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 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.

But it is the same as having 'a few tokes on a spliff'' yeah? Not enough to be 'stoned' but enough to think 'ahh thats nice'

we used to drink snakebite & black which basically tastes like ribena

I occasionally like the feeling of alcohol but also love the taste. I wish it were possible to get non alcoholic wine that tasted like the real thing.

Me too.

I really like a glass of wine with dinner

It's not a judgement. if you have to drink something enough that you get used to like it or mix it with nicer things then it's not innately a nice thing. I just think it's best to be honest rather than justify it. That's all the op is saying.

box it really is still a matter of taste, you know. I have never enjoyed sweet sugary alcoholic drinks and have always liked the taste of single malt whisky (from when my parents let me have it, so 17-18 years old) and good quality wine (from about 16). I've never needed to get used to those flavours at all. If it were the case that the human palate's innate response to the taste of high quality alcoholic drinks is 'bleurgh!' then there would not be such a market for the really good stuff. Not everyone develops their palate using sickly sweet 'gateway' booze and it's patronising to assume that the majority of people here who say they like the taste of alcohol are 'justifying' something.

Of course it's a drug. I've taken a lot of drugs in my time, and I would classify alcohol the same as those, a recreational mind altering substance, rather than in the same category as coffee or chocolate. Certainly it's my favourite drug, but I'm under no illusions that it is less harmful than, for example, ecstasy or a joint. It just happens to be legal.

I am enjoying a G&T right now with a slug of fresh lime juice. Its utterly delicious :)

I've missed a couple of pages, but Herc's use of the term 'Big Alcohol' is annoying me. It's akin to those who support homeopathy end other bollocks referring to 'Big Pharma'. Makes me quite cross, actually.
People choose to drink. They do it for the taste and the effect and the vast, vast majority have no ill effects/addiction issues. Attitudes revealed by phrases like 'big alcohol' show that some people think we are all dupes and need protecting from ourselves. We don't. It's the ultimate sanctimonious bs.

If you knew as much about the lobbying etc as I do, you'd know the term is very apt. As it is with pharma and tobacco (and I hold NO truck with homeopathy and am a reluctant non smoker, certainly not a militant one). It's purely a description of financial and lobbying muscle. I haven't suggested anywhere that I think people who drink are dupes. I don't think they are dupes. Any more than I think people who take medicine are dupes. I do think that some of the practices of the large corporations involved in many areas of life are extremely questionable.

Technically I don't think you are quite correct because there are all those wine tasters who apparently spit the alcohol out.

However, I think they are few and far between.

If you are drinking alcohol you are consuming a drug. Of course all forms of food and drink contain some kind of drug. However, until having a second bar of chocolate puts you over the driving limit, chocolate and alcohol aren't really comparable.