To rant about alcohol and the way it's normalised?

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It's EVERYWHERE and it's poisonous. People normalise it..."Oh...wine o'clock already tra la la!"

And all that shite.

It's responsible for thousands of deaths and injuries and trauma every year and yet it's the first thing people think of when they want to celebrate something.

Get this

3 May 2017: New figures released today show that hospital admissions due to alcohol are at their highest ever levels.

The data, summarised in a release from NHS Digital, shows that alcohol-related hospital admissions in England have increased by 64% over the last decade, with an extra 430,000 people being admitted due to alcohol-related causes in 2015/16 compared with 2005/06.

This takes the total number of alcohol-related hospital admissions to over 1.1 million in 2015/16.

And this

Alcohol is linked to over 60 illnesses and diseases, including heart disease, liver disease and cancer. Figures from the local alcohol profiles for England show that admissions due to liver disease have gone up 57% over the last decade, and that the number of people diagnosed with alcohol-related cancer has increased 8%.

How is this a lovely drink? How is this something that is ok to do in front of children and even to allow children to partake of?

People on MN often say "Oh I let my 12 year old have half a glass of wine...it's a good way to introduce it!"

WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO!?

And new research points to the fact that it causes irreversable damage to stem cells, scrambling DNA and eventually causing cancers.

www.theguardian.com/science/2018/jan/03/alcohol-can-cause-irreversible-genetic-damage-to-stem-cells-says-study?CMP=fb_gu

Think about it. Society is not doing itself any favours.

This page has some quite good information. 57% of adults reported drinking in the last week, and 15% 'binged' (which is defined as more than 8 units for men, 6 for women). And 'binged' is not the same as 'throwing up on the street and getting into fights', which is a much smaller sub-section.

The medical parlance of a binge is
a martini before dinner,
a glass of white with the starter,
two glasses of red with the main,
a small glass of sweet with the dessert and
a digestif to round off the meal

hence why I disregard published statistics about binge drinking

That is a lot of units of alcohol though. You don’t have to be swigging White Lightning on a bench to be a binge drinker! What you describe is middle class binge drinking. Similar to my very middle class parents who will go through several bottles of wine over a beautiful dinner followed by a few g and ts.
The other type you can see in every major city on a Fri and Sat night where nearly everyone is drunk to a lesser or greater degree. Nights out in this country and meals out tend to involve heavy drinking. Unless you don’t drink in which case you’re looked at like you’re crazy and badgered to have a ‘proper’ drink.
Then there’s the ‘wine o’clockers’ who ‘just’ have a couple of —large— glasses to unwind in the evening —half a bottle—. Not healthy yet few of these people think they have a drink problem because over drinking, in the right context, is the norm.

And it’s is all about context. Drinking on your own is bad. Drinking too early - before wine o’clock? Bad. Drinking and getting into fights. Bad.
Drinking the same amount on a night out and dancing like a twat. Hilarious. Drinking the same number of units in the form of wine over a meal - fine. A few glasses of wine to unwind each evening - fine.
A binge or regular over drinking has the same effect whatever the time of day or context. In some contexts excessive drinking of alcohol is mainstream in this country.

Ta1kinPeace, the two glasses of red with the main would be enough to class a woman as on a binge.

The fact that people are shocked by how little is classed as a binge surely shows how a ‘binge’ is hardly anything to some people. Does that not show in itself that excessive alcohol intake is normalised in our society?

It’s exactly the same way obesity has been normalised and mothers are in the Daily Mail with a cats bum face saying how dare the school say their little darling is overweight when they just look like a regular 6 yr old. Well yes they do but a lot of 6 yr olds are overweight and some are obese!

Or it could be that certain groups set the bar artificially low so they can make news out of 'binge Britain'.

I want to apllaud this post and say I totally hear you.
I've lost my mum to alcohol, my dads had a transplant (liver) they aren't traditional alcoholics.

I'm a nurse. My dissertation was done on admissions, bed days and alcohol screening. Other European countries do so much better at this than us.

I work on a hepatology ward, not many of my patients are 'traditional' stereotype alcoholics. They are the ones where it's snuck up on them, they realise when the have cirrhosis, alcohol related dementia, hepatitis.

I'm involved in educating our hospital teams, by looking at research, doing research, reading journals such as drink and drug news.

The cheapness of alcohol and the glamorisation such as gin o clock. Really doesn't help my cause.

The campaigning for smoking has worked well, not so much for alcohol.

Sorry, I've rambled a bit but what I wanted to really say it I totally agree with you!

I also tend to agree, but I do drink and also enjoy getting pissed occasionally. A lot of things are cancer-causing so I’ll take my chances with the booze for now!! I’m not a ‘glass a night’ person - I don’t tend to drink in the week as I get up too early for a start!!

There's no drinking a bottle of vodka at home before going out, brawling & puking on the streets

that isn't how the majority drink here, and French young people certainly do drink plenty of vodka. The whole "oh its nothing like that in France" is not quite true at all.

JustDance, your comment about not drinking in the week is interesting. I think for anyone who is not particularly sensitive to alcohol (eg migraine sufferer), one standard size drink such as a small glass of wine or a single measure of spirit would be unlikely to have any effect the following day. I suspect that most people, if they have a drink, have several units, which would have an effect both at the time and the next day. Those units could be in the form of a large glass or 2 of wine, which would probably be about half a bottle, or a couple of gins which would probably each be doubles. You get 6 standard glasses of wine from a bottle, but IME, the norm here is to have a huge glass and have it 2/3 full.

An effect the next day from one large glass of wine?

I would feel it the next day as I rarely drink. I know people who can put 2 bottles away over a meal and seem absolutely no different though.

Yanbu. But you'll never convince those that think it's fine to have a glass of wine or beer most nights a week and will justify it until the cows come home.

But you'll never convince those that think it's fine to have a glass of wine or beer most nights a week and will justify it until the cows come home

They don't need to justify it, for two main reasons. First, they don't answer to you or anyone else, and secondly, because it IS perfectly fine to have a glass of wine most nights a week.

Anyone else think that the thread has demonstrated the cultural blindness well?

Alcohol IS Normal.
Until the 20th century everybody drank beer (children as well) because tap water was not safe, but once fermented it was.

Farm workers were allocated several pints during the day.
Navy rum was what they drank, because there was no drinking water on ships.
Gripe water was given to calm babies - it has gin in it.

Kind of proved my point there Peppa

Lots of things were normalised in the 19th century and earlier that would be considered dysfunctional and unhealthy now.

That's why we don't tend to use those eras as our yardstick for desirable modern societal behaviours and policies.

See also capital punishment, child labour, colonialism, marital law, compulsory primary education and so on

And what was the life expectancy then? Although it's entirely possible that drinking alcohol was safer than drinking contaminated water in the past. How is that relevant to people in the U.K. today who have access to a safe water supply? There are plenty of things that were normal in the past that aren't advisable today. Maybe we should shit in holes in the ground instead of using toilets as well?

Whatsthecomingoverthehill, binge drinking for women could be two glasses but only when the glasses are enormous! The standard definition of a binge for women is around half a litre of 14% wine. If you don't want your 2 glasses to be classified as a binge, it might be worth using smaller glasses.

My exh has cost the taxpayer thousands and thousands in hospital treatment because he's a drunk

I just think people don't realise the heath risks and how you don't need to consume vast amounts to make your health suffer in the long run.

It's clear to smokers of the risk of COPD, lung cancer etc.

I suppose fundamentally is the idea of addiction isn't highlighted enough. Two glasses of wine a night 7 days a week can be an addiction long before the individual realises. It's just not the park bench view of it.

Sadly a lot of older generations drink through loneliness in retirement. Younger generations when the kids go to bed. Commuters on the train home.

It's hard, I wouldn't begrudge anyone a drink, but I do think often about routine drinking. It really is akin to smoking, I wonder if it times alcohol
Will go the way smoking has- because once that was acceptable. They are all forms of drugs tho- but you can tell a chocolate addict that chocolate is a drug.

Kind of proved my point there Peppa

Kind of didn't. That was not a justification at all, it was telling you we don't need one. I hope you can tell the difference.