To wonder why young women are drinking so much?

[TabithaStephens]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-23358078

Why are so many young women drinking more than they did in the past? From the women I know, I think the figures for women born in the 80s and 90s will be even worse than the current ones for women born in the 70s. Is it down to the pressures of modern life? Were women formerly expected not to drink to excess and now those expectations are not there so women are drinking more?

Men still drink more but seemingly less than they did in the past. Are the sexes just coming closer together in their drinking?

I'd hope so. I think there is a general trend towards realising that alcoholics can be functioning people rather than park bench drunks.

apparently it is now ok for young women to be seen vomiting in the gutter, and it is not a good night out if you can remember it.

revolting in either sex. People with no brains, no interests and no life - but clearly plenty of money!

The woman I know who drinks all the time is a widow of 53; she's trying to find a new man and is always drinking in bars on her days off work.

Also there are the women who drink lots of red wine with husbands as a 'hobby', and those who sink a bottle a night on their own.

Younger women tend to binge drink more just for fun. But it's the older women I know who are the serious drinkers.

As for men, well I know of lots of men of all ages who drink far too much.

A glass of wine is "mother's little helper" these days, whereas in the 60s and 70s it was valium.

Yes, Valium did the same job, but it was a shameful secret. Now, it's perfectly acceptable and I see real antagonism to those who don't drink or dare suggest someone has had enough.

All these wine o'clock mummies kid themselves that they're having fun, making informed choices, not sending negative messages to it endangering DCs blah blah.

Where I live, it's icy cava or prosecco and artisan crisps.

I would say about 75% of the group I know need it rather than want it. They'd trample their granny to death when the Smeg opens and the cork pops.

It's still numbing. It's still Wendy Craig in Butterflies "making the day go away."

Either "vomiting in the gutter" is. ok for everyone, or it's not ok for anyone. But please with the moral panic about gasp women acting the same way as men havedone for decades.

I think most people who drink too much are perfectly well aware of the fact. They are just in denial.

'I would say about 75% of the group I know need it rather than want it'

It reminds me of Betty Draper in Mad Men - skulling back the red wine and cocktails because she's so utterly miserable and trapped in her outwardly 'perfect' life. 'Numbing' is exactly the right word. It's sad, but you can kid yourself it's all great fun because drinking is so socially acceptable, which makes it even sadder

I think they probably just enjoy drinking. It is very pleasurable after all.

There is still a sizable prohibitionist lobby in the UK, which is always pushing for more regulation of alcohol. Doctors, rather than giving facts about the effects of alcohol, play political games instead. Fake charities like Alcohol Concern receive money from the government to lobby the government! (They don't actually give help to actual alcoholics). Rather than an open debate about how alcohol should be regulated, battle lines are drawn, information is cherry picked and misrepresented.

People are drinking less. Young people especially are drinking less. But apparently this isn't good enough for the prohibitionists.

Indeed, it's telling that the article uses the term "young women" in the first place. The study looks at people born up to 1979 which is the year I was born, and while I'm delighted to be classified as a "young woman" I don't think my demographic is really what people have in mind when they spew out all the usual tabloid cliches about vomiting in the gutter on Saturday nights etc. As others have said, the people that are drinking too much and in denial about it are very likely to be doing it on the sofa in front of Homeland with their spouse.

But using the "young" bit is a neat little trick, because it prompts readers to think that things are deteriorating, that each generation is actually worse than the last, that the youth of today are going to hell in a wheelbarrow and Something Must Be Done, when in fact the figures show the opposite to be the case. We were the bad eggs.

Girls just wanna have fun...

Or, As with so many shock horror stories that hit the media, they are talking about a rise in a tiny % of women, while the big number continues to drop.

'As others have said, the people that are drinking too much and in denial about it are very likely to be doing it on the sofa in front of Homeland with their spouse'

Very much agree with this. Virtually all of my heavy drinking over the last 5 years or so was done on the couch in front of the TV. I'm exactly the same age as you MadBusLady so hardly ancient but I'm just not a clubbing/partying type.

I agree that its really wine drinking at home that's become the problem. There was a thread on here about a week ago about the 'normalising' of wine drinking on telly, where everyone reaches straight for the bottle of wine when they get in from work and relaxes on the sofa with a huge big glass of merlot watching television.
I think a lot of people have started to emulate that and treat wine the way our mothers' generation treated 'a nice cup of tea'. Something you automatically have when you sit down and relax.
I've cut out wine during the week but was definitely over drinking at one stage. It just felt weird to not have some wine every evening because it had become such a habit. Once I stopped I very quickly lost that feeling because home from work time no longer triggered that 'wine o clock' feeling.

^^
There is no problem, this is a made up story on misunderstood statistics.

These stories only ever highlight a tiny proportion of the population. There will always be the excesses on the fringe, the difference now is that whole tv shows are dedicated to a handful of people getting slaughtered here and abroad.

Male or female this will always be the case. The vast, vast majority drink responsibly and I take exception on the notion that minimum pricing, state controlled alcohol supply or any other measure that is punitive to all to temper the behaviour of the few is a solution.

Walk into any lively pub tonight and you will see people, clearly drunk, being served over and over again then going into clubs where it continues. This got more prevalent with the decline of landlords and the rise of managed houses. The role of poacher and gamekeeper in the pub environment and its uselessness is altogether too apparent.