run by brewer…

My idea originally comes from the fact that in eastern europe you have either a beer (500ml) or a "small beer" (330ml). Cans are 500ml and bottles vary. In france there is a pint (500ml) or a "half beer" (the usual size) which is 200-250ml. Cans are again 500ml but bottles are all over the place and mostly 330ml.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#716

Post by bumby »

netizen-936824 wrote: post #680
saiya-jin wrote: post #671

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just wow... I guess you would have different sentiment if you would be on the poor side of the inequality scale. Sentiment about poverty being good because it gives 'vastly different life experiences'? One of the things we can be actually proud here in Europe (mainly western part though), a rather strong middle class and tons of help to the poor (maybe too much according to some). I know its nice to find cheap poor f…

People love to make excuses for shitty behavior, such as calling the US an experiment

The claim that the US is an experiment has a long precedent.

>No experiment can be more interesting than that we are now trying, and which we trust will end in establishing the fact, that man may be governed by reason and truth. Our first object should therefore be, to leave open to him all the avenues to truth.

-Thomas Jefferson, 1804

Re: America has a drinking problem

#717

Post by NateEag »

makeitdouble wrote: post #693
graphtrader wrote: post #676

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are just repeating things you have read about. People walking out of their jobs because wages are so low is obvious bullshit. The people I know in this situation are the hardest working people I have ever met and it is insulting to them to say such things.

I have no idea about your walk of life, but people leaving low paying jobs doesn’t feel irrational or lazy, or bullshitty in general. Why shouldn’t they ?

"Walking out" of a job implies leaving the employer without warning in the middle of a workday, something many people in the US pride themselves on not doing (despite largely having the legal right to do so).

It's related to strong senses of personal responsibility and pride in reliability and dependability, in my experience.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#718

Post by throwaway894345 »

industriousthou wrote: post #514
throwaway894345 wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Take it to the extreme of an LSD trip, you can get something out of it that you can't get any other way. You take a day to mentally dig into your psyche and cut through so many of your mental ruts, while having some crazy hallucinations. Maybe. I'm unconvinced that this is the only way to achieve any kind of insight. In particular I'd be surprised if it outperforms a cup of coffee or a rhapsodical conversation for…

Sometimes escaping can give you a little distance and a perspective from which you can see reality more clearly. Sometimes confronting reality is just (mis)applying ingrained cognitive patterns to a bunch of details. Also, sometimes things are just really shitty and there's nothing that can realistically fix them and escapism actually is a reasonable choice.

> Also, sometimes things are just really shitty and there's nothing that can realistically fix them and escapism actually is a reasonable choice.

I don’t buy this. Even when you can’t fix things (and I’ve been there) you can still process through your emotions and accept and make sense of your new normal. You don’t have to do it all at once, but that’s the only path to recovery—drugs and alcohol won’t get you there.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#719

Post by throwaway316943 »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #692
op00to wrote: post #686

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one has ever quit a job because they can’t survive on it. If you’re really working paycheck to paycheck and barely scraping by, you don’t have the luxury of quitting. You would be homeless very quickly.

It's a little more nuanced than that. Crappy "barely survive" paying jobs tend to have high turnover and that's a two way street. You lose your job being janitor at the airport for pissing hot and you might not even lose a day's wage because you could be sweeping floors at the hospital that night if you play your cards right. Jiffy Lube gives you crap jobs for the 3rd straight week and you're rolling your toolbox int…

That’s hilarious that people are downvoting this. I imagine they don’t even know that daywork is a thing or that getting paid by the hour isn’t just a metric used for billing different clients.

Re: America has a drinking problem

#720

Post by Bissaka »

fataliss wrote: post #615
marton_s wrote: post #613

I’m curious if there is a country which does not have a drinking problem (set aside those where alcohol is forbidden).

And even then, if prohibition showed one thing is that forbidding alcohol does not prevent alcohol drinking at all :D

Allow me to offer a different perspective.

I'm 40 years old who is a muslim. I spent half of my life living in a muslim/arab country and the other hald in the west. Here is what I've seen:

1- Of all the people I know where I grew up in the arab country, probably only 2-3 drunk. This does correlate with the data [1]. But those 2-3 people did drink heavily.

2- Alcohol in the arab world has a different meaning. In the arab world it would be more like: "hey there is this poison, let's drink to forget about my issues and lets do that in hiding". While in the western world, it's more "let's meet for a drink and have a little fun".

3- There is no drinking culture in the arab world. This is because there are limited number of bars/pubs and people do not consume it openly. Not in weddings, gatherings or barbeques. A minority will come already drunk to a wedding (see point 1)

4- Islam is big on forbiding Alcohol. Not only that, but there is this idea that alcohol can stay up to 40 days in your body (never verfied this claim). Hence why a lot of people who actually drink, stop drinking 40 days before Ramadan starts. While a lot of muslims don't pray, the majority do fast and hold onto Ramadan. Bars and Pubs actually close a month before Ramadan too. The drinkers I knew, did actually follow this rule.

5- Yes, I know, you probably knew that guy in high school who was an arab and a heavy drinker. And that is correct. But the data and what I've seen in arab countries correlate more with point 1 above. Alcohol is so frowned upon, that even people who like to drink don't want to show it to their kids or neighbors. It's rare to have an arab family buy alcohol and put it in the fridge. Alcohol is also not available in supermarkets or anywhere except in bars. I lived in >1mil city and we had 3 bars.

6- There is a weird association in arab countries between Alcohol and Violance/Agression. WHich is some time true.

I never understood this obssession with Alcohol. Because I just wasn't used to it. It's so bizzare that I had to explain myself all the time on why I'm not drinking.

[1] https://ourworldindata.org/alcohol-consumption

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