to think that if you enjoy a drink, you're enjoying a drug?(alcohol)

[curlygiraffe]

Please tell me if iabu and settle a debate with a friend.

I rarely drink, I have had health issues and regular drink is not recommended. I know lots of people who 'like a glass of wine' in the evening to relax. Whilst I'm not suggesting that they necessarily have a drinking problem, I have said that the reason that people enjoy alcoholic drinks is due to the physical reaction from the alcohol (brain and body relaxes etc) and they like the taste due to past experience telling them that the relaxed feeling is coming.

If the alcohol wasn't the main 'benefit' of the drink, then why wouldn't people save money and drink grape juice or water? My friends and I are divided on this.

Surely the reason people drink alcohol is due to the physical reaction from the erugi

I dunno about the taste thing. I like wine and hate beer. If the only options were beer or soft drinks, I'd chose a soft drink every time. Surely if what I liked was the effect of the alcohol, I'd pick the beer?

I am fairly recently teetotal (two months now ) and herc is spot on about Big Alcohol.

It's completely insidious and stepping outside of it makes you see the whole con for what it is.

It's been eye opening.

Herc maybe you are quick to take offence, and take it where it's not meant, if you think my comment about moving in different circles = I think you are talking out of your arse.

And although I do drink, I have several close friends who don't drink at all. When I am in their company I have never seen them get any grief from anyone who wants them to drink.

Yes of course alcohol is a drug. And one which causes a raft of problems in our society, arguably it's the worst drug used in terms of the various impacts it has in terms of health and crime.

Eleanor it's not just alcohol though and it would be unfair to not mention eg big dairy, big meat, big motorist, big cyclist, big 'school sport', big Christianity, big atheism ....

This world has an awful lot of lobbyists. And an awful lot of people who are uncomfortable with the idea of choice. I'm very aware of it partly because of the nature of my job, and partly because some of my own choices are 'outside the norm' - but many of them are within the 'norm' and it's so easy to forget that. I'm frequently picking myself up on incipient 'norming' attitudes. I don't think there are many people alive who don't need to work a bit on their tolerance towards difference.

I think most people probably like the taste as well as the effect. How much they like the one or the other part of that will differ very widely. You honestly can't generalise. Well, you can, but it's pointless.

Lots of alcoholic drinks (e.g. Campari) are bitter in a way soft drinks rarely are, so if you like that kind of taste (as I do) then you're going to have to drink alcohol to get it.

Many people don't drink enough alcohol at any one time for there to be a marked effect on feelings or behaviour. I'm one of them. One drink is lovely, two drinks fine but I'll feel it the next morning, hangover starts during the third drink. So I mostly stick to one.

And lots of people are remarkably defensive about anything that shines a spotlight on their drinking, be it the frequency or amount of it or the motivation for it.

Bowlers - you are far from the only person who has done the 'different circles' thing on this thread! And I'm not even slightly offended. I'm amused.

I like the taste and the effect.

Sometimes I like a little effect, sometimes I like a lot.

But if a vodka, soda and lime wasn't available I wouldn't even be slightly tempted to drink some White Lightning or Lambrini if they were the only other things on offer.

Alcohol does have an unpleasant taste. That's why people have to force themselves to like it. Be that by drinking enough beer you get used to it or finding a wine which is the least sour or by mixing alcohol with nice tasting soft drinks.
Of course people drink it because it is a drug. I think they also do it because it is a social convention that they feel they should adhere to eg wine with a nice dinner, cider on a hot day, champagne to celebrate etc. it's ingrained as part of what we do.
People are very rude to non drinkers. My partner is teetotal and gets loads of grief from people of all ages. They make the same jokes over and over or just try to pressure him to drink for some reason.

Alcohol does have an unpleasant taste

- to you perhaps...taste is entirely subjective!

Herc - you asked me specifically if I drink, and speculated that I do.

In fact, I never drink in public. This is because I live very rurally and always drive. I do drink at home occasionally - a glass of wine with friends or family over a meal.

Not once have I been pressured to have a drink while out. Nor have I been asked why I'm not drinking.

I've also experienced pressure to drink or pointed questions about not drinking.

Although overall I think it is often harder to be a moderate or very light drinker than a teetotaller. I've found people are more accepting of not drinking at all than of someone who does drink alcohol but only wants to drink very little of it, which is incredibly irritating.

Some of it is just hosting anxiety, people seeing it as their role to make sure you've got a drink. Some of it is not wanting to have their own rapid consumption made conspicuous.

I just tell people that I'm allergic to hangovers. I haven't had one in 15 years now and I don't want one ever again, simple as that.

denzel -I agree.

Cinnabar - do you really think that because something has never happened to you it never happens to anyone?? I have been quite specific about where this happens to me. Not with my friends. With work colleagues at functions. I am quite prepared to believe (and wouldn't expect otherwise) ghat friends don't behave badly towards non drinkers. Relative strangers however often do. There are plenty of other people in this thread who agree.

Going back to the OP, I'm not drinking at the moment because I'm pregnant and I do miss the effects, but I also miss the taste. I don't think I like the taste only because of the effects because, as others have said, I'd rather have a soft drink than an alcoholic drink I don't like. But I do really miss sitting down to a nice cold beer on a summer's day!

Someone mentioned upthread that alcohol has an unpleasant taste - well, different forms of alcoholic drinks taste very different. I first tasted port when I was really young, and it was sweet enough that I liked it then. Over the years I have come to enjoy the taste of beer (which I now LOVE!) and whisky, in much the same way as I have come to enjoy the taste of olives and the texture of avocado. The fact that your tastes change over the years doesn't mean you've "forced" yourself to like something.

On a different point, Herc I have been in situations where I have (as a drinker who wasn't drinking on that occasions) felt pressured to drink and I have seen people try to push others who don't drink into drinking. I probably used to do it myself, to be honest, but since spending many years with a close friend who was an alcoholic, I am now extremely careful in the way I talk about alcohol. I do have concerns about the way our society treats booze, and about the normalisation of excessive drinking, but I am also conscious that for most people it doesn't cause lasting harm, and that preaching can just create bigger problems. I know I upset friends of my alcoholic friend by trying to help get a grip on the alcoholism, because they felt it reflected badly on their own drinking habits. I continue to find it hard to express my own feelings about alcohol abuse given that I have friends who I think are probably close to the line. So I sympathise with what you say, but I'm willing to bet that you will have come over as disapproving or preachy at some point or another. I know I have.

Actually, I love the taste of malibu but hate the effects of alcohol.

I have one malibu when we go out to eat. So for me, I simply do like the taste because I get no good feelings from drinking alcohol whatsoever. If I have one with a meal I don't feel it and get to enjoy the taste. If I could find a non alcoholic malibu drink I would probably drink it like water.

Alcohol does not relax me or makes me feel good so I have not been conditioned to like the taste of malibu.

I like the effect, yes. But I have to like the taste as well.

I've spent large chunks of my adult life not drinking (due to prescription drugs & my health) and rarely have people even noticed.
I don't feel pressure to drink and as I've got older & wiser my taste has refined and I tend to drink better wines, beers & spirits which don't really support 'big alcohol' as was referenced up above. (Jack Cain gin is to die for)

I don't like chocolate much and my DS doesn't like ice cream both of which get a 'you must be crazy' comment from everybody. But the biggest reaction I get is that I really don't like Coke or fanta, j2O etc in fact most non-alcoholic alternatives in pubs as they are far too sweet. I get stuck with sparkling water or very occassionally a decent tonic water. I would say that Coke & Pepsi have the real stranglehold.
I have loads of options at home but out and about not so much.

That's how I feel too wonkylegs-there are very few good non-alcoholic drinks that are not sweet offered for sale. Even bitter lemon seems out of fashion and hard to find. So the choice is mostly have something with alcohol in it, and/or with loads of sugar in it, or have water.

Osmiornica I have tried alcohol free lager (a variety of brands including Bitberger and Becks) but they just don't taste right to me. For some reason I feel they taste more "chemical" than normal lager. I now prefer ale, albeit lighter summer-type ales, to lager in any case, so maybe that's partly why.

I don't think you're right actually. Having one glass of wine in the evening is not like having a pill or a line which rockets a complete change of personality.

Oh and I like the taste of wine. Water is too boring and grape juice too sugary.

I do think that for most people alcohol is an acquired taste, hence teens usually start on sweeter, lighter drinks, and people work their way up to things like strong real ales over time (if they ever do! yuck).

Oh yes, alcohol is definitely an acquired taste. On my first teenage drinking attempts I used to favour awful sweet drinks, malibu and milk (!), bacardi breezers, vodka and lots of coke. Whereas now if I hate a vodka that's been drowned out completely by the mixer.